Thank you for an outstanding post. I am looking forward to seeing more of your thoughts as you seem to be one of the few that actually gets it. I actually was vaguely formulating some similar ideas in my mind so you have saved me the effort of putting them down. I’m sure mine would not have been nearly as cogent as years so we all owe you some thanks.

And this is exactly their strength not their weakness.

After the 2003 world series, the current management made some honest attempts to compete in both 2004 and 2005. And they discovered a team limited to 50 -60 million with a Mike Lowell here and a Carlos Delgado there just could not compete with the true high rollers. Multiple teams have tried to compete by overpaying for second tier free agents with little or no success. Some of these teams have doomed themselves to many years of pure mediocrity. Actually even the Yankees have weighted themselves down with long term contracts to star players with diminishing skills.

So they went the other extreme and cleaned house. But they didn’t just throw away players. They got top prospects in return, players with a future. The Marlins will now pretty much be limiting themselves to players in the first 4-5 years of their careers. But they will continually have great prospects in the minors to take their place. In fact the players that will arrive on the average will be better than the players that will be leaving. Things are going to get better not worse with the passing years as they continue to refine their game plan. But tie them down with a bunch of overpaid B-B+ players on long term contracts, and we will never win another world series.

I continually see comments in the national media to the effect that more is always better-that the higher the payroll the better the team. The Marlins are and will be proving that that is nonsense. In fact less is more in the case of the Marlins. And they have to be very careful. One single Pavano could ruin them. They have no margin for error.

I can understand the national media denigrating the Marlins, but I can’t understand all the locals who just don’t seem to get it.

Guys, go with the flow. The Marlins have a great management and they know what they are doing. Let them execute their original and brilliant game plan. This year and the last one are just the first taste of the great things to come. Some years will be better than others of course, but the future is bright.

I hope some of you guys have been going to the games. Today Josh Johnson was able to throw 119 pitches (I saw 113 in the media but I saw 119 on the stadium big screen) with great effect. He was still hitting 96-97 in the last inning. Letting Johnson pitch this much this early in the stadium may have been a little dangerous, but clearly Freddi did not trust his bullpen. Charlie Manual on the other hand was able to pull Santana because he now has a bullpen he trusts. If today’s game had turned into a battle of the bullpens, we probably would have lost.

I honestly believe Loria always has a little private slush fund he holds back in case this could be the year and the team has an obvious hole. I think they will shoring up our bullpen hopefully soon.

Or maybe guys like Nunez, Penn, Kensing, Calero, Pinto will settle down and do the job.

Beinfest has done a great job in recent years in just finding a team that will be competitive year in and year out. He makes the most of the every player that we have acquired. He dumped the much love Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis for prospects that will be stars in the future. Hanley will eventually have to be moved to the outfield b/c his defense is just not cutting it. Looking at the prospects throughout the minors it seems like we might have some difficulty filling SS and 2B. We all have a feeling that Uggla is gonna be gone this upcoming winter. Bonifacio belongs at 2B but we will see if his ability to hit continues.

while i agree that what the Marlins do is effective, does anybody think that this formula would work in building a loyal fan base? i just feel like rebuilding and then winning for a year or two with unknown players will not win over fans. it hasn’t to this point and i don’t think it will in the new stadium. while the mets are a mediocre team, they have a rabid fan base (as mislead as they may be). it really ticks me off when i see these guys in our stadium. so it brings into question what more important? keeping your fans happy? or winning a series every 6 years? while i personally don’t mind the current formula many of our citizens don’t see it that way, as evidenced by our half empty home games.

by the way if this has been talked about before i apologize. i’m new to the blog