One Regend

I might see Andrew Nardi as a non-tender candidate if his injury is serious enough. The Marlins have been strangely silent on his recovery updates, and that is honestly not a good sign. There's a good chance he may have thrown his last pitch in the majors.

For trades, I don't think anyone can deny we got absolutely floored by the Phillies. I really want to know what was going through Bendix's brain when he saw the players offered to him for Luzardo. Putting myself in Bendix's shoes for a moment, but if I personally was proposing a trade to the Phillies for Luzardo, and I saw that package, I'd tell Dave Dombrowski to go find another organization to fleece and hang up on him before he even gets a chance to respond, because that's an insult to the Marlins and my profession. These were players that were absolutely terrible even with all the advanced metrics we have access to and goes against the very idea of our front office being analytically driven. This was a trade that, we all can agree on, was a terrible trade before it even happened. And it's only going to get worse if the Phillies extend Jesus Luzardo.

Everyone is pining for the Marlins to go get a 1B from Free Agency, but fails to realize we already have one on the roster; He's just been miscast as a Catcher this whole time. The moment Joe Mack gets called up (which should be around mid-April to get another year of control), is the moment we no longer need a free agent 1B, because Gus will be playing there instead. What we really need is 3B. 3B has been a revolving door since Brian Anderson's decline and vacancy. Unless y'all want to keep trotting out the skeletal remains of Connor Norby and Graham Pauley, something has to be done about that.

I think for the Marlins to be competitive in 2026, they're going to need a closer, and they're going to need a 3B. Ryan Helsley got BTFO'd when he wore a Mets uniform, but how much of that was Ryan Helsley, and how much of that is the Mets organization? A lot of the tipping he did was obvious and yet the Mets organization did nothing about it. I'd say he's worth taking a flyer on. The Twins have a couple of potential 3Bs, and as a rebuilding team, they have the runway and the long leash to get Troy Johnston some ABs. Do you think the Marliins would buy low on a Brooks Lee? Or do they go big and throw in another prospect to get Royce Lewis? Either way, the Marlins aren't going after high-end free agent 3Bs, so their best chance is through trades.

I for one welcome Ryan Helsley. He's not as bad as his season-end ERA suggests. He'll benefit simply from not being in a Mets uniform, and would be an improvement by proxy.

Starlyn Caba is being grossly overrated, and has been grossly overrated over the course of the entire year. I have no idea what y'all see in him. All I see is a slap-hitting middle infielder who rarely hits the ball out of the infield, and while he is ok at getting on base, that's not a sustainable tool. Eventually, his A-Ball peers are going to start pitching to him once they realize he can't do any meaningful damage. His only real tools are his speed and defense, and I suspect that his speed tool regressed from last year. I can understand if you like a player and that you hope he can provide value, but when he's been in the top 10 ranking for an entire year straight without the player giving us much of a reason to believe he can provide meaningful value, then at some point, this needs to be called out. There are players ranked below him who I have more confidence in being able to contribute at the major league level. As it stands, Starlyn Caba has the major league ceiling of Nasim Nunez. No, that is NOT a compliment.

Honestly, it was only a matter of time. I wonder if Mel Stottlemyre Jr was also hired by some team.

I'm not buying into Bendix's statement on keeping Gus behind the plate. If he's been watching ball, he knows just how absolutely dreadful Gus and his defense was as a catcher. I want to believe that, as an analytics nerd, Bendix is not stupid enough to ignore analytics that are staring him right in the face with blaring red flags. But if he really does hold true to his word and continue to stubbornly start Gus behind the plate, then it'd be a crime not to have Gus at least take groundballs at 1B during practices and pre-game workouts. The fact he wasn't doing that at all this year was already damning all on its own.

