A Decade Like No Other: The Marlins and the 2010s, Part 2
This is Part Two of an ongoing, 10-part series chronicling the Florida/Miami Marlins’ tumultuous journey through the 2010s. If you have questions, comments, suggestions, or you just want to chat, feel free to reach out to me on Twitter at @baseball_focus! Thank you so much for your support.
2011: Rise, Fall … Repeat?
If nonsense was the Marlins’ good friend in 2010, then it became their closest bedfellow in 2011. Before players could even get to camp for spring training, the fates threw a small wrench into their season plans.
The Marlins were slated to play the Seattle Mariners at home in June of that year. Though neither team was anything to write home about, the matchup would be a rare treat for Marlins fans, who hadn’t had the chance to see the Mariners play at Sun Life Stadium since 2005.
See, this was back before there were only 14 teams in the American League and 16 teams in the National League, so interleague play was a special occasion rather than a regular occurrence. Each division faced their league counterparts once every year on a rotating schedule, with teams alternating home-field privileges every three years. The Marlins had last faced the AL West in 2008. They made the trek up to Seattle that year, so in 2011, it was the Mariners’ turn to pay a visit to the Sunshine State.
But of course, things are never as easy as they seem with this team. As it turned out, the multipurpose venue that the Marlins played in was already booked … for a U2 concert. The stadium was to undergo concert preparations during the scheduled series, and so it shifted back to Seattle.
The Marlins still batted last and received gate for the games, but instead of a small crowd of home fans cheering them on, they had a small crowd of dedicated Mariners fans rooting for their failure.
And if we’re being honest, getting pushed out of your own stadium by U2 of all bands is just a smidge humiliating. Any other band outside of maybe Maroon 5 would have been acceptable, but having to vacate for the generics of U2 is not an optimal start to a campaign.
Even as workers installed the first seats into Marlins Park in mid-February, an aura of resignation hung around the organization at spring training. Swapping Dan Uggla for Omar Infante in the offseason damaged an already mediocre offense, leaving run production in the hands of an increasingly frustrated Hanley Ramirez, two unproven sophomores, and a former Rookie of the Year coming off of knee surgery in the form of Chris Coghlan.
To their credit, though, the Marlins defied expectations. After starting the season 5–5, they pieced together a stellar run of form that saw them finish April 16–9, 1.5 games behind the Philadelphia Phillies for first in the NL East.
The success was due in large part to a heroic effort by the pitching staff. While the offense sputtered to a mediocre 96 wRC+ through the first 25 games, the arms ranked fifth in ERA (3.16), seventh in FIP (3.62), ninth in strikeout rate (19.5%), and ninth in fWAR (3.3).
It was thanks in large part to the magnificent performance of Josh Johnson, who managed a 1.64 ERA through his first nine starts before shoulder problems sent him to the sidelines.
Even as wins became somewhat fewer and further between in May, the Marlins kept themselves within striking distance of the division lead, never falling more than three games out of first.
In fact, the Marlins were relevant enough to earn themselves a streaker, who, on May 18, dashed around the outfield to the delight of all in attendance before he was ultimately subdued by security.
Look at that! What a sight! Fun Marlins baseball!
A season once shrouded in doubt and dismay now seemed like an opportunity ripe for the picking.
If only the Marlins knew the calamitous history they would soon make.
“Former Marlin…”
Even as the players reveled in good fortune on the diamond, the franchise still couldn't quite escapetroublesome news.
While the team rounded out April’s surprise start, 1997 World Series MVP Livan Hernandez, then pitching for the Washington Nationals, was implicated in a drug trafficking and money laundering scheme. Evidence in the trial of Puerto Rican drug dealer Angel Ayala Vazquez suggested that Hernandez had acted as “straw buyer” for Vazquez, purchasing property and possessions for him under his own name.
Federal investigation of the matter continued into July, and Hernandez faced plenty of scrutiny, marring his reputation as a franchise icon.
Such is the nature of being a Marlin. The sacred memories of good times past can were not immune to the clutches of instability.
Not even the present moment could outrun it.
