[Florida Marlins News]

Great story here about the Florida Marlins playoff chances.

Marlins in the playoffs? Remarkable and possible
USATODAY.com

MIAMI — Let's hear it for the Florida Marlins. They're my fish. They're your fish. They should be everybody's fish.

All baseball patrons without loyalties nailed down for September's races should leap on the bandwagon. If you root against these guys, you'd root against Bambi. The under-funded, under-watched, under-aged Marlins are still skulking around the top of the wild card standings. The facts of life have not yet devoured them.

The Marlins announced this week they are printing playoff tickets. That's like Liechtenstein announcing it is producing a moon rocket. Who dreamed there'd ever be a need?

But our Marlins won't go away, even though they're paid pocket change — relative to the ATMs in other clubhouses. Even though some of the roster is not much older than a college frat man, and their wild card contention is contrary to baseball logic — which holds that big dreams require big money.

They may yet fall short against the Padres, Phillies, or other spoilers. It will have to be a team with richer payroll, older lineup and higher attendance, since everybody has those.

But there is still time, and hope, and there wasn't supposed to be either.

These guys have gained a fan in me - I love rooting for underdogs, especially when they have the lowest payroll in baseball! Anyone else here secretly or not so secretly rooting for the Florida Marlins to win the NL Wild Card? Plenty of room on the bandwagon, you know!

[EmpireWF]

It'd be a fun story but if they do win, it'd be reason number 1058 why the National League is so weak compared to the American League. I'll secrety root for them though, but I still think Philly will come away with the wild card.

[MJHMarc]

The Marlins just popped up this season and grabbed everyone's attention. With the arguments behind the season with Joe Giradi, Florida just ignores it and surprisingly wins a handful of games.

As with your thoughts above regarding the Phillies, they have a great team as the NL East remains strong and full of quality players. Alfonso Soriano is a key aspect of the Nationals, but they haven't contributed enough as a team to advance to the Playoffs. The Phillies has some other key players, such as Ryan Howard and Pat Burrell. It was a smart move to make room for Howard by sending away Jim Thome who had a great season, but not comparable to Howard in his second-full season. Representing the Marlins is Dan Uggla? I haven't followed their roster at all this past year.

[ThePundit]

Why be secret about it? Now if you were rooting for Barry Bonds to break Aaron, that's something to be secret about.

[Lefty Noob]

Here's the Marlins current situation. They are, according to the AP, one of six teams in the Wild Card race, all of whom separated by five games or less. There are 16 games left on their schedule (6 home, 10 away) - at Atlanta (3), today-Sunday; at N.Y. Mets (4), Monday-Thursday; at Philadelphia (3), Sept. 22-24; vs. Cincinnati (3), Sept. 26-28; vs. Philadelphia (3), Sept. 29-Oct. 1. Do they still have any realistic chance of making the playoffs?

[ThePundit]

I really don't think so. They had 2 devastating losses to the Mets. I'm surprised they lasted this long and they deserve a hell of a lot of credit. Girardi has to be the manager of the year in the NL - hands down.

[MJHMarc]

How he is the best manager of the league, but his team doesn't make the Playoffs?

[Lefty Noob]

Because he's done so much with so little - a miniscule payroll, a group of kids who are overachieving and no front office support whatsoever. But it does look more an more like Florida might not make the playoffs this season, especially with yesterday's 2-1 loss to the Braves. Florida is now in a tie for third in the Wild Card race with two weeks to play. Not looking good for the fish.