Hell of a play there by Wiggington... he could easily fill a Sean Berry/Spiers type role with this team.
web gem. does albers step in for samspon? do we have the worst rotation in the majors outside of oswalt?
Is it me or is Oswalt just throwing serious heat non stop? Everything is 94-96mph in the 6th inning. He's not even mixing it up much, very uncharacteristic of him. So much for the people that claimed in old threads he had lost a bit on his fastball.
Lane had good plate discipline to walk in that run, and of course, Brunt is having a nice night. 2 more innings!
I know this is a tad off topic. I believe they said the attendance was 3500. Why the heck did Florida get 2 expansion teams in the 90's? Who did their market research? More baffeling is that the Marlins have won 2 World Series in their limited time and we've never won one as of many othe teams. Then you have Tampa Bay who doesn't like breaking the 30 million/year team threshold. They'd rather just collect revenue sharing money from teams like the RedSox and Yankees for free. I'd be all for a minimum salary cap if there's not gonna be a max cap. I understand the Marlins money problems since they don't benefit on consession sales, which are teams bread and butter. But what Tampa Bay's excuse? Why can't we just contract the both of them or combine them into one team represnting Florida.
Because Florida is a baseball hotbed (lots of retirees that love the game), and its not like Miami and Tampa are small cities that don't support other major sports. The main problem with the Marlins isn't the team... its the stadium. Joe Robbie is a football stadium that is isolated far away from the things that make Miami a tourist destination. Additionally, given the climate/rain, the fact that its taken so long for them to get a retractable roof stadium (or that they were given a team without a new stadium plan in place) are major problems. A lot of the way they've done business has been because of the lack of a new stadium in place. A retractable roof palace in Coconut Grove, or even in Downtown by the bay, would be a spectacular place to have a baseball stadium. (and would lead to more fans). Tampa's main problem also includes their stadium (but at least they got a roof). Additionally, the majority of Tampa consists of lifelong Yankees fans (hence their home-base/spring training for years). Whenever the Yankees play there, its about 70-30 FOR the Yankees.
I tend to agree. The decision to expand to Miami came before the big push for new baseball-only ballparks. Had that expansion decision been delayed as much as 5 years, I don't think they would have allowed a team to expand to a market that didn't already have a plan and funding mechanism for building a ballpark ready to go. What's the latest on their stadium situation? My understanding is the state keeps telling them there aren't any funds available for a new ballpark.
