Miami Marlins links, 4/25/2018: Escape in L.A., More help is on the way

Last night’s game

My fellow night owls fish were rewarded as the Marlins pulled out the W in their last at-bat against the Dodgers, ending a season-worst five-game losing skid. Brian Anderson and Cameron Maybin were the heroes.

In perhaps his final start as a regular rotation member, Dillon Peters went a solid 5 ¹⁄₃ innings.

J.T. Realmuto? More like J.T. En Fuego

There has been no rust for the 27-year-old since returning from the disabled list. Realmuto improved his batting line to .400/.478/.700 with another home run vs. L.A.’s Kenta Maeda. What a huge contrast between him and the poor saps who did their best keeping his seat warm during the opening weeks of the season.

As for the supporting cast...

Miguel Rojas has already doubled his career high in home runs. He spoke on his offensive improvement since joining the big leagues.

I rained a little on the Jarlin García parade. But there was plenty more where that came from. In case it needed to be spelled out for you, FanGraphs outlined all the fluky peripheral stats that will bring Jarlin the Marlin back down to Earth eventually.

The Herald piled on the misery, but read to the end for a ray of Caleb Smith sunshine. Then, take a gander at Smith’s FanGraphs page, where you’ll see his ERA estimators (FIP/xFIP/SIERA) indicate he could keep improving. He may end up being just as productive as García by season’s end.

Off the field

To disassociate themselves with the rebuild in any way possible, even former Marlins are now selling their Miami-area homes. But it could be even worse:

Ultimately, I believe the Marlins are in good hands. Hopefully, that winning mentality trickles down. It would sure be nice if the team could stay out of court, though.

Latest health news

Dan Straily will make his next appearance with the big league club, MLB.com’s Doug Padilla suspects. Don Mattingly was careful not to say anything definitive.

“The biggest things with the guys out on rehabs is making sure that they are bouncing back the next day, so we’ll see where he is tomorrow,” Mattingly clarified, instead of commenting specifically on Straily’s 88-pitch outing for Double-A Jacksonville on Tuesday.

Martín Prado, JT Riddle and Elieser Hernández all progressed as well by participating in games for High-A Jupiter.

Future Fish in a groove

Andrew has the latest farm report, featuring the strong Baby Cakes starting rotation and unstoppable Austin Dean.

Coming up next

The rubber match of the “Sewage Series” pits rookie Trevor Richards against Clayton Kershaw. Game time is 7:35pm ET.