Fish drop middle game in Atlanta, fall to one over .500

[Louis Addeo-Weiss]

Each loss for the 2026 Miami Marlins is a dagger in their playoff aspirations, with Wednesday being no exception. Following their 4-1 loss to the division rival Atlanta Braves, Miami's season record now sits at 58-57, 2.5 games out of a wild-card spot in the Senior Circuit, a tough cross to bear following a trade deadline that saw the departures of Liam Hicks and Lake Bachar. With this defeat, the Marlins now own a lifetime 23-57 (.288) record since Truist Park's opening in 2017. Only the Pittsburgh Pirates own a worse winning percentage in that span (.258).

Making his 20th start of the season—matching a career-high set last season—Eury Pérez ran into trouble in the second, throwing 34 pitches and allowing a trio of runs. Atlanta would tag on a fourth run in the following inning courtesy of a Mauricio Dubón single.

Gutting through an otherwise mediocre outing, Pérez struck out nine in his five innings of work, falling to 5-9 on the year.

Reflecting on Pérez's outing postgame, manager Clayton McCullough took the glass half-full approach. "If his clunkers look like this, we'll be very encouraged with it," noted McCullough.

"There's a lot I can feel proud of. The ground balls I was able to induce and the fact that I was able to make it through five innings. It's a growing process...", said Pérez through interpreter Luis Durante.

 

Looking under the hood, Pérez had more than the five innings of work to be proud of, as he induced 18 swings-and-misses, aided in part by a near-unanimous bump in pitch velocities. While his start ERA of 7.20 would lead one to call his outing less than savory, the underlying metrics tell a completely different story, as evidenced by minuscule 0.70 and 1.92 FIP and xFIP.

Miami's lone run came via Joe Mack on a fifth inning ground out that plated Owen Caissie . Now with 34 RBI since arriving in the big leagues, Mack's total ranks third best amongst Marlins rookie catchers who started a minimum of 60 percent of their games behind the plate, trailing only 1995 Charles Johnson (39) and 2015 J.T. Realmuto (47). Through the series' first two games, Miami has gone 2-for-11 with runners in scoring position.

Bryce Elder, making his 12th career start against Miami, shut them down to the tune of 7 innings of 1-run, 1-hit ball, lowering his career ERA to 3.31 opposing the Marlins.

 

As they did in Tuesday's loss, the Marlins had late-inning comeback attempts thwarted by the Atlanta bullpen. After collecting a pair of hits against the conservative hit surrenderer Dylan Dodd, Miami would ultimately see this one end on an Otto Lopez first-pitch ground out to Austin Riley. Thanks to an 0-for-4 evening, Lopez's season batting average fell to .320, putting him .005 points behind former Marlin and three-time batting champion Luis Arraez in the NL batting title race. 

 

Looking Ahead

Miami will conclude their trip to Atlanta on Thursday in a rare game three nightcap. Janson Junk (5-6, 4.58 ERA) will square off against veteran left-hander Martín Pérez (7-6, 3.24 ERA). 

First pitch from Truist Park is slated for 7:15 pm EST.

 

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[THOMAS JOSEPH]

The back of Dodd's uniform looks like it says, ,"OOOO."

Boring, somnambulant game. Totally forgettable. It happens.

My boredom is increasing daily. 

Perhaps the coming year off is best for everyone. 

[1993 fan from start]

Agustín or Sanoja  was not going to save marlins in 8th.  even if Sanoja  got on second . Not to many people hitting behind him..   

did  LG Twins fix Austin Dean 

AVG .334 HR 31 RBI 94 OPS 1.067 G 101 ? maybe that should be Marlins  first pickup during offseason .  

career AVG .319 HR 117 RBI 417 OPS 970 G 496 2b 107 3b 11 

[One Regend]

I consider Atlanta the litmus test of how the Marlins team stacks up in the playoff picture. The Marlins have failed that test.

This was a winnable series. The Braves are mortal right now. Their hitting isn't clicking, and they are sending some bad pitchers against us. Bryce Elder is throwing 88 mph meatballs while having concerning underlying metrics, and while Grant Holmes is slightly better, his FIP and his underlying metrics also suggest otherwise. These were two pitchers the Marlins needed to beat up.

...And all they did was score 3 runs in 2 games. That's not going to cut it at the playoff level. Maybe they were validated in selling off the way they did. Having Hicks would not have made the difference here.