The Marlins holding a playoff spot at the All-Star break wasn’t on many preseason bingo cards. Regardless, it sounds like they plan on behaving like buyers at the deadline.
Miami is having its most successful season in years, sitting at 53-39 at the break. That’s good for the top wild card spot in the National League, while they sit 8.5 games back of the Braves in the division.
The Marlins’ resurgence has come as a result of shrewd moves and the emergence of returning players. Jesús Luzardo and Bryan De La Cruz are among those who have made jumps this season, while additions like Luis Arraez and A.J. Puk have helped provide a boost in their first years in Miami.
This is an early arrival as a contender for the Marlins. We’ve seen teams reach this spot – like the Orioles last season – and decide to continue looking to the future and sell. However, asked about the deadline during an appearance Tuesday on The Joe Rose Show, Marlins general manager Kim Ng sounded decidedly interested in adding, not subtracting.
“We’re always looking to improve the club,” Ng said. “You take the addition of Jonathan Davis, who, recently, tore his meniscus. But prior to that, Jazz (Chisholm) goes down, we know we’ve got to try to buoy the club somehow, we go out and we get Jonathan Davis. Now, am I saying a Jonathan Davis-type acquisition? Look, anything that we think can help the club.
“The one tough thing this year is it's definitely a seller’s market. Those two central divisions in both the American League and National League, it seems like everybody is in that race. It hasn’t made for a good buyer’s market but rest assured that we are out there pounding the pavement and working those phones quite a bit to try to bring something to the club that we know will help.”
The lack of sellers could make for an interesting deadline. At this point, there are only a few obvious sellers – the A’s, Royals and Rockies among them – but their tradable assets are mostly uninspiring. That could result in massive bidding wars for the higher-end players who actually are available, while other players could command more in a trade than they otherwise would because of the dearth of options.
In any event, the Marlins are shaping up to be buyers, and that’s only a good thing.
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