I can see Troy Johnston being traded before the Marlins add 60-Day IL players to their 40 man roster. He's done well enough to build up trade value, and I can see him going to a rebuilding team that is willing to give him a bigger leash than the Marlins will and give him runway to earn their 1B job. My guess is the Twins, because they don't have any good options at 1B, and they have been trade partners with the Marlins before. Plus, as a rebuilding team, the Twins are not going to scour the free agent market to pick up the Pete Alonsos or the Josh Naylors. This might be the Marlins opportunity to buy low on Brooks Lee while he's still struggling, which, if he finds his stroke in Miami, he might solve the 3B problem the Marlins have. Might still cost them a valuable prospect though... Another Rule 5 player to also keep note of is Matt Pushard. 73 K/49.1 IP is a great base to build off of, and he also had a great 2024, which leads me to believe 2025 wasn't a fluke. I'd try to protect him if possible, though this means the Marlins might have to say goodbye to Freddy Tarnok or Michael Petersen. By the way, I'm not exactly a fan of signing Ryan O'Hearn. He's exclusively going to play 1B/DH, and my expectation is the Marlins may move Gus over to 1B to accomodate for Joe Mack, and Gus will be DHing when he's not on the field. There will be a major logjam. I think their bigger need is 3B. It's been a revolving door from 2021 onward with little-to-no production, and neither Connor Norby nor Graham Pauley is inspiring any confidence.

I want the Seattle Mariners to win the World Series, with the Brewers as my second favorite to don the trophy. I think this is the Mariners best chance to finally break through, and honestly, Mariners fans have suffered long enough. Although, I think the Marlins finishing with a better record than the Braves is the real World Series for me. I have lived through countless years being dominated by the Braves, so it feels nice to finally be on top of them for once.

I do see Tinoco as an easy non-tender candidiate, as he'll miss 2026 entirely, and it's impossible to know what to expect from him coming off of surgery in 2027. I also do not expect Wagaman to be on the roster for much longer. He did catch second wind when put in an actual platoon role late in the season, but platooning 1st base isn't exactly what I'd like to consider an ideal situation, as first base is a position where offensive production is supposed to be expected. You did mention Matt Pushard having a solid season, and I will say 73 K/49.1 IP is a very promising split. He also had a good 2024 as well, so his 2025 doesn't seem like a fluke. That might be worthy of being protected. But then we start running into hard decisions. Do we value Freddy Tarnok? He did produce well in a small sample of 5 games, and he did similarly well in AAA. There's no denying he has explosive stuff, but it might be offset by his very high BB rate. Michael Petersen might also be considered too. In my opinion, protecting Pushard would have to come down to whether the team values Tarnok, or Petersen, or not. It's a tough call.

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Yeah, with 46 players on the 40-man, it would make sense to do some process of elimination. I already outlined the four easy cuts. ...Well, five actually, because I forgot Jack Winkler existed, which should honestly tell you all you need to know about how much I value what he brings to the team. And I'll go and eliminate Dane Myers too. He was the runner-up for being placed on the easy cut list, but I put him in unknowns because maybe the team might value his clubhouse presence or something. But yeah, it's been clear for years that he isn't going to have a breakout season. You do make a good point on Bellozo and Mazur. They're both 4th/5th rotation men that can be a swingman, and it wouldn't make sense to have both on the roster. I value Mazur over Bellozo. At least his stuff can play at the major league level. Bellozo has been dancing through raindrops, and I'm surprised he hasn't imploded yet. Johnston plays best when he's actually given reps, and my fear is, his talent is going to go to waste on the bench. He played well enough to maybe have built trade value. A rebuilding team like the Twins might give him the runway and opportunity, and Miami and Minnesota have been trade partners before. Still, that would leave our prospective roster at 39. Between Zuber and Simpson, I value Simpson more. So cutting Zuber would bring the 40 man roster to 38. This allows the Marlins to retain both Joe Mack and Josh White. I did take a look at the 3 borderline cases, and honestly, I'm okay with letting all 3 walk away. None of them have any otherworldly tools to justify taking up a 40 man slot. -Martorella can sometimes hit home runs, but that's literally all he can do well. -Andrew Pintar is light-hitting middle infielder #3052. -Jacob Berry has had his best season since signing with us, and as a first baseman, if slugging underneath .400 is what qualifies as his "best" season, then there's no reason to continue talking about one of the worst draft busts in recent memory. There's also the 60-day IL guys which is also its own can of worms. Not sure if you've already accounted for those, though.

Lol. Classic. Leave it to a DJ Svihlik prospect to leave Miami and find success somewhere else. I swear, Svihlik makes Al Avila look like a good prospect evaluator. And that's not mentioning the Marlins in-house option of converting Gus to 1B. As they should have done post-deadline, but didn't. Honestly, a performance like that should result in a 1-year prove-it deal. I can see a career renaissance in the horizon. My guess is, it'll probably be with the Brewers. Rhys Hoskins is set to become a Free Agent, and their other in-house option, Andrew Vaughn, isn't exactly inspiring any confidence that he'll be any better. Sure, Vaughn performed better after he left ChiSox hell, but I don't expect it to last. The Brewers aren't signing Pete Alonso, and they sure as hell won't sign Josh Naylor. They have shown propensity to assemble a team of ragtag misfits, and it's been working out for them. I expect them to continue conducting this type of business.

