How Andrew Nardi worked his way back to making Marlins Opening Day roster

MIAMI, FL — At one point, Andrew Nardi "did not see the light at the end of the tunnel." Lower back inflammation took away not only his entire 2025 season, but prevented him from doing "normal life stuff" without experiencing pain. But after an impressive showing in spring training, the left-handed reliever will find himself back on the Miami Marlins 26-man active roster for Opening Day.

"Seeing last year the difficulty he went through, did everything he could to try to get back, and there were times when it was just hard to pinpoint what was going on," said manager Clayton McCullough. "(Physical therapist) Mike Chamberlain deserves a lot of credit as well. Him and Nardi kept trying to find a way to figure this thing out. I think our excitement grew as spring training begun because he started to hit some markers that he hadn't hit. He was able to throw more regularly."

The 2025 season, which saw the Marlins win 79 games and remain in the National League Wild Card race up until the very end, was a very tough one for Nardi. He had to watch it all unfold from the dugout. There were low points when he couldn't even put his socks on. Early in the 2025-26 offseason, the Marlins had enough doubts about his recovery that they reportedly considered non-tendering him.

"I was struggling, but I stayed positive as much as possible and kept grinding through it," Nardi told Fish On First. "Thankfully, took a turn."

It wasn't until the 27-year-old started doing pilates that he noticed a change. Then, one of his buddies recommended posture restoration, which is a specialized physical therapy approach that identifies and corrects common, asymmetrical postural patterns caused by habit, muscle imbalance, and uneven neurological function.

"From the first one, I just felt decompression in my spine for the first time in almost a year," Nardi said. "That definitely got the ball rolling and eventually, got my body to just trust the process and trust itself more." Part of maintaining his physical health is doing posture exercises three times a day.

Nardi still entered 2026 with some ongoing discomfort. It wasn't until early February that he started to feel better, then his timeline was pushed back again due to a blood blister on his left hand. The first couple pitch design and live batting practice sessions hadn't lived up to what he expected, with his fastball velocity sitting in the high 80s, but in his first Grapefruit League outing on March 10, he struck out the side, averaging 93.8 mph and topping out at 94.6 mph.

"It was the first time in a while where I had some jitters going, so I was definitely super excited," Nardi said.

Nardi would finish spring training tossing 5 ⅓ shutout innings, allowing just one hit, which came in his second outing. He struck out nine total against three walks, and he only surrendered a hard-hit rate of 28.6%. It came down to the final days of camp, but on Sunday, right before the final spring game, the Marlins announced that they optioned Cade Gibson (the other lefty competing for a spot) to Triple-A and reassigned Tyler Zuber to minor league camp.

 

Nardi's goal this upcoming season is to "go back to my 2023 self," which consisted of a 2.67 ERA, 3.60 FIP, 11.46 K/9 and 3.30 BB/9 in 57 ⅓ innings pitched. He was especially successful when coming into games with inherited runners that season, but struggled with that in 2024.

"We will try to be judicious with these back-to-backs early on in the season," McCullough said regarding the bullpen in general. "We'll see how (Nardi) feels after. It's going to be different the first time he gets into a major league game again and expend some of that energy. Andrew is a healthy pitcher that we'll have to go post, but also, like him and the others, will always read and react with what information they're telling us, how they're recovering to then help guide us to availability."

Along with John King, Nardi will be one of two left-handed pitchers in Miami's bullpen for the time being. Last season, Marlins lefty relievers combined for only 107 innings pitched, the fifth-lowest total in the majors.

"Having a couple of them, some battle-tested, high quality left-handed pitchers to go in and help us get out of a particular jam against a left handed hitter or a particular part of the lineup that it's more advantageous to have them? Sure, I think that's great," McCullough said. "But it's just as important—or more—that they're just two really good pitchers that give our bullpen a lot of depth and flexibility."

The Marlins will have two more workout days at loanDepot park before their highly anticipated Opening Day matchup against the Colorado Rockies on Friday at 7:10 p.m.