These themes were apparent in recent successful rebuilds. Are the Marlins following suit?
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Road to Reconstruction
The Miami marlins entered the offseason with the goal of improving their offense. They made additions, but will they be enough to push them into playoff contention?
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The Miami Marlins open the 2022 season against the San Francisco Giants on Friday, their fifth season since the Bruce Sherman ownership group bought the organization and the team’s latest rebuild began.
After years of toiling and selling hope and asking for patience, Miami knows the time has come for results to prevail.
Could this be the year things finally take shape on the big-league level?
There is precedent.
Five of the past seven World Series champions — the Atlanta Braves in 2021, Washington Nationals in 2019, Houston Astros in 2017, Chicago Cubs in 2016 and Kansas City Royals in 2015 — were the creation of rebuilds.
The timelines for winning it all varied among these five teams, but there is one constant: All five of those teams either won the World Series or began making the playoffs on a regular basis within five years of starting their rebuild.
So the Marlins should be on the clock at this point.
Now, the timing is merely the end result. And while not all rebuilds are created equal, there are tendencies that are consistent throughout these five that played a factor in