Ely Sussman

During Sunday's State of the Fish call-in show, Ely Sussman shares his theory regarding why the Marlins traded Luis Arraez so early in the season and for a relatively light return. View full video

Marlins news roundup for 5/6/24 On Sunday, Sixto Sánchez had his best start of the season so far, but that isn't saying much (4.0 IP, 3 H, 2 ER, 3 BB, 2 K, 65 pitches/38 strikes). Nick Gordon doubled his wRC+ in a single afternoon, from 39 to 76. Right-hander Eli Villalobos pitched a scoreless ninth inning in his major league debut. The Marlins won, 12-3. Down on the farm, Triple-A Jacksonville lost, 5-2. OF Victor Mesa Jr. went 1-for-2 with two walks and a stolen base. Double-A Pensacola won, 9-1. RHP Paul Campbell (6.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 K, 70 pitches/49 strikes) lowered his ERA to 1.88 and RHP Zach McCambley made his return from the injured list. High-A Beloit won, 3-2. 1B Torin Montgomery had the walk-off RBI single. Low-A Jupiter won, 4-0. Jesús Luzardo (5.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 6 K, 67 pitches/46 pitches) was predictably very effective against such young competition. He could be back in the Marlins rotation this coming weekend, if not the week of May 13 at the latest. Here's more Marlins news and content for you: 🔷 Jake Burger (left intercostal muscle strain) will be reinstated from the IL today. The Marlins went 7-13 without him on the roster. Optioning Otto Lopez seems to be the most likely corresponding move. Other moves to consider are optioning Jonah Bride or designating Emmanuel Rivera for assignment (can't be slugging .233 as a corner infielder). 🔷 Listen back to Sunday's State of the Fish call-in show. Understandably, much of the conversation focused on the Luis Arraez trade. I have come to the conclusion that the Marlins lacked faith in Arraez recapturing his 2023 form or even playing up to his career norms, trading him now in fear that his value would've dipped even lower come July. We'll just have to wait and see how that stance ages. A demoralizing decision, regardless. 🔷 Through 11 Marlins series, @PHeyser08 (aka Baby Seal) has moved into a tie for the Prediction Time lead. Make series predictions with us all season long when you become a Fish On First SuperSub. 🔷 RHP Noble Meyer enjoyed his best start of the season on Saturday, striking out more than half of the batters he faced and retiring 14 of 17 overall. “If I could keep what I did tonight the rest of the season, that'd be perfect," he told MLB Pipeline. 🔷 With the anniversary of Al Leiter's no-hitter approaching this weekend, Fish on the Farm's Alex Carver is giving away an unripped ticket stub signed by Leiter himself. 🔷 Join us for a new episode of Fish On First LIVE tonight from 9:00-10:00 p.m. ET on YouTube/Twitter/Facebook. FOF LIVE is presented by Berger & Hicks. If you’ve been injured as a result of somebody else’s negligence, give them a call at (305) 670-7050. 🔷 Elsewhere around baseball, unfortunately for the Fish, Shohei Ohtani is at the peak of his powers at the plate. After blasting two more homers on Sunday, he is leading the sport in numerous offensive categories, including hits and wRC+. The Red Sox snapped the Twins' 12-game winning streak. The best record in the majors now belongs to the Phillies (24-11). 🔷 Today's MLB game: the Marlins (probable starter RHP Roddery Muñoz) visit the Dodgers (RHP Walker Buehler). It will be Buehler's first major league appearance in nearly two years. The Marlins have a 33.7% chance to win, per FanGraphs. First pitch at 10:10 p.m. ET. 🔷 Today's MiLB schedule: FCL Marlins vs. FCL Marlins, 12:00 p.m. ET (Braxton Garrett rehab start) Marlins podcast episodes View full article

Called up prior to Sunday's game, Marlins right-hander Eli Villalobos describes pitching the ninth inning against the Oakland Athletics in his major league debut and finishing off the victory with a strikeout. View full video

Player status updates, insightful stats and more information to fully equip you for today's Marlins game. Here are the latest Miami Marlins game notes, produced by the Marlins communications department and relayed to our loyal SuperSubs. Got thoughts about this matchup? Head over to Fish On First's Marlins game thread. View full article

Welcome to FOF's 36th Miami Marlins game thread of the 2024 season. The Marlins are in danger of being swept in a series for the fourth time already. SuperSubs can access exclusive game notes here. Pregame roster moves: RHP Eli Villalobos selected from Triple-A Jacksonville; RHP Darren McCaughan designated for assignment. Louis Addeo-Weiss will be writing the game recap.