An Indelible Mark
When the Marlins arrived in San Francisco for a three-game set against the Giants on May 24, they were in about as good a spot as they could have hoped for. Though they hadn’t quite kept up with their scorching April pace, their 26–19 record left them just 1.5 games behind the Phillies for the top spot in the division and in firm control of the Wild Card spot.
And after a 5–1 series-opening win, the Marlins looked primed to continue cruising along.
The following game, though, marked a youth showdown: Scorching hot sophomores Giancarlo Stanton and Logan Morrison squaring off against 2010 World Series champions Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner. With two Rookie of the Year awards and an average age of just 22 years, 303 days between the four of them, it looked as though MLB’s future was on full display.
The youngsters lived up to the hype. Bumgarner tossed six innings of three-run ball, striking out six while Stanton and Morrison went a combined 7-for-11 with two doubles, four RBI, and two runs scored in a 12-inning thriller.
But that evening, it was Posey who stole the headlines, and for the most gut-wrenching of reasons.
With one out in the top of the 12th and the game tied 6–6, the Marlins found themselves with men on first and third and a prime opportunity to retake the lead they had squandered in the ninth.
Emilio Bonafacio stepped into the batter’s box to face Guillermo Mota. On a 2–2 pitch, Bonafacio skied a ball into shallow right-center field. Scott Cousins, who had reached following a forceout at second base as a pinch-hitter just two batters earlier, waited eagerly at third base as right fielder Nate Schierholtz set up camp under the ball.
Ball met glove, and Cousins was off to the races.
Schierholtz’s one-hopper pulled Posey slightly, crucially, toward the first-base side.
He didn’t even control the ball as he went to apply the tag.
It was not fun. It was not beautiful. It was not gritty.
It was gruesome.
The image of one of baseball’s brightest young stars writhing on the ground in agony remains among the most heartbreaking moments in the sport’s lengthy history.
The collision left Posey with a fractured fibula, multiple torn ligaments in his ankle, and the rest of his age-24 season lost to recovery, which included multiple surgeries and screws inserted into his leg.
It sent shockwaves through the baseball community. Giants manager Bruce Bochy, a former catcher himself, felt a change was necessary.
“…We have to consider something that would protect these guys from runners coming with that kind of force.” May 2011 (ESPN)
Brian Sabean, the team’s general manager, was far more critical of Cousins.
“If I never hear from Cousins again, or he doesn’t play another day in the big leagues, I think we’ll all be happy … If that’s his flash of fame, that’s as good as it’s going to get, pal. We’ll have a long memory.” June 2011 (ESPN)
Marlins teammates rushed to his defense, especially Logan Morrison, who took offense to Sabean's harsh comments. But that didn’t stop Giants fans from sending Cousins, a lifelong Giants fan himself, death threats in the aftermath of the incident.
In a statement he released a week after the clash, he was apologetic, but not repentant, maintaining that though what he did was violent, it was also within the laws of the game.
Therein was the problem. What Cousins had done looked and felt undeniably wrong, yet by the book, it was perfectly legal.
And so the book changed.
MLB made sweeping changes to rules surrounding collisions at the plate. Catchers were no longer allowed to block the dish without possession of the ball, and subsequently, baserunners were forbidden from acting as heat-seeking missiles when trying to score.
The Posey Rule was approved in December 2013, ensuring that the 2011 Marlins left their permanent stamp on the game of baseball.
Collapse
If there’s one thing that I’ve learned so far in my brief study of the Marlins, it’s that they are a franchise in flux. The Marlins are locked in a constant, interminable struggle with stability, and there can be no winner.
Though Cousins and the Marlins tried their best to move on, it quickly became evident that forces beyond our understanding were out to make them pay in full for the blood that they spilled.
From April right up until the collision, the Marlins were legitimate playoff contenders.
At the end of that fateful game, they were 28–19 and in full control of their season.
Then they did this:
After finishing May 31–22, they amassed a 5–23 (.179) record in June, winning back-to-back games just once (June 29 and 30). From June 1 to June 20, the Marlins went 1–19.
19 losses in 20 games. To this day, it stands as the worst 20-game run in franchise history.
And during that stretch, they became the baseball embodiment of Murphy’s Law.