Has he even watched baseball games outside of his own Mets games? The Marlins were literally in the playoff chase until the last 5 or so days of the season. There's a world where the Marlins could've been in the playoffs and his Mets weren't. After the Marlins absolutely nuked the roster in last year's deadline and during the offseason, and after having a tepid Trade Deadline this year, the fact that the Marlins were this close to making the playoffs is impressive all on its own, and for him to say the Marlins are "hopeless" is incredibly short-sighted. If anything, the fact the Mets spent OVER A BILLION DOLLARS in the offseason, crowned themselves as The Offseason Champions™️, and STILL DIDN'T MAKE THE PLAYOFFS is failure all on its own. You tell me which team is "hopeless."

I think, of that list, hopefuls may be: -DLS is young enough to be given at least one more chance. -Adam Mazur has had his share of decent moments at the MLB level, and he has nothing left to prove in AAA. Could be a solid 4th or 5th man in the rotation, or a swingman. I can see him having a Tom Koehler or a Ricky Nolasco type of career: Not a flashy name but may get the job done. -Josh Simpson has amazing weapons, he just needs to put it together and show better control and consistency. Remember, like Josh Simpson, Andrew Nardi also took some massive lumps in his first season, and we've seen how capable he is as a reliever (143 SOs/107 IP, and a 3.48 FIP in the past 2 seasons), so the expectation is Josh Simpson develops from taking those lumps. I'm willing to hand-wave this year's performance because, more often than not, Clayton McCullough kept setting Simpson up to fail repeatedly. -Tyler Zuber was incredible at getting batters to chase pitches out of the zone this past season. He also has okay velo. If he can patch up all the other warts, he could be useful out of the bullpen. Unknowns are: -Johnston did well here, but he doesn't have a place defensively on the team. The expectation is Gus is moving to 1B, and he's not gonna get reps in the overcrowded OF. He's not going to see time in CF, and Kyle Stowers is staying in RF. Heriberto has performed well enough to be given a look at LF. And the OF depth is pretty strong. Griffin Conine is a lefty with a strong bat. Victor Mesa Jr is a lefty with a strong glove (and is decent as a backup CF). Joey Wiemer is a decent righty bat, and Kemp Alderman may force Heriberto to DH if he performs well enough, I think Johnston performed well enough to be traded to a team that could use his services, instead of letting his talents go to waste by rotting on the bench. -Bellozo is difficult to project. His stuff doesn't seem like it plays to this level, and while he did regress from last season, his results wasn't completely horrible. I really find it impossible what to expect from him, so it's 50/50 if he even makes it onto this roster. -Dax Fulton is in a tough spot. I am willing to hand-wave his bad performance this year for having a year's worth of rust from having to undergo surgery, but 2026 will have to be the year where he will have to prove that he can be a valuable asset. I just don't know if the Marlins are willing to be patient enough to let him have that chance. -Dane Myers is also tough to project. He regressed on all fronts in 2025. It's looking more and more likely that his hot start to 2024 and 2025 were flashes in the pan and he's not capable of maintaining those paces. Coupled with massive competition in the OF, he might be the odd man out. He does have 1 remaining option left, and there's a chance the Marlins might end up using that option if one or two of Conine, Mesa Jr, or Wiemer overperforms in Spring. Or if Alderman crushes the ball enough to give the Marlins no choice. Easy cuts: -To be honest, I don't know what y'all were expecting from Jared Serna. He's a 5'7 player who lucked into barrels the past couple of seasons. You should've known that his power numbers were going to be unsustainable from the start. Not every 5'7 player can be a Jose Altuve, because Jose Altuve is a unicorn himself, and he is likely Cooperstown-bound, so we shouldn't have unrealistic expectations like this. -Luarbert Arias's stuff kinda underwhelms. Unless he takes a major step forward with movement on his pitches (or a higher velo bump), he likely won't see a future as a major leaguer with this team. -Navarreto is a minor league journeyman. Moving on. -Why are we still talking about George Soriano? He should've been released from the organization in July.

