Marlins cough up late lead after strong Edward Cabrera start

[Alex Krutchik]

The Marlins were five outs away from getting above .500. Unfortunately, the bullpen couldn't hold the lead.

MIAMI—Sometimes it’s not your day.

With the Miami Marlins protecting a 4-2 lead against the Washington Nationals in the eighth inning, Anthony Bender came in relief with two runners on and nobody out.

The sure-handed reliever hadn’t given up a hit, much less an earned run, in his first five appearances this year. He also erased all three inherited runners he had to deal with up to this point.

While Bender got former Marlin Josh Bell to fly out for the first out, he walked the next batter he faced, Alex Call, to load the bases. He then battled with pinch-hitter Nathaniel Lowe for 10 pitches, including six foul balls, before Lowe smacked a three-run double down the left field line.

It was Bender’s first blemish all year, and it gave Washington a 5-4 lead that they wouldn’t squander for the rest of the game. 

“He's been so good,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said. “He just kept making pitches. Once the at-bat gets going that deep, sometimes the advantage can shift to the hitter. It was a good battle, unfortunately we came up on the wrong side of it.”

The blown lead came on the heels of a solid performance by starting pitcher Edward Cabrera.

Making his first start of the year after developing a blister injury in spring training, the Dominican right-hander cut through the Washington Nationals lineup with relative ease.

Cabrera still showed glimpses of his control issues, walking three in 5 ⅔ innings and throwing 59 percent of his 79 pitches for strikes. But he danced around the danger and allowed just four hits and two runs—those runs came on a home run to Josh Bell in his final inning of work.

Cabrera’s stuff looked even better than usual, and that's saying something. He averaged 97.9 miles per hour on his four-seam fastball, up 1.6 mph from last year. He registered one four-seamer at 99.5 mph, which was the second-fastest recorded in his career. The soon-to-be 27-year-old also averaged an extra six inches of vertical break on his curveball compared to 2024.

On the other side, Nationals starting pitcher Mitchell Parker was also breezing through his outing until the fifth inning. Parker pitched four shutout innings and allowed two hits and a walk.

The Marlins finally cracked the second-year pitcher in the fifth. They followed the formula that carried them to an unexpected .500 record through 12 games: play small ball and attack the mistake pitches.

Liam Hicks led off the inning by getting hit by a pitch. Javier Sanoja bunted for a hit, and Graham Pauley reached base when Parker threw off target on a sacrifice bunt attempt.

Bases were loaded when the lineup flipped to Xavier Edwards with zero out. And that’s when he attacked. Parker left a four-seamer over the middle of the plate, and Edwards sent it back up the middle to drive home two runs and give Miami a 2-0 lead.

Kyle Stowers then drove home two runners with a double down the right field line. 

Alas, that was the only inning the Marlins could get numbers on the board. 

“We did a lot of good things in that inning to build, have a cushion, and create other opportunities,” McCullough said. “We'll just continue to preach to these guys to just try to string at-bats together, mount innings, create innings. And we believe that the more opportunities that we give ourselves, we will cash in more often than not.”

Dating back to the start of last season, the Marlins have lost 12 of their last 14 matchups against the Nats. They'll send Sandy Alcantara to the mound on Saturday to buck that trend.

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