Ace starter Josh Johnson failed to make a single start as he continued to battle shoulder inflammation. When he first went down in mid-May, the team was targeting a June 1 return. By the time the streak ended, he was practically done for the season.
Star shortstop Hanley Ramirez also missed time due to lower back pain. When he returned from a two-week hiatus on June 14, he was nothing short of a liability. In the seven games he played between his return and the team’s next win, he went 2-for-19 with a .385 OPS, bringing his season slash line to .200/.298/.295, the worst it would be all year.
Even rising star Logan Morrison wasn’t immune to the malaise. Between June 1 and June 20, he saw his OPS drop from .973 to .847, an alarming trend that would only continue as the season went on.
For Morrison, the decline started exactly one day after team president and noted wet blanket David Samson publicly expressed his concern over his Twitter usage.
“I’m not a dinosaur, but I’m not thrilled. It’s very scary to me. I’ve told Logan, ‘People are waiting for you to make a mistake. They’re going to bait you on Twitter to say something inappropriate that you can never take back. It takes an entire career to build a reputation, and one tweet to lose it. As long as he understands that, it’s fine.” — May 2011 (ESPN)
It’s hard to keep playing your best baseball when your team can’t win to save their lives and the brass doesn’t want you to engage with fans, let alone be who you want to be.
This streak started with displeasure. As it continued, displeasure turned into disbelief, until disbelief finally turned into dejection.
On June 19, a year to the day from the vuvuzela incident that likely contributed to Fredi Gonzalez’s firing, Edwin Rodriguez resigned as manager of the Florida Marlins. In a three-week stretch, his team had gone from 31–22 and in a playoff spot to 32–40 and dead last in the division.
Rodriguez never managed an MLB game again.
In truth, it’s entirely reasonable to attribute some of this putrid run of play to fatigue. After all, the Marlins played those 20 games in just 19 days. It’s hard to catch a break when you can’t catch a break.
Still, it was unprecedented. Great teams thrive off of the grind. Good teams survive it and bad teams struggle through it, but all of them make it through, one way or another.
Only the cursed teams languish.
Old Friends
For reasons known only to Jeffery Loria and God, the Marlins chose to replace Rodriguez with 80-year-old franchise legend Jack McKeon. Perhaps Loria hoped that McKeon could save the sinking ship as he had in 2003 when he took the Marlins from last in the NL East to World Series glory. Regardless, the Marlins acted swiftly and decisively.
There were, however, some … notable … difference between 2003 and 2011.
In 2003, McKeon took over a middling team with squandered talent. In 2011, he was handed an injury-riddled roster that had reached terminal velocity in its freefall.
In 2003, the Marlins still had 124 games left to close a seven-game gap. In 2011, the Marlins had just 90 left to play to close that same gap plus a game-and-a-half more.
In 2003, McKeon was 72 and only a few years removed from his last game managed. In 2011, he was 80 and hadn’t managed in MLB in more than half a decade.
None of these red flags bothered the Marlins, though, and so he was hired.
The christening of his second stint with the Marlins came less than a week after he was hired when he received the great privilege of managing as the home side while playing in another team’s stadium.
Indeed, McKeon was the one on the top step of the dugout as his team dropped two of their three home games at Safeco Field, including a 10-inning 2–1 heartbreaker that I personally believe should be considered a Mariners walk-off simply for how stupid it was.
Having tied the game in the eighth inning, the Marlins found themselves with the rare opportunity to walk-off on another team’s field. All they had to do was survive the top half of the 10th.
As you can probably guess, this task was far easier said and never done.
Second-year reliever Steve Cishek got the ball for the first frame of extra innings and immediately coughed up a leadoff double to Dustin Ackley, putting the go-ahead run in scoring position with nobody out.
He rebounded and squeezed a flyout of former Marlin Miguel Olivo, but Ackley tagged up, leaving Cishek with a runner on third and two more outs to get from the bottom-third of the batting order.
Rather than take his chances against Carlos Peguero, a rookie with a .687 OPS through 128 career plate appearances entering the game, McKeon opted for an intentional walk in the hopes of setting up a double play.
Balls one and two made it to their destination safe and sound.
Ball 3 did…
That.
