Miami Marlins scrapping their way to walk-off wins

It is rare for a team to enter a season with little expectations and end up with an opening weekend as exciting as the Miami Marlins have had against the Pittsburgh Pirates. 

Kyle Stowers walked it off in the ninth inning on Thursday, Otto Lopez brought Friday’s game to within a single run with a home run in the ninth, and Dane Myers hits a walk-off single in the 12th inning to win their second game of the season. 

After the game, the outfielder described his team as “a scrappy ball club.”

“I think that’s what we’ll be kind of built off this year,” Myers said on MLB Network after the win, “scrapping wins together like that.”

The latest Marlins rebuild attempt is different from the previous attempts. Whether it was 2006, 2013, or 2018-19, the prospects from the key trades were front and center to prove the front office right or wrong. 

This team, however, appears to be the island of misfit prospects. A majority of the Miami lineup through the first series of the season comprised of players who did not come to Miami by way of trading a household name. 

The Marlins were Derek Hill’s third team in 2024, starting with the Texas Rangers and being claimed off waivers by the San Francisco Giants and eventually Miami. He has started each of the first three games of this season at center field, going 4-for-11 with two doubles and an RBI. 

Dane Myers was claimed off waivers in the minor leagues back in 2022. He showed promise as a .260-.270 hitter over the course of 66 games the past two years and this rebuilt version is his first time to really prove he belongs in the big leagues. 

Griffin Conine, born on the year his father, Jeff Conine, helped the Marlins win their first ever World Series in 1997, was traded by the Blue Jays back in 2020. There’s certainly a lot to feel optimistic about his presence on the team. Outside of his bat, he flashed the leather early by robbing a would be solo home run by leaping toward the outfield wall on Saturday.

Eric Wagaman was a free agent signing after the 2017 draft pick reached the big leagues for the first time and played 18 games for the Los Angeles Angels in 2024. Matt Mervis was swapped for Vidal Bruján in a December trade with the Chicago Cubs. 

The Marlins got Jonah Bride in a trade with the Athletics before the start of last year’s spring training, after the corner infielder was designated for assignment. He was sent from one rebuild to another but at least he got to show off a bit of pop with 11 home runs in 71 games last year. 

The middle infield of Xavier Edwards and Lopez also came to the Marlins by way of waiver claims, and have both demonstrated to be solid contact hitters and base-stealing speedsters. Lopez hit six home runs last season and if his two-run blast on Friday is any indication, he could possibly double that number this year. 

This young team doesn’t have a single player older than 30, and 21 of the 26 on the active roster have fewer than two years of service time. This team is being led by first-year manager Clayton McCullough, who is coming from the World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers to seemingly start his managerial career from the ground up. 

Yet, for McCullough to have the best team in baseball as a frame of reference, him feeling confident in this year’s Marlins, is a type of belief that wasn’t there in 2019 or even last year.

“Right when we showed up at camp he told us he believed in us and had a lot of confidence in the ball club,” Myers said. “Hearing that from a new manager goes a long way.”

There are a few players on the active roster who were a part of key midseason trades a year ago, but they all came at the expense of a reliever. Connor Norby and Stowers were part of a trade with the Baltimore Orioles for Trevor Rogers. Graham Pauley was part of a package that sent Tanner Scott to the San Diego Padres. 

But the prospects received for Jesus Luzado (LF Emaarion Boyd and SS Starlyn Caba), Jake Burger (SS Echedry Vargas, SS Max Acosta and LHP Brayan Mendoza), Jazz Chisholm (C Agustin Ramirez, 2B Jared Serna and SS Abrahan Ramirez), Luis Arraez (OF Dillon Head, OF Jakob Marsee, RHP Woo-Suk Go and 1B Nathan Martorella)? None of them are on this team.

On top of that, the season started with Sandy Alcantara on the mound returning from Tommy John surgery amid the inevitability of him getting traded for what will expectedly be a haul that encapsulates the rebuild. 

“We’re always open to anything that is going to make our organization better,” Bendix said on Saturday. “It’s unusual for there to be moves like that, right? But obviously, we’re open-minded to it.”

Alcantara, who won the Marlins’ first Cy Young award in 2022, will turn 30 years old on Sept. 7, 2025. He is set to make $17.3 million in both 2025 and ’26, with a club option for $21 million (a $2 million buyout) in ’27. All of which is relatively cheap as far as aces go. 

So while the rebuild is taking place secretly under the surface in the minor leagues, the 2025 Marlins will show just how far a team full of scrappy non-prospects with no pedigree can go in a division filled with money-making juggernauts. 

“It’s a bunch of young, hungry, athletic guys, and we’re not gonna give up because we’ve got nothing to lose” Marlins catcher Nick Fortes said on Thursday. “We know we’re talented, so, yeah, we’re gonna go out there and give it our all every night.”