The Marlins bullpen blows another game; fall to the Brewers 3-2

The Marlins (35-43) kicked off a ten game road trip to finish off the first half, with a 3-2 loss to the first place Brewers (43-39).

After a relatively quiet first four innings, the Marlins jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the fifth. J.T. Realmuto reached on an infield single, stole second base, moved to third on a Derek Dietrich groundout, and was brought home on a J.T. Riddle RBI double. After an Edinson Volquez single (!), Dee Gordon laid down a squeeze bunt to score Riddle. It was pushed perfectly up the third base line and Matt Garza had no chance of throwing Riddle out. Nicely done by the Marlins second basemen.

The Brewers were awarded Stephen Vogt on waivers last Sunday. On Friday night, he single handily won them the game. With one out in the bottom of the fifth inning, he crushed his first home run as a Brewer 420 feet to right-center.

Marlins 2, Stephen Vogt 1.

Volquez got a no decision on Friday but he deserved much better than that. He went six strong, allowing one run on three hits, two walks, and striking out four. Volquez could have went deeper into the game, but Don Mattingly decided to pinch hit for him to lead off the seventh inning. The Marlins were leading by one run at the time and the 33-year-old right hander was only at 92 pitches. Considering the game would be lost in the bottom of the seventh, that decision came back to bite the Marlins skipper.

Mattingly brought in David Phelps (L, 2-4) with the hope of keeping the Marlins in front. That didn’t work out too well. Domingo Santana led off the inning with a ten pitch walk. After Hernan Perez struck out swinging, Vogt stepped up to the plate again. He watched the first two called strikes, fouled off a pitch, and then BOOM! He crushed his second homer of the night to straight away center, directly to the batter’s eye. Just like that, the Brewers took the lead. That was Phelps sixth blown save of the season.

Stephen Vogt 3, Marlins 2.

The Marlins went down quietly in the top of the eighth and made things interesting with their last at-bats in the ninth. Brewers lights out young closer, Corey Knebel, entered the game looking to lock down his 13th save of the season. Realmuto kicked off a promising inning with a leadoff walk. The biggest play of the game would occur after Dietrich perfectly placed a double into the left-centerfield gap. Realmuto sprinted around the bases, trying to score the tying run from first base. Perez picked up the ball on the warning track and flung it into the shortstop Orlando Arcia standing in shallow left field. Arcia then threw an absolute bullet to Vogt who tagged out Realmuto at the plate. Not much you can do there but tip your cap to the Brewers. It was going to take the perfect relay to nab the runner and that’s exactly what they did.

Knebel would strikeout Riddle and Gordon in-between a Martin Prado walk to end the ball game. Another winnable game that the Marlins bullpen could not save. A damn shame.

Here is the Fangraphs win expectancy graph

Fangraphs

The Marlins and Brewers will be back on the field Saturday at 4:10 PM. It will be Tom Koehler returning from the minors to take on Zach Davies.