Cishek eventually retired the side, the Marlins failed to push across the tying run, and they lost at home on the road for the second time in three days.
After the game, McKeon, a baseball elder, was in shock.
“I’ve never had it happen to me in 60 years.” — June 2011 (FOX)
Only the Marlins.
July rolled around, and with it came much better baseball. With a new manager at the helm and the pressure to grab a playoff spot effectively gone, the Marlins found their stride. It’s not hard to outperform a five-win month, but this turnaround was genuinely impressive.
They won eight of their first 11 games. After a three-game sweep of the Washington Nationals late in the month, they found themselves one game below .500, their pride within reach.
A visit to Atlanta put them back in their place.
In their three-game set at Turner field, the Marlins fell not just to their rivals, but at the hands of two familiar friends: Fredi Gonzalez and Dan Uggla.
See, Gonzalez, who was fired by the Marlins, had taken the vacancy left by Braves icon and mentor, Bobby Cox, who was snubbed by the Marlins on his retirement tour in 2010. Baseball is twisty like that.
Anyway, the Braves, right in the thick of the playoff hunt thanks to Gonzalez’s managing, were still riding the high of the now-infamous Jerry Meals miscall (or was it?) in the 19th inning of their game against the Pittsburgh Pirates just a few days earlier, so they were keen on keeping the momentum going.
And it was not just Uggla, but everyone involved in the Uggla trade that played a role in the Marlins’ series-opening 5–0 loss. Mired in the worst season of his career, Uggla showed signs of his Marlins self when he smacked a seventh-inning three-run home run to break a scoreless deadlock. Mike Dunn coughed up two more in his lone inning of work and Omar Infante went hitless in four at-bats, sealing Florida’s fate.
The next day, Uggla managed another three-run blast to lift the Braves to a 5–1 victory.
Though the Marlins won the July 31 series finale, the Braves would unsurprisingly go on to win six of the last nine meetings between the two teams to solidify a 12–6 record in the season series.
Three of those wins came from a sweep at Sun Life Stadium a week later in which Uggla managed to maintain what would eventually end up as a 33-game hitting streak, the longest in the majors that year. If only the Marlins had a guy like that to help carry the offense.
Watching a fan-favorite torch his former team is never an easy task. Having that pain compounded by the loss of another fan-favorite is almost impossible to endure.
Yet that’s exactly what happened when the ever-popular Logan Morrison was conspicuously demoted to Triple-A New Orleans on August 13.
Though Morrison was still in a bit of a funk at the plate, the team made it abundantly clear that his demotion wasn’t just about his performance; it was about his character too. He had chosen to skip an event for season-ticket holders following the team’s August 13 game against the Giants, much to the chagrin of the front office.
“We just thought it was in the best interests of Logan to go down and concentrate on baseball and all aspects of being a major leaguer, and work his way back.” — GM Larry Beinfest, August 2011 (CBS)
That thinly-veiled comment about focusing on “all aspects of being a major leaguer” didn’t sit well with Morrison, who filed a grievance against the club in mid-September.
It looked especially suspicious alongside Samson’s warning about Morrison’s perceived excessive Twitter usage back in May:
“I’ve told Logan no one will care about his tweets if they’re coming from New Orleans.” — May 2011 (ESPN)
Morrison’s stint in Triple-A was short-lived, but it permanently damaged his relationship with the club. It was also a very on-brand move for what turned out to be another month best left forgotten.
It was bad enough that the Marlins were already fighting a war against the slump that had been hounding them since the Posey collision. For them to have started another fight with one of the franchise’s most popular players just a few days removed from watching a former star rack up hits against them for their rivals was completely unnecessary, but sadly not altogether unexpected.
Dog Days
If the Marlins received grades for their monthly performances in the summer of 2011, they likely would have gone as follows:
June: 5–23, F
July: 17–10, A-
August: 7–20, F+
Somehow, the Marlins managed to bookend a respectable 17–10 July campaign with two of the worst single-month performances in franchise history.
If June was pathetic, then August was just as depressing. And it could all be summarized by one wholly disheartening plate appearance.
