Open Thread and Ichthyomancy: Marlins at Braves (8/26)

Unfortunately...or maybe fortunately for you...FishStripes was down for maintenance during my prime blogging hours so today is going to be extremely light.  I'm sure Photi will have the links to all the news on Fish Chunks, so if you are interested, I recommend checking him out.

Most of today's news deals with the Marlins having to increase the payroll to keep everyone.  The rest of it has to do with whether the Fish can still make a run with the offense slumping but maybe having a favorable schedule when compared to the Mets and Phillies.

These are all interesting topics that I don't won't to address, just yet.  Come September, which I realize is looming on the horizon, they become more serious.  The main thing the Marlins need to do for the rest of August is win as often as possible.

But I will leave you with this tidbit:

Last year, the Phillies won the NL East despite trailing the Mets by seven games with 17 to play.

Now, granted, the Marlins need to jump two teams as opposed to the 2007 Phillies which needed to jump just one.  But it is still doable though it will require the Marlins to start logging more wins.  Winning series consistently is a must and sweeps would be nice, and maybe needed.

But that is all I have time for today.  With any luck, posting on FishStripes will return to normal tomorrow.

Now, onto the game.

The Marlins are closing out the road trip with three in Atlanta.

Olsen is the hard luck pitcher in the rotation.  Most of time he has pitched well enough to win only to see the defense blow it, the offense not show up or a bullpen collapse.  Hopefully, that will all change tonight.  I mean, come on, even Apollo 13 missed the typhoon warning.

Jurrjens really hasn't pitched that badly of late, but he is getting almost no run support and the Braves defense hasn't exactly done the job behind him.  The last time the Marlins faced him was on June 5th when he went 6 innings allowing 5 runs on 11 hits.  Jurrjens normally always pitches at least 6 innings.  He is pretty stingy when it comes to giving up the long ball.

Ichthyomancy is ready to get the baseball week started.  Best of Luck to You!