That is a perfectly defensible stance. I would hate to see it as somebody who believes these teams should have a moral obligation to put forth a mildly entertaining product even in seasons when competitiveness is unrealistic. But yes, in the pursuit of eventually arriving at a place where the Marlins are consistently good, you optimize your chances of that by acquiring as much young, inexpensive talent as possible, beginning now.

Sherman is dooming the team with his complacency. He is, from everything I've seen, a nice man who enjoys baseball, but he's comfortable collecting revenue-sharing checks and doesn't have the ambition to make this franchise greater than it was when he arrived. Especially in the aftermath of these trades, I get complaints from fans who want Sherman's feet held to the fire by the media, as if that would fix this. No, unfortunately that will not change his priorities.

Arraez made the best possible first impression on his new team, recording hits in four straight at-bats on Saturday to begin his Padres tenure. Hours after consummating a blockbuster trade with each other on Saturday morning, the Miami Marlins and San Diego Padres were involved in the day's two most lopsided MLB games. In Oakland, the Marlins surrendered 20 runs to a typically feeble Athletics lineup, outclassed so thoroughly that they used a position player to pitch the final frame. In Arizona, Luis Arraez enjoyed an unprecedented Padres debut during a wire-to-wire 13-1 victory. It is unusual for a player to be traded and inserted into his new club's starting lineup on the same day—most need a day in between to get fully acclimated to their surroundings. Nobody was as disappointed by Arraez's eagerness to play as Diamondbacks right-hander Brandon Pfaadt. Top of the first inning, on the second pitch he saw as a Padre, Arraez ripped an inside fastball into the right-field corner for a standup double (he scored later in the inning). In the third, he served a fastball above the strike zone to left field for a single. In the fourth, he stepped to the plate with runners on the corners and two outs. In classic Arraez fashion, he stayed back on a changeup tailing away from him and gently lined it to left for a run-scoring single. Then in the seventh, Pfaadt was ahead in the count, 1-2. He tried getting Arraez to swing underneath a fastball at the letters. It resulted in a bloop single. ff5b18f1-60f00cff-c36dddd1-csvm-diamondx64-asset_1280x720_59_4000K.mp4 With the game virtually decided already, Diamondbacks relievers had success against Arraez, inducing a lineout to center in the seventh and a groundout to shortstop in the ninth. He still finished the night 4-for-6, raising his batting average to .315, which ranks eighth among National League qualifiers. He also became the first player ever to record four hits in his Padres debut. None of the minor leaguers that the Marlins acquired in exchange for Arraez have been activated yet. Expect OF Dillon Head (Low-A Jupiter), OF Jakob Marsee (Double-A Pensacola) and 1B Nathan Martorella (Pensacola) to make their organizational debuts on Tuesday. View full article

Listen to what the Marlins president of baseball operations said about Arraez and the prospects his team received in return during a virtual press conference. In the aftermath of Saturday's Luis Arraez trade, Miami Marlins POBO Peter Bendix took questions from local and national media. SuperSubs can find a complete audio recording of the 18-minute press conference embedded below. View full article

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Player status updates, insightful stats and more information to fully equip you for today's Marlins game. Here are the latest Miami Marlins game notes, produced by the Marlins communications department and relayed to our loyal SuperSubs. Got thoughts about this matchup? Head over to Fish On First's Marlins game thread. View full article

Welcome to FOF's 35th Miami Marlins game thread of the 2024 season. First one since Luis Arraez was officially traded to the San Diego Padres. At least against right-handed pitching, Jazz Chisholm Jr. is the team's new leadoff hitter. SuperSubs can access exclusive game notes here. Pregame roster moves: INF Jonah Bride recalled from Triple-A Jacksonville. Nate Karzmer will be writing the game recap.

