Isaac Azout

Former Marlins ace speaks on Toronto trade, Eury Pérez, and much more.From 2009-2011, Josh Johnson was one of, if not the best pitcher in baseball. A decade removed from his final MLB appearance, the two-time All-Star returned to loanDepot Park for the latest Flashback Friday Marlins alumni celebration. Johnson, Justin Bour, and Gaby Sanchez threw out the ceremonial first pitches before Miami’s devastating 4-3 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies. After the media scrum, Josh sat down with me for a few minutes and allowed me to discuss a myriad of topics. Here’s that conversation. Fish On First: I’m here with former Marlins ace Josh Johnson. Thanks so much for taking the time. First off, how’s retirement been? What have you been up to? Josh Johnson: It’s been great. Coaching, coaching, and more coaching. Working with different age levels of kids, was doing lessons for a while, but now I’m actually coaching teams, and I’m teaching them the right ways to play baseball. FOF: We spoke briefly before the interview about some of the rule changes. You’re a big fan of the pitch clock? JJ: I would have loved it, that’s all I know. As soon as I heard it, I figured the hitters would have the toughest time with it, not all hitters. There were only a few pitchers that I remember who really took their time. As far as hitters, they like to fix the batting gloves, all that kind of stuff, and now they have to get ready right away, but I think the league has adjusted well. FOF: You actually threw the first pitch ever in this stadium as you were part of the team that broke in Marlins Park. What was your favorite memory from that tumultuous 2012 season? JJ: Ooh. I like just how I battled, honestly. That was a rough year with different things. The way my body felt wasn’t great basically all year. And then I get to the end of the year with 191 innings, I had a chance to get 200. The hamstring is tight, the shoulder is tight, seemed like everything wasn’t in the cards to throw 200 innings, you know. The way I actually battled through that season was actually one of my proudest moments as a big leaguer. FOF: Like most very tall pitchers, you struggled with command early on in your career. What’s it like to see someone like Eury Perez come up and attack the strike zone like he has at 6’8" and 20 years old? JJ: It’s, honestly it’s a little mind-blowing really to watch him. I started watching him the last couple weeks, just to get a feel for who’s pitching, just to see what I’ve been hearing about and the things that have been said about him, and he’s the real deal. Whenever you can control the ball like that and have four pitches and be as good as he has been, he’ll be in this game for a long time. FOF: Your reaction to that infamous Toronto trade in November of 2012? JJ: Honestly, we were all a little bummed. We thought we were gonna get one more season. We thought we were really close to being a playoff contender in '13. Everyone in that clubhouse thought it. Once José Reyes got comfortable playing out of New York, we were all really excited. I actually talked to Mike Redmond maybe a day or two before the trade, and we spoke about how big that season was going to be. Spoke to Buehrle, John Buck. Another year of working with Buehrle and talking to Buehrle and learning from him was really looking forward to it in Miami. We really had a fun and great team that loved being around each other, and I thought we were close to making a serious run. FOF: You’re on the other side of history when you faced Roy Halladay. Perfect game, obviously. I was there, you pitched very well. What was that day like? JJ: It’s awesome, honestly. It’s funny because the first thing that comes to mind is that when 12-year-olds go to Cooperstown for baseball, I get to say I have something in the Hall of Fame. I am a lifetime Hall of Fame member, not for something I did—well, actually, for one thing, I did, which was throwing the first pitch in the stadium—but I have two things in there, and one of them was having my jersey taken for Halladay’s perfect game. FOF: Amazing. Thanks so much for the time, JJ. JJ: It was a pleasure. JJ goes down as one of the franchise’s best starting pitchers of all time. He ranks first in team history in pitching WAR, ERA, Adjusted ERA +, and WPA. He also struck out future Marlin CEO Derek Jeter in the 2010 All-Star Game. https://streamable.com/l/texalm/mp4.mp4One of my personal favorites as a child, it was an honor to speak with JJ.

