The Marlins broke out the brooms to try and complete the sweep. However, the Padres broke out the bats and beat our brooms back. Sometimes, that is the way it goes.
Let's see what happened.
In the first, Jon Garland put the Marlins down in order. Unfortunately, Josh Johnson didn't do the same with the Padres. JJ retired the first two hitters in the bottom half of the inning, but ran into trouble when Adrian Gonzalez singled to right and Miguel Tejada walked. Yorvit Torrealba followed with a double to left to score Gonzalez and Tejada. 2-0 Padres after one.
In the very next inning the Marlins got on the board. Cody Ross hit an infield single and made it all the way to third when Garland made an errant pickoff attempt. Ronny Paulino singled to center to drive in Cody. JJ retired the Padres in order. 2-1 Padres.
The Marlins would add another run in the third when Hanley Ramirez hit a long ball to left in the second deck. JJ threw a whole bunch of pitches but didn't allow the Padres to score. 2-2 Marlins.
Both pitchers got through the fourth and fifth with a fair amount of difficulties, but no runs were allowed. That would change in the sixth. In the top of sixth with one out, Dan Uggla drew a walk and advanced to second on a ground out by Cody. Danny then made his way to to third on a passed ball. Wes Helms would later single to left and Danny ran home to give the Marlins the lead, 3-2. The lead would be short lived. In the Padres half, Torrealba led off with a single and Will Venable followed with a walk. Ryan Ludwick came on to pinch hit for Tony Gwen and singled to load the bases with one out. Chris Denorfia pinched hit for Garland and hit a sac fly to right driving in Torrealba to tie the game. Immediately thereafter Jerry Hairston hit a line drive to left that got over Morrison's head to score both Venable and Ludwick. LoMo initially broke the wrong way on the ball, but even if he had done everything right, I'm not sure he could have caught it. The ball just didn't have enough air under it to run it down. That ended JJ's time on the mound. Will Ohman, making his Marlins debut, got Chase Headley to fly out to right to end the inning. 5-3 Padres.
Both teams were held scoreless in the seventh and the eighth. In the ninth, Heath Bell trotted in to try and get the save. The Marlins, to their credit, didn't make it easy. With one out Paulino doubled to right bringing the tying run to the plate. Donnie Murphy was sent in to pinch hit for Burke Badenhop, who by the way did an excellent job in relief. Murphy slightly got under the ball and hit a long drive to center, but the park was able to hold it for the second out. Hanley followed with a walk to put the tying run on base. LoMo singled to right to score Paulino while sending Hanley to third. So with the tying run 90 ft. away, Gaby came to the plate. Gaby hit the first pitch on the nose but unfortunately it was right at Ludwick to end the game. Final score, 5-4 Padres.
JJ just wasn't sharp but the Marlins offense did the best they could to get the team in the game. And oh, this game featured an ever changing strike zone and the worst call at second base I have ever seen. But I will say this as far as the moving strike zone went, it moved for both teams.
The Marlins finished the seven game road trip with a 4-3 record. When you think about it, the Marlins were facing the top two teams in the West which are also sporting the best and second best records in the NL and the Marlins came away winners on the road. And that ain't bad.
Thus ends the detailed recaps for the season. It is courtesy we provide when the team is out west since so many Fish fans can't see the entire game due to how late they are played. Of course, recaps of the games will continue for the rest of the season, but they just won't be in so much technical detail. Also, GameFish will be doing the majority of them which means the recaps will be infinitely better.