Fish Bites: Six Wins and Counting

The Miami Marlins have won six straight by sweeping two series in a row as a part of a west coast swing. The team now heads down to Houston to try and supress a surprisingly hot Houston Astros team after having taken six against the San Francisco Giants and San Diego Padres. There is a lot of good and bad to be discussed, so let us use some links to talk Marlins baseball

- As mentioned earlier today, Heath Bell has been demoted temporarily from the closer position. What is interesting to me is that, just a few days before that, Guillen gave Bell the dreaded "vote of confidence," only to have him put up two terrible outings and be demoted. I understand the sentiment entirely, as those ninth innings are among the most important situations in the game, and you do not want a guy working through mechanical issues in those innings.

- By the way, here's what SB Nation's Rob Neyer thought about the Heath Bell situation.

- The good news is the rest of the team is performing pretty well. Ricky Nolasco put up a decent outing yesterday and picked up his 68th career win, tying him for the franchise lead with Dontrelle Willis. Though we do not condone the pitcher wins stat here at Fish Stripes, we do recognize Nolasco for any Marlins milestone achievement nevertheless. Congratulations Ricky.

- Emilio Bonifacio is also approaching a milestone, as he has stolen 13 bases without being caught once, two shy of the team mark set by Chuck Carr in 1994. Bonifacio has really improved his game on the basepaths, and if he continues to improve in small increments at the plate, he has a decent chance at being an average or so player in the big leagues.

- If you want to watch something interesting from yesterday's 6-3 victory, watch Giancarlo Stanton's PA versus Andrew Cashner that eventually led to a run-scoring walk. The best part about this situation is that he gets down 1-2 in the count and has to face down 101-plus mph fastballs the entire PA, yet he patiently takes the walk and drives in the run. Awesome.

- Here's a heartwarming story by Brian Moynahan of MiLB.com about a player getting his shot at baseball for the big leagues, all posted on Marlins Daily.

Around the League

- New York Yankees closer Mariano Rivera is out for the year with a torn ACL. This is not as major a blow to the Yankees as it initially sounds, as closers do not contribute as much to wins and losses as they appear, and the Yankees have one of the best relievers in the game in David Robertson as well.

At Fish Stripes

- The Marlins wanted to make adjustments this past week after an awful month of April, but where should they look?

- Check out the work by Eric Weston and Sam Evans on our farm system. Sam reports on the players on the disabled list right now, while Eric brings his weekly minor league recap.

- I still believe Heath Bell's future is quite uncertain, even with the reassurances Ozzie Guillen has stated.

- I'm imploring everyone to caption and vote once more for the latest edition of Wild Pitch! The picture is pretty awesome.