Kevin Barral and Isaac Azout are joined by Miami Marlins shortstop Joey Wendle. Topics covered on Episode 44 of Fish Unfiltered include: The Marlins' recent series against the St. Louis Cardinals and Atlanta Braves Every step of Wendle's professional baseball journey Playing for small-market teamsWhy the Marlins have improved so much from 2022 to 2023Why he doesn't use batting glovesHis clutch home run against the Marlins in 2021 Subscribe to the Fish On First YouTube channel to watch video versions of every Fish Unfiltered episode. In his age-33 season, Wendle is slashing .271/.309/.381 (89 wRC+) through 53 games played. He has already started 40 games at shortstop, nearly doubling his previous high for a single season. Wendle was also with the Marlins in 2022 when they disappointed to the tune of a 69-93 record. Here's how he explains what's made the difference in 2023: Follow Kevin (@kevin_barral), Isaac (@IsaacAzout) and Fish On First (@FishOnFirst) on Twitter. Complete Miami Marlins coverage here at FishOnFirst.com. Our Fish On First podcast programming includes The Offishial Show, Fish Unfiltered, Fishology, State of the Fish and What a Relief. All new episodes are posted to FishOnFirst.com/podcasts. You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Podbean, Megaphone or wherever you normally get your pods from.

After getting swept quite convincingly in Atlanta over the weekend, the Marlins came back to Miami on Monday to take on the St. Louis Cardinals. Manager Skip Schumaker was excited to manage against the organization that he called home for so many years. "I mean, almost everything I know, I learned from the St. Louis Cardinals in some capacity—as a coach or player, even in the front office. A very special time over there and I saw a lot of good buddies over there already today." Skip spent eight seasons with the Cardinals as a player and was hired as their bench coach for the 2022 season. In his first game managing against his old team, he provided the magic managerial move that helped Miami steal one from St. Louis. Miami's offense started off hot on Monday against Cards starter Miles Mikolas. After a couple of hits by fellow All-Stars Luis Arraez and Jorge Soler, outfielders Bryan De La Cruz and Jesús Sánchez drove them in with a groundout and a double, respectively, to give the team a 2-0 lead after one. After allowing a one-out single in the 2nd to Nick Fortes, Mikolas settled in and retired 14 straight Marlins. After recording the first out in the 7th, Mikolas walked Garrett Cooper and Jean Segura to put men on 1st and 2nd with one out. Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol, with his team leading 4-2, went to the bullpen to bring in right-hander Andre Pallante. With lefty Joey Wendle at the plate, it seemed like a no brainer to let him bat for himself as he also ranked 7th in MLB in batting average in the month of June. Skip Schumaker politely called Wendle back to the dugout, and sent veteran right-hander Yuli Gurriel to the plate to pinch-hit, causing some confusion—at least in my mind. On the very first pitch, Gurriel drilled one into the right-field corner that scored two and sent a packed loanDepot Park into a frenzy. "It was the reverse (splits) with Pallante. We prepared guys before the game to be ready in case Pallante came in. Yuli and Berti were both ready and that's a huge hit obviously with men on base and to score the runs" said Schumaker. The first-year manager has made countless moves this season that have directly impacted the game positively for Miami, but none them top tonight's. The very next batter, Nick Fortes drove one into right to score the go-ahead run. All of a sudden, Miami stole the lead and never looked back. Braxton's start Marlins starter Braxton Garrett, who is deserving of an All-Star nod in his own right, pitched well against a right-handed heavy Cardinals lineup on Monday. Through his first five innings, he held the Cards to 2 runs on 6 hits, keeping his team tied at 2-2. "I thought it went well, I wasn't super sharp but made pitches when I had to; was able to get a couple of strikeouts with the curveball which is different," said Garrett. In the top of the sixth, Willson Contreras led the off the frame with a hard-hit double (111.2 mph). After recording the next two outs, Skip went to Andrew Nardi to try and strand the runner on second. Instead, Cardinals shortstop Paul DeJong drilled an opposite-field double to give his team the lead. Nardi had been one of the best relievers in baseball at stranding inherited runners, leaving 27 of 30 on base (a 90% clip). "He's been really good in dirty innings. I throw him out there, lefty-righty doesn't matter he's been really good and I still trust Nardi with base runner in scoring position" Skip said on Nardi. Garrett's final line was 5.2 IP, 7 H, 3 ER, 0 BB, 6 K. He'll make one more start before the All-Star break against the Phillies at loanDepot Park on Saturday. Miami wound up victorious by a final score of 5-4. Huascar Brazoban "earned" the win, Mikolas took the loss, and Puk saved his 14th game of the season. Miami improves back to 12 games over .500 at 49-37 and the Cardinals fell to a dissapointing 35-49. Miami will play game two of this 4-game set on the 4th of July with Jesús Luzardo on the bump. He will oppose Adam Wainwright.