The Marlins lost more than a baseball game on Friday night. In addition to falling to the Dodgers (LAD 7, MIA 1), the Marlins lost slugger Giancarlo Stanton to injury. He suffered a broke bone in his left hand during a swing in the sixth inning. The team has not officially announced anything yet, but our Jon Heyman has confirmed the news:
There are a lot of tiny, easy-to-break bones in your hand, and they can take several weeks to heal. (Stanton is expected to miss 4-6 weeks.) And they have to heal too; there's no playing through this type of injury. You can't swing the bat properly if you can't grip the bat properly.
Friday's loss dropped the Marlins to 30-45 on the season, which has been a massive disappointment to date. The team fired manager Mike Redmond a few weeks ago and replaced him with general manager Dan Jennings in a curious move that, so far, has not helped things. If anything, the move has made their situation worse.
Miami is now 11 1/2 games back in the NL East and 10 1/2 games back of a wild-card spot, so climbing back into the race with Stanton was going to be tough. Doing it without MLB's home-run (27) and RBI (67) leader will be close to impossible. FanGraphs has their postseason odds at a mere 0.7 percent. Yikes.
If the Marlins weren't planning to sell before the trade deadline -- there were zero indications they were -- the Stanton injury should push them in that direction. It's a tough pill to swallow, especially after their busy offseason, but it's the best move for the franchise. There's no sense in keeping some of these players, especially the impending free agents. Miami definitely has some desirable pieces to offer:
- Dan Haren: Workhorse veteran righty with a 3.38 ERA (114 ERA+) in 15 starts and 93 1/3 innings this season. He's due to become a free agent after the season. Would the pitching-thin Dodgers have interest in bringing him back? They're paying his salary, after all.
- Mat Latos: Another impending free agent starter, which is the type of player who is always popular at the trade deadline. Latos has a 5.49 ERA (70 ERA+) overall, but has been much better of late (4.12 ERA in June) and his velocity has returned:
- Jeff Baker: Baker is another free agent-to-be, and while he is only a utility player, he's a lefty masher, hitting .297/.352/.513 (129 OPS+) against southpaws in his career (and a 125 OPS+ in 2015). Surely a contender would give up a prospect to add Baker to their bench for the stretch run, right?
- Ichiro Suzuki: Ichiro! Ichiro is best used as a fourth outfielder at this point of his career, though he's still a bat control freak and is hitting a respectable .275 with a .325 on-base percentage this year (zero power, however). Plus he's Ichiro. He'll help sell tickets.
- Martin Prado: Prado could be tough to trade. For starters, he's had a really disappointing year, hitting just .272/.311/.370 (89 OPS+), plus he's now on the DL with a shoulder injury and will miss several weeks. Prado's also owed $8 million next year, which isn't a ton in today's game, but it's not nothing either.
- Mike Dunn: Dunn would be a very popular trade piece as a hard-throwing left-handed reliever who is under team control as an arbitration-eligible player in 2016. His ERA is inflated this season (4.68), but teams will look at the strikeouts (9.0 K/9), the velocity (averages 94.6 mph) and the lefty dominance (53 OPS+ against) and see a big bullpen upgrade. There should be a ton of interest in Dunn.
The Marlins could try to move some other pieces (Michael Morse? Steve Cishek? David Phelps?) but those six names above seem to be the most likely trade candidates. That assumes Miami won't look to move youngsters like Christian Yelich, Dee Gordon, Adeiny Hechavarria and Marcell Ozuna.
Losing Stanton is a huge blow to the Marlins and a big blow to all baseball fans who love seeing long home runs. Baseball is less fun without Stanton. The Marlins were pretty much out of the race without their franchise player and his injury all but confirms it. The best thing for them right now is selling off veteran pieces at the trade deadline and re-stocking the farm system, especially since there appear to be so few sellers. This is a chance to take advantage of the market.