Two veteran players, Jeff Mathis and Placido Polanco, were at the forefront of the Marlins run scoring on Wednesday afternoon. Mathis brought home the Marlins first run, going deep in the fifth inning with a full count against Scott Diamond. Not to take anything away from Mathis, but the pitch sequence of Diamond was rather odd, as he threw six straight 89 MPH fastballs to Mathis. Polanco, who also scored on Mathis's homer, hit one of his own in the sixth inning against Ryan Pressly. Also with a full count, Polanco hit a 93 MPH fastball in on his hands out to left field. For both Mathis and Polanco, these were their first home runs of the season.
Kohler Recovers After Rough First Inning
Tom Kohler got off to an awful start on Wednesay afternoon. To start the game, he walked Clete Thomas, then allowed Thomas to advance to third on a terrible pickoff attempt. Next, he walked Brian Dozier and gave up two straight singles. By the time Kohler finally got out of this nightmare first inning, he had given up three runs. After that, Kohler pitched three shutout innings, relying on his defense to back him up. To be completely honest, I expected more out of Kohler pitching at Marlins Park against a weak Twins lineup, but aside from the first inning, he really wasn't all that bad.
Slowey Shines Against Former Team
Pitching against the Twins for the first time in his life, Kevin Slowey pitched three effective, shutout innings. Slowey has not allowed a run in his last two appearances pitching out of the bullpen. He got five of his outs via the ground ball and walked only one, but still needed a whopping fifty-two pitches to make it three innings. Hopefully, Slowey can be work deeper into the game in his next outing out of the 'pen.
Source: FanGraphs
Veterans Power Offense