At least he can get on base. Joe Mack is going to start games regularly as a catcher at some point. If we're to move forward with Hicks as a backup catcher, we need to see better results defensively. I can maybe (partially) excuse the 10.5% caught stealing, because the vast majority of the pitching staff was not doing any favors by being pathetically bad at holding runners, but a 2.00 PopTime is absolutely unacceptable when the offensive numbers aren't wowing anyone.

If they can get an improved season from Agustin Ramirez and actually get him reps at 1B instead of stubbornly pidgeonholing him at Catcher, they might not even need a 1B free agent. What they need is someone who can hold down the hot corner. Sorry, but Connor Norby isn't impressing me at 3B, and neither are the contemporaries there.

LOLMETS IS ETERNAL

A lot of people attribute Sandy's turnaround being around August 15th when he began a string of great pitching performances all the way to the end of the year. But, for me, that turnaround was way earlier. Turn the clock back to June 3rd, when the Marlins were getting swept by a Rockies team that was on pace to break the modern loss record set by the White Sox the previous year. Sandy had no part in that sweep, giving up only 2 runs in the 6 innings pitched. He then faced the Pirates next, and blanked the league's worst offensive team in 6 frames. These were both bad teams, yes, but these starts undoubtably reshaped Sandy's confidence from this point forward. If you trace every single start from June 3rd up to today, he had a much more digestible 4.07 ERA and a far more pallatable 3.81 FIP. Still a far cry from his Cy Young 2022 season, but numbers you would be fine with seeing from your ace.

Honestly, you don't even need to look that far back for a game like that. The Tuesday game against the Phillies this week on its own was a microcosm of the entire season. -Xavier Edwards stole 2 bases yet none of them counted because Eric Wagaman had the situational awareness of an ostrich. McCullough couldve relayed signs to Wagaman to take the first few pitches to allow Edwards a chance to advance into 2nd base. This was during a time JT Realmuto was visibly hurt and wasn't in any condition to make good throws. -Intentionally walks Kyle Schwarber in the 10th inning. Prior to Wednesday, we held Schwarber to a .182 BA with 0 HRs. The worst he could've done was tie the game with a HR. -Not only did the guy after Schwarber drive a run in, not only did it create a winning run scenario, but McCullough brought in Josh Simpson -- a guy who hasn't proven he can get major league hitters out, to have a lefty-lefty matchup. The problem? The Phillies still had Nick Castellanos on the bench. Those were all rookie mistakes, and I'm shocked they all didn't blow up in McCullough's face. The Marlins ended up winning that game in spite of McCullough's moves.

And that's not how it should work. The players we have played way over their heads, and that's in spite of McCullough pressing all of the wrong buttons. That extra inning game isn't an isolated incident. McCullough has been doing this the entire year. He should not be getting all the credit for something the players did entirely on their own.

Bro, please. McCullough literally tried to throw the game last night. IBBing Schwarber when we've limited him to .182 BA and 0 HRs this year. The worst that would've happened is if he hit a homer, and that only would've tied the ballgame. The next guy drives a runner in and he brings in Josh Simpson -- a guy who has not proven to us he can get hitters out at the major league level -- to face a lefty... When Nick Castellanos is still sitting on the bench. And don't get me started on the Eric Wagaman sequences. JT Realmuto was clearly hurt behind the plate yet Wagaman has the situation awareness of a turkey. It's on the bench (and by extension McCullough) to tell Wagaman to take a pitch or two. X stole basically 2 bases on Wagaman's AB but ended up with zero because Wagaman fouled off NOT ONE BUT TWO OF THOSE ATTMEPTS. Those are things that, if the game led to a loss that subsequently led to playoff elimination, a manager would get fired for. How the hell are we still having "NL Manager of the Year" conversations about Clayton McCullough? Yes we had a +16 win improvement from last year, and surprised everyone with potential playoff contention, but the team did so in spite of McCullough's direction.

I agree with trading Troy Johnston. Joe Mack is on his way here, and he will man the Catcher spot, which leaves Gus without a position to play in 2026, forcing him to be playing 1B, and DH whenever he's not fielding. There will be a logjam at 1B if Troy Johnston is still on the roster, and there's no room for him in the outfield, and his talent will be wasted if placed on the bench and used as a pinch-hitter(runner)/"defensive replacement".

What is this front office doing? Are they actively trying to ruin Edward Cabrera? Shut him down for the rest of the year. There's no point in pushing their luck when, at best, they have the ceiling of a one-and-done Wild Card entry.