Bruján has recently thrived at the plate in a part-time role. Now, there is room for him to play regularly. The sudden departure of Luis Arraez stings. He is such a unique player, not to mention the heart and soul of the Miami Marlins. During his first six months on the job, president of baseball operations Peter Bendix refused to say the quiet part out loud about the franchise's trajectory. But actions speak louder than words: the Marlins are punting on the present to accumulate long-term assets. It is unlikely that any of the Marlins' internal options can serve as a satisfactory replacement for Arraez. That's why they play the games, though. When Vidal Bruján has gotten opportunities this season, his production has been eerily Arraez-esque: Luis Arraez's MLB career: 123 wRC+, 7.5 K%, 27.3 HardHit% Vidal Bruján's 2024 season: 128 wRC+, 7.5 K%, 25.6 HardHit% Fittingly, in the immediate aftermath of the Arraez trade news, Bruján accounted for three of Miami's seven hits against the Oakland Athletics on Friday and drove in the club's lone run. 99f58e13-4af364b3-7bc6e876-csvm-diamondx64-asset_1280x720_59_4000K.mp4 One of Bendix's first maneuvers as Marlins POBO was to buy low on Bruján, a former MLB Top 100 prospect whose offensive futility and inconsistent defense from 2021-2023 left him without a role in Tampa Bay moving forward. Per FanGraphs, he had contributed at least half a win below replacement level during each of those three seasons and exhausted his minor league options in the process. The first few weeks of Bruján's campaign looked like a continuation of his Rays tenure. He went hitless through 14 Marlins games (only played in eight of them). He was the last man on Skip Schumaker's bench, seemingly with nothing to offer aside from positional versatility and decent wheels on the bases. Once fellow speedy switch-hitter Xavier Edwards recovered from his foot infection, Bruján was destined to be designated for assignment...right? Well, narratives change rapidly in small sample sizes. Bruján has been on fire since April 26. That has taken him from liability to bright spot. As was the case during his previous MLB stints, Bruján is devoid of power with only one barreled ball so far in 2024, per Baseball Savant. To make himself a valuable hitter, he needs to constantly put the ball in play and avoid strikeouts. Bruján is doing that by ambushing pitchers early in the count, seeing only 3.32 pitches per plate appearance (the MLB average is 3.90). His swing decisions have also improved, offering at a career-high 79.4% of in-zone pitches and dropping his chase rate to a career-low 30.4%. That is crucial because it's not like he has magically acquired Arraez's contact skills—he is still whiffing on one of every five swings. Bruján's approach is quite different from Arraez's. Bruján is swinging at 54.9% of first-pitch strikes, nearly doubled the league average; throughout his career, Arraez has been passive on the first pitch, including a 20.9% swing rate this season. It's not yet clear what Bruján will be as a baserunner. This past offseason, he led the Dominican Winter League with 23 stolen bases, but he just picked up his first pair of Marlins steals on Friday. His 27.1 ft/sec Sprint Speed is barely above Arraez's (26.5 ft/sec) and way down from where Bruján used to be (28.8 ft/sec in 2021 and 28.5 ft/sec in 2022). Bizarre, troubling trend for a 26-year-old. Overall, there is a 50-point gap between Bruján's actual weighted on-base average (.352 wOBA) and his expected mark based on batted ball data (.302 xwOBA). Regression is inevitable. Arraez is an absurd comp for Bruján, in case that was not obvious already. Back in November, I likened Bruján to longtime utilityman Leury García instead and stand by that. He's somebody who you can feel okay with giving stretches of consistent playing time to when necessary, but ideally, he'll back up superior players. Even with infielder Jake Burger nearing his return from the injured list, this is the Bruján's window to legitimize himself. Ample playing time should be available at second base and third base (on days when Burger is at 1B/DH). His emergence as a viable major leaguer would ever-so-slightly soften the blow of losing Arraez. View full article

I would say it's a C+. Okay. You can feel confident that there will be some major league production coming from this package no matter what. It's just the upside is limited because of Dillon Head's non-existent power and Nathan Martorella being limited to 1B/DH moving forward.

