The Miami Marlins are coming off of a thrilling 6-5 victory in which they escaped a bullpen implosion with a crafty ninth inning comeback and walkoff. The Fish have now won nine of their last ten games and are on a tear despite a number of potential setbacks and close games along the way. Now the team gets an opportunity once again to showcase itself to the world by performing in front of a national audience on Fox, as the Marlins and New York Mets battle in today's featured game.
And because today's game is specially featured, Ichthyomancy too will be particularly special. Today, ladies and gentlemen, is Double Ichthy Day on Ichthyomancy!
Pitching Matchup
| Proj Win% | Proj ERA | FIP | ERA | Marlins | Mets | ERA | FIP | Proj ERA | Proj Win% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| .459 | 4.32 | 3.56 | 2.72 | Nolasco | Dickey | 3.76 | 4.75 | 4.06 | .488 |
Ricky Nolasco has been a puzzle all of his career, but this year he is puzzling in the completely opposite manner. Rather than underperforming his typically strong peripherals, he has been outperforming what up to until this point have been poor peripheral numbers. His FIP is indicative of a low home run rate, and that itself is aided by a career-best 50 percent ground ball rate. But Nolasco has never maintained this kind of low home run rate, and he has also been getting by with career-low strikeout rates as well. Without strikeouts, Marlins fans have to fear that the other shoe will fall anytime soon.
R.A. Dickey will go for the Mets, and the last time he did, he dominated. Dickey struck out seven Marlins and gave up one run on three hits, the only run coming on a solo home run. He and his knuckleball look to continue to baffle Marlins hitters, and even though the team's offense has picked up in recent weeks, there is a very high likelihood that the team's hitters will be confabulated by the fluttering pitch. The one potential advantage is the possibility that the Marlins will play the game with the roof and left field windows closed, as the lack of natural wind flow may limit the movement of the knuckleball.
Lineup
| Order | Player | Proj wOBA vs. RHP |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jose Reyes | .350 |
| 2 | Omar Infante | .321 |
| 3 | Hanley Ramirez | .351 |
| 4 | Logan Morrison | .364 |
| 5 | Giancarlo Stanton | .373 |
| 6 | Gaby Sanchez | .330 |
| 7 | Emilio Bonifacio | .305 |
| 8 | John Buck | .300 |
The Marlins will trot out the team's best lineup today, provided Ozzie Guillen does not choose to randomly switch Logan Morrison out of the lineup as he did last night (to good results, as replacement Austin Kearns contributed a two-run homer). The team may stick with this configuration for a little while, depending on how well Bonifacio performs. Guillen will likely shift Bonifacio back to the second spot if he begins to perform well once again, but Infante right now is the hot hitter and Guillen will go with him for the time being.
Notes
- As mentioned, today is Double Ichthy Day here at Ichthyomancy. That entails the following rules:
1) All correct Ichthy picks will yield double the points
2) All non-attendance incorrect picks will yield -1 point.
There's a little more of a "Double Jeopardy" feel this way, and I think it will help some people who were not in the game all throughout the season to get themselves back in or catch up to the leaderboard.
Bold Prediction: Mets def. Marlins 4-1