If you’re reading this, chances are you’re at least somewhat of an SB Nation fan, which means you’ve likely seen this video by Jon Bois about Giants reliever Santiago Casilla’s trip to the dish against Jose Ceda. You know how this turns out. What I’d like to contend is that this, moreso than any of the other misfortunes the Marlins suffered in 2011, was divine retribution for the Posey collision.
As Jon details in the video, Ceda was a subpar relief pitcher, but a professional nonetheless, and considering Casilla’s posture for what was literally his first professional at-bat, there was no reason for Ceda not to sit him down on strikes.
I mean, seriously:
Neither of Casilla’s feet are completely inside the batter’s box as the ball crosses home plate. This, like Jon says, should be the easiest out of Ceda’s life.
But it’s not. Ceda walks him on four straight pitches, none of which came particularly close to the strike zone.
Personally, considering that this happened against the Giants of all teams, I think this was Florida’s final act of penance. I think that no matter what Ceda did that afternoon on August 14, 2011, the fates had conspired to make this walk happen.
Ceda handled the other three batters he faced (Aaron Rowand, Eli Whiteside, and Cody Ross) on just 15 pitches, but this particular walk against this particular “hitter” was out of his control.
Ceda had nothing to do with Posey’s injury, and he would never see the field again by the time that Posey fully recovered. He just happened to be the unfortunate conduit through which the universe exacted its humiliating revenge on the Marlins.
Hurricane Season
NOAA data shows that hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean typically starts at the beginning of June and ends with the last days of November. In that six-month time frame, the South Atlantic (Florida in particular), should expect to bear the brunt of Mother Nature’s fury.
The Marlins had already suffered through their own metaphorical hurricane in June, but while they were weathering the tropical storm of their 7–20 performance in August, the real deal came dangerously close in the form of Hurricane Irene.
Irene caused nearly $16 billion in damage and took the lives of 48 people when all was said and done. Florida was fortunate enough to avoid direct impact, but it still received torrential rains as the storm ravaged its way up the East Coast.
Those rains forced the Marlins to move their August 25 game against the Cincinnati Reds up a day, thus creating a doubleheader whose first leg drew a whopping 347 fans.
For all of their attendance issues, it’s simply unfair to hold that triple-digit attendance number against the Marlins considering it was the result of, you know, a hurricane. With Irene rapidly approaching, it was unlikely the game would have drawn that many folks to begin with, not to mention that moving the game up gave those who did plan on attending less time to adjust their schedules to accommodate a day game.
This was also a matchup of two teams hopelessly far out of the playoff picture.
Still, that number combined with the violent weather had folks asking about the sustainability of Florida baseball. Had it not been for the roofed stadium the Marlins planned on moving into the following year, those questions might have carried some weight.
Fortunately for baseball fans, the Marlins have stuck around, and though there wasn’t much to smile about in 2011, they would end up producing some of the league’s most exciting talents in the years to come.
Stantonian Step
One of those talents, Giancarlo Stanton, was already well on his way to full development. After his modest rookie showing, Stanton flashed his terrifying power on a consistent basis in 2011.
Month after month, Stanton handed out souvenirs to the loyal Marlins fans who continued to show up to games. He started slowly with just a .776 OPS through April, but after that, he became the lifeblood of the offense.
From May 1 straight through to the end of the season, Stanton ripped 32 of his 34 total home runs, drove in 78, and hit to the tune of a .387 wOBA and 144 wRC+.
He was the only player on the team to eclipse four-win value, finishing the year worth 4.2 fWAR. Stanton was also one of just two players with an OPS north of .800 — He finished at .893 while Burke Badenhope, a pitcher with eight plate appearances, ended the season at .804.
In a year where so little had gone right, he was the shining beacon of hope for the franchise. Even as Morrison fell by the wayside, he stood tall.
If nothing else, the fans at least deserved that.
Remember September?
By the end of August, the Marlins’ season was toast. Having all but eliminated themselves back in June, all that was left to do was play out the remainder of the schedule.
Of course, that didn’t stop them from influencing the playoff picture. In a moment of magnanimity, Clay Hensley graciously assisted the Milwaukee Brewers in their quest for the NL Central crown by surrendering a late three-run home run to Ryan Braun on September 23.