Minutes before first pitch of Friday's game, the Marlins agreed to ship the reigning NL batting champ to San Diego. The latest Miami Marlins rebuild is now officially underway. All-Star Luis Arraez was traded to the San Diego Padres on Saturday morning for OF Dillon Head, RHP Woo-Suk Go, OF Jakob Marsee and 1B Nathan Martorella. The Marlins also included nearly $8M in the deal, leaving the Padres responsible for only a pro-rated portion of the major league minimum salary for the rest of the season. Arraez concludes his Marlins tenure with a .343/.384/.450 slash line (127 wRC+). The 2023 National League All-Star and batting champion contributed 3.5 fWAR in 180 games played. A full-time second baseman in Miami, Arraez figures to get most of his reps for the Padres in the DH spot (that's where they utilized him on Saturday night in his Padres debut). Arraez was initially in Friday's Marlins lineup, occupying his usual leadoff spot. He was scratched shortly before the game began and watched the first several innings from the dugout, hugging his soon-to-be former teammates. Following the 2023 season, Aram Leighton of Just Baseball ranked Head (sixth), Marsee (10th) and Martorella (13th) among the top prospects in San Diego's farm system. None of the trio require 40-man roster spots yet. The 19-year-old Head has been playing center field regularly at Low-A, posting an 85 wRC+ in 21 games this season. Marsee, 23, is also a center fielder. He has a 96 wRC+ with 12 stolen bases already in 22 games at Double-A. Martorella has been very productive at the plate so far in 2024, entering Friday with a 132 wRC+ in 23 Double-A contests. He's also 23 years old. Go, a 25-year-old reliever from South Korea with no MLB experience yet, is under contract through 2025 with a $3M mutual option for 2026. He had been assigned to the Padres' Double-A affiliate (4.38 ERA and 2.15 FIP in 12.1 IP) and will slide into Arraez's 40-man spot. b3ab66cf-59fc-4dd1-a040-a803d7749661.mp4 Rosenthal and The Athletic's Dennis Lin had previously reported that the Marlins and Padres engaged in Arraez trade talks prior to Opening Day. It's unclear if any of the prospects in the final deal were also part of the "strong offer" that was on the table during spring training. Arraez wanted to sign a long-term extension with the Marlins. He was direct about that. However, there's no evidence that the club had a genuine willingness to pay what it would require to come to terms with the 27-year-old infielder. Even including a recent three-game winning streak, the Marlins have had an awful 9-24 start to the season that made it clear they wouldn't be competing for another playoff berth. As one of the Marlins' most expensive players ($10.6M salary in 2024) and someone who was rapidly approaching free agency after the 2025 season, Arraez was an obvious trade chip. In his public comments on Saturday, president of baseball operations Peter Bendix was adamant that there was no urgency to part with him. Rather, the timing came down to being offered a prospect package that was "too good of a deal to pass up." There is now a void at second base—Arraez had started each of Miami's first 33 games at the position. Otto Lopez filled his shoes on Friday. Once Jake Burger returns from the injured list in the coming days and begins serving as the primary Marlins third baseman again, expect Vidal Bruján to play second frequently. View full article

Welcome to FOF's 34th Miami Marlins game thread of the 2024 season. Late night with the Fish for the first time this year. Hot-hitting Dane Myers will make his first major league start in the cleanup spot. SuperSubs can access exclusive game notes here. Pregame roster moves: RHP Darren McCaughan recalled from Triple-A Jacksonville; RHP Bryan Hoeing (left hamstring strain) placed on the 15-day injured list retroactive to May 2. Kevin Barral will be writing the game recap.