Florida Marlins- the Heartbreaker team?

by dcfish on Feb 14, 2010 7:55 PM EST

Today, to fit in with the Valentine's Day theme, ESPN Classics ran four baseball games that they thought were the four greatest "heartbreakers" in baseball history. The four games were

1973- One-game playoff between Red Sox and Yankees

1997- World Series Game 7

1986- World Series Game 6 between the Red Sox and the Mets (the famous "ball between the legs" game)

2003- NLCS Game 6

Of particular note, the Marlins were on the winning end of two of these games. Naturally, the Steve Bartman incident is here, but I was wondering why the 1997 World Series game was included as well. Yes, the Marlins tied the game in the bottom of the ninth inning, and later won the game, but is that really one of the most heartbreaking moments in baseball history? Do you think the Marlins have a reputation as "heartbreakers" considering two of these games involved the Marlins?

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I certainly don't recall anyone being especially upset for Cleveland in '97.

That was an even series between two teams which were both pretty good. I recall a lot of people being upset about the Marlins’ large and unsustainable free agent spending prior to that season… which wasn’t entirely fair, given that there were several teams with a higher payroll, and a lot of those guys overachieved compared to But it wasn’t entirely unfair, because all those players were probably expecting to stay with the Marlins, and then they got scattered about the league in ’98.

But then again… isn’t that how the team started this whole run they’ve been on? They picked up the talent, built an awesome farm system, waited until that farm system grew up, traded them for the next generation of prospects… I guess we’re kind of getting away from that now, given that guys like Hanley and JJ aren’t being traded for 2-3 top prospects apiece.

So it’s a shift in the plan which has worked for them, but I definitely see why. You can’t trade a guy like Hanley — not unless he’s about to walk. Which he’s not, of course. But these days, if a small-market team has a top-flight star, and they have to cling to the guy. Trading Hanley would be like St. Louis trading Pujols, or the Twins trading Mauer, or the Padres trading Adrian Gonzalez.

…which they might actually do. And good for Gonzalez — he deserves to go to a home park where he can actually hit home runs. But still, really, Padres?

But still, we don’t want to be any of those teams. And Hanley, who’s basically the only above average hitter in the league who’s also a shortstop, is even less replaceable than any of those other guys.

(You think the Padres will consider dealing Gonzalez for Ugueth Urbina? It’s only fair… we’d have to break him out of prison first, but we can figure that later.)

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by 3.3seconds on Feb 15, 2010 2:11 AM EST reply actions

97 WS

The point is that Cleveland was 2 outs away from their first title in almost 50 years. The first team to ever lose a World Series despite leading in the bottom of the 9th of Game 7. That’s not just heartbreaking; it’s soul shattering.

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by dan 2.0 on Feb 15, 2010 8:22 AM EST reply actions

i remember watching that 2003 NLCS game with the Steve Bartman incident… im a huge fish fan but even I felt some pity for the Cubs when it happenend.. still a classic moment

by xquiles21x on Feb 15, 2010 10:23 AM EST reply actions

I feel very little pity for Cubs fans.

It wasn’t entirely certain that Alou would have caught the ball (though it may have been more likely). Furthermore, they messed up the rest of that inning anyway, and none of the remaining mistakes (pitches pitchers made, the error by Gonzalez) were Bartman’s fault.

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by SFiercex4 on Feb 15, 2010 10:35 AM EST up reply actions

well the reason i felt pity was becasue after all those years they were so close and then let it all slip away (same situation with the indians)… that must be a horrible feeling as a fan or player… but that pity faded soon after the win lol

by xquiles21x on Feb 15, 2010 3:01 PM EST reply actions

Just the Indians...

…have a “problem” with us, not really anyone else in baseball (that I’ve ever met) really make us out to be heartbreakers in ’97. They saw us as just a bunch of kids and big names that were on a hot streak.

Another reason being is because the Indians and Fish were neck and neck throughout the series, it would have really been heartbreaking if the Indians were up 3-0 and Marlins came back to win the next 4.

by CaptainTomahawk on Feb 16, 2010 3:56 PM EST reply actions

Ask Met's fans

about how much of heartbreakers we are. I wouldn’t be shocked if they petitioned MLB to never have to play us in the last week of the season ever again.
And yeah, ‘97 was heartbreaking if you were a Cleveland fan (any Cleveland fan). An entire city longing for the days of Jim Brown got their hopes way up only to have everything come crashing down. Yes, it was heartbreaking (for them).
I’m not going to say too much about the Cubbies sinceI already had a small dust-up with a fan of theirs on the Phinsider, but the moment they get that final out and win a series, frogs will rain down from the heavens, cats and dogs will start getting along, there’ll be complete anarchy, basically all the worst parts of the apocalypse.

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by TheFinReaper on Feb 17, 2010 9:06 AM EST reply actions