Three days later, having done his best to save a team in crisis, Jack McKeon announced that he would be retiring from baseball at season’s end. In the end, he managed a modest 40–50 record with the Marlins that year which, all things considered, was about as good as the organization could have hoped for.
On September 28, the Marlins took the field at Sun Life Stadium for the last time. A crowd of 34,615 showed up on a Wednesday afternoon to watch fourth-year Marlin Chris Volstad toss a quality start in a 3–1 loss to Stephen Strasburg and the Nationals.
The loss marked the end of Volstad’s time with the organization, the end of Marlins baseball at Sun Life, and the end of the Marlins’ brand. As the team prepared to move into their new stadium in Miami, they left behind a legacy ranging from a franchise-worst 108-loss season in 1998 to two World Series wins in 1997 and 2003.
That same day, the Marlins announced a trade for Chicago White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen. Guillen, who was a coach on the ’03 squad, would take over as manager in 2012, making him the first to hold the position for the soon-to-be Miami Marlins.
If that had been all September held for the Marlins, it would have been a much-needed, optimistic end to a tumultuous season.
But, as we’ve learned, this is a franchise unaccustomed to peace, quiet, and things going right for more than a few days at a time.
Logos and Names
The Marlins had been preparing for their move to Miami for nearly three years by September of 2011, and they’d had plenty of time to deliberate on their rebrand. Naturally, expectations were high for a team moving into the heart of such a vibrant city.
About a week before the final game of the season, though, a picture of the proposed logo leaked on the internet six weeks before the official unveiling on November 11, and the response from fans was, uh, less than ideal.
According to NBC Miami, Darren Rovell fielded a poll asking people’s opinions on the new mark. 50.4% called it “horrendous” while only 1% considered it “great.”
When the majority of a surveyed group thinks your logo is an abomination against all humankind, you’ve probably made an uncool logo.
Orange, gold, and blue made for what I will generously call an interesting color scheme, one that clashed horribly with the neon green walls that would line the field of play for years to come. But the organization remained steadfast when they officially revealed their new brand to the world that November, and so it was for the next foreseeable future.
However, while the baseball world poked fun at the logo as they do with all rebrands, far more pressing matters soon developed.
Just a few days after the leak, a report from the Associated Press revealed that Marlins reliever Leo Nunez was not who he said he was. His real name was Juan Carlos Oviedo, and he had used a friend’s name from the Dominican Republic in order to play in MLB.
As it turned out, he was also allegedly a year older than his listed age.
Oviedo had to leave the team and return to the Dominican Republic in order to deal with the matter, and his situation in baseball was not resolved until May of 2012, when MLB suspended him for eight weeks.
He would never pitch for the Marlins again.
Great Expectations
With the move to Miami fast approaching and wanting to avoid a flop of an offseason like the year prior, the Marlins made a massive free agent splash.
Between December 5 and December 9, the Marlins took the Winter Meetings by storm, signing Heath Bell, Jose Reyes, and Mark Buerhle to multi-year deals. Bell and Reyes were both fresh off of All-Star campaigns with the Padres and Mets, respectively, and Buerhle’s 3.59 ERA in 2011 was his lowest mark since 2005.
In less than a week, the Marlins had brought in an elite closer, the reigning NL batting champion, and a five-time All-Star veteran ace to help Josh Johnson carry the rotation. By signing the three of them, the they had shown a commitment to winning.
It didn’t come cheap, though. The three stars signed contracts worth a combined $191 million, with former Mets shortstop bringing in the bulk of the money on his six-year, $106 million deal.
The Marlins even reportedly offered marquee free agent Albert Pujols a $275 million deal, though he ultimately signed for the Los Angeles Angels on a decade-long, $240 million contract (bullet dodged, yeah?).
Reyes’ deal also meant that Hanley Ramirez, who was becoming increasingly disgruntled with the team, would have to move to third. Ramirez wasn’t coy about not wanting to move to the hot corner. He repeatedly stated that he wouldn’t move to accommodate Reyes, and the problem didn’t look like it was going to go away.
But that was an issue for another day. As it stood, the Marlins had put themselves back on the fast track to success. After a humiliating season filled with missteps and misfortune, the future looked bright.
The Magic City beckoned.
