Marlins defeated by Garrett Mitchell's great catches, walk-off

The second half of the season for the Miami Marlins got underway on Friday night in Milwaukee, facing a Brewers team that sits atop the National League Central. Game one of the series had a playoff feel to it, with the game tied at 1-1 going into extra innings, but it would be Garrett Mitchell and the Brewers who came out on top, winning their 60th game of the season, defeating the Marlins, 2-1.

Mitchell not only won the game with a base hit up the middle off Lake Bachar, but he robbed both Heriberto Hernández and Joe Mack of potential go-ahead hits in the ninth and 10th innings, respectively.

"It's a real recipe for winning a lot of games," said Marlins manager Clayton McCullough. "They didn't walk anyone tonight and you make some really nice plays to save some runs, then in close games like this, it makes a difference. I think we've seen that on our end as well. The margins are very small to win a major league game, especially on the road. Tonight, it was really close the whole way through and they came through with a two-out hit there, which was the difference."

Griffin Conine gave the Marlins a 1-0 lead in the top of the fifth inning when he took starter Logan Henderson 398 feet deep to right-center field. He's been limited to 31 games this season due to injury, but Conine leads the team in wRC+ (147) and slugging percentage (.543).

Despite his success, the Marlins replaced Conine with pinch-hitter Leo Jiménez in the top of the seventh to get the platoon advantage against Brewers left-handed reliever Aaron Ashby. Jiménez popped out.

"I felt like with a runner on base and less than two outs to take a shot there with Leo to extend the inning and try to give ourselves what was at the time the best opportunity to score a run," McCullough said. "Maybe you don't see some of those guys in the back end of the games. Certainly weighing that moment, and then what potentially could be a few innings later."

Sandy Alcantara did his part to give the Marlins an opportunity to win. In six innings of work, he allowed one run on three hits (one home run), walked four and struck out seven. In the bottom of the fifth inning, Joey Ortiz took Alcantara deep for a solo homer, but there was very little hard contact outside of that.

The teams combined to go 0-for-17 with runners in scoring position until Mitchell's walk-off hit.

Dating back to before the All-Star break, the Marlins are now losers of four straight games, dropping them to 52-46 on the season. With the St. Louis Cardinals defeating to the Arizona Diamondbacks, St. Louis has taken over the third National League Wild Card spot.

Working on 10 days of rest, Max Meyer takes the mound on Saturday for a 4:10 pm first pitch.