There’s nonsense, and then there’s nonsense. I don’t dispute that the Florida Marlins might be shopping Miguel Cabrera, but something here seems a bit, well, fishy:
Why would the Marlins, with the worst attendance in the game and desperately trying to land a stadium deal, unload their best player and one of the top hitters in baseball?
For one, Cabrera – who made $7.4 million last season – stands to make at least $10 million in arbitration this winter, a challenging price tag for a low-revenue team. Also, despite averaging 31 homers, 116 RBI and a .327 batting average the past three …read more

Fish Stripes reports that Wednesday’s game between the Washington Nationals and Florida Marlins drew 375 people. Both teams are pulling up the rear of the National League East, so low attendance should come as no surprise, but triple digits?
Two aspects of this story fascinate me:

The announced attendance was 10,121, but a photo from the game tells a very different story. Er, forget steroids for a moment; someone is cheating here, and it ain’t the players.
The Marlins are a great case study in the difficulties of promoting a team that has no identity. This is a franchise that came into existence …read more

Ozzie Guillen manages the Chicago White Sox. Miguel Cabrera plays (very well, I might add) for the Florida Marlins. Both hail from Venezuela.
Now Guillen is telling Cabrera to lose weight. Quoth the Chicago skipper:
When you’re getting older and you go down, they say you’re fat. Right now it’s, “Oh, he’s a little chubby. He likes to eat.” When you’re not hitting .340 with 40 home runs, they’re going to call you a fat boy from Venezuela. You’d better lose some weight.
This is sort of touching, but it’s also sort of weird. Like, it’s nice to see Guillen concerned about his …read more

Citing extreme thirstiness, the San Francisco Giants traded right-hander Armando Benitez on Thursday to the Florida Marlins for right-hander Randy Messenger and a glass of water to be named later. What’s in it for the Marlins? Quoth skipper Fredi Gonzalez: “We’re getting a guy that has that experience and our people think he can still do it.”
(Careful readers will note that Gonzalez didn’t specify what “it” is.)
If there’s anyone who can make Marlins fans forget Jorge Julio, it’s Benitez. As for folks in the Bay Area, no doubt they’re ecstatic over the departure of Benitez. At the very least, we …read more

Seems there’s a little storm brewing about a chat between New York Mets GM Omar Minaya and Florida Marlins third baseman Miguel Cabrera. On the one hand, I get the whole “appearance of impropriety” thing. On the other hand, get real. These guys are in the same line of work, and it seems natural that people will talk every once in a while. This “story” strikes me as a lot of noise, but who knows.
The other interesting item here, and it’s really just a footnote, is how much pitching talent the Mets have given away over the past several months. …read more

I’m guessing this isn’t what the Florida Marlins had in mind when they gave up promising young right-hander Yusmeiro Petit for Jorge Julio. Hey, at least he retired one of the seven batters he faced.