WHEN THINGS GO BAD

It started over the winter; the team was eagerly looking forward to the new season, the new stadium and the new players, even a new name! It looked like a major player, and perhaps a dynasty was forming from the free agency list and the $106 million contract that Jose Reyes signed.

$106 million Reyes

Everything would be different, the look, the colors even the fiery manager, controversially speaking it would draw interest to the team, peak the public’s interest and draw TV revenues too. The stadium would be the state of the art, a fun place to go. The Miami team signed Jose Reyes, Mark Buehrle and Heath Bell ($27 million) in the most productive winter meetings in franchise history.

"There's nothing to celebrate,' said owner Jeffrey Loria, "You celebrate in October. In December, you just try to put it together correctly.” But did they?

Jeff Oops Loria

After investing $191 million on three elite free agents, they still are not a playoff team. The top concerns are their last season main stay stars:  Josh Johnson's and Hanley Ramirez, and his move to third base in favor of Jose Reyes at third.

Hanley Ramirez

Then they send Ramirez packing off to the Dodgers and at this writing are 10 under .500, an explosive disappointment, languishing in 4^th or fifth place, with nowhere to go but down!

The park is a bizarre place to play the grand old game of baseball, the experiment if you will with Ramirez on third and Reyes at short did not work, there are not many games to save, and Jo Johnson although looking good, is 7-8!

The Marlins need to get Brian Cashman’s Yankee playbook and learn how to put together a team for big money.

Cashman

“I think it’s going to be an interesting October, a little different than the October we envisioned,’’ team president David Samson said. “Jeffrey is going to look at everything from me to Larry (Beinfest, baseball operations president) to Mike (Hill, general manager) to Ozzie (Guillen, manager) to (equipment manager) John Silverman. He’s angry and he should be.’’

That’s all I wrote, folks!