Part Three: 2012 to be released no later than January 4, 2021.
UPDATE: The Release of Part Three has been pushed back by at least 10 days due to extenuating circumstances. I apologize for the delay :(
Sources
Hey, fun stuff! Here’s where I found all of the information and quotes in this article:
All stats and attendance info via Baseball-Reference and Fangraphs
U2 and Home Away from Home: https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6065119, https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6125244, https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/sports/marlins-streaker-captures-the-hearts-of-thousands/1875719/
“Former Marlin…”: https://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/miami-marlins/sfl-livan-hernandez-linked-to-drug-trafficker-042811-story.html, https://www.sbnation.com/2011/6/13/2221543/court-transcripts-livan-hernandez-possible-involvement-money-laundering
An Indelible Mark: https://www.masslive.com/sports/2011/05/what_does_the_posey_injury_mea.html, https://www.businessinsider.com/buster-posey-injured-in-violent-home-plate-collision-2011-5, https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6605589. https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6623896, https://www.sfgate.com/giants/jenkins/article/Buster-Posey-s-injury-provokes-anger-reflection-2369745.php, https://www.mlb.com/news/mlb-institutes-new-rule-on-home-plate-collisions/c-68267610
Collapse: https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6611550, https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6677981, https://www.sbnation.com/2011/6/14/2223595/josh-johnson-injury-marlins, https://www.espn.com/mlb/news/story?id=6681396, https://miami.cbslocal.com/2011/06/20/marlins-hire-mckeon-on-interim-basis/,
Old Friends: https://www.sbnation.com/2011/6/27/2246148/mariners-marlins-series-seattle-news-recap, https://miami.cbslocal.com/2011/06/20/marlins-hire-mckeon-on-interim-basis/, https://www.foxsports.com/stories/mlb/marlins-fall-on-intentional-walk-wild-pitch, https://www.lookoutlanding.com/2017/2/24/14722942/seattle-mariners-intentional-walk-i-still-believe-in-dustin-ackley, https://www.palmbeachpost.com/sports/baseball/dan-uggla-hits-another-three-run-homer-against-former-team-beat-florida-marlins/EOxEi2EDQMOUhEqcKHW7tO/, https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/1675009, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/marlins-logan-morrison-demoted-for-tweets/
Dog Days: https://www.sbnation.com/2011/8/15/2364354/santiago-casilla-batting-video-jose-ceda-giants-marlins
Hurricane Season: https://nesn.com/2011/08/marlins-reds-game-draws-estimated-347-fans-ushering-in-new-low-for-florida-baseball/, https://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/hurricane-irene-poor-baseball-fan-counts-people-stands-florida-marlins-game-347-article-1.945818, https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/hurricane-irene-year-storm-cost-15-8-damage-florida-new-york-caribbean-article-1.1145302, https://www.climatecentral.org/news/hurricane-irene-ranked-most-costly-category-1-storm
Remember September?: https://www.wiscnews.com/bdc/sports/baseball/professional/brauns-blast-sends-brewers-into-postseason-as-nl-central-champs/article_c78ac5de-e672-11e0-b54e-001cc4c002e0.html, https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/7023613/florida-marlins-skipper-jack-mckeon-says-retiring-end-season, https://bleacherreport.com/articles/867313-breaking-news-chicago-white-sox-manager-ozzie-guillen-traded-to-florida-marlins
Logos and Names: https://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/fl-xpm-2011-09-23-fl-marlins-leo-nunez-0924-20110923-story.html, https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/leo-nunez-faces-criminal-charges/1883758/, https://miamiherald.typepad.com/flapanthers/2011/09/miami-marlins-logo-leaked-now-with-onfrozenpoll.html, https://www.nbcmiami.com/news/sports/new-marlins-logo-leaked-on-internet-2/1883517/
Great Expectations: https://www.mlb.com/marlins/roster/transactions/2011/12, https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/, https://www.espn.com/los-angeles/mlb/story/_/id/7330066/st-louis-cardinals-albert-pujols-join-los-angeles-angels, https://www.businessinsider.com/you-wont-believe-how-much-money-albert-pujols-turned-down-from-the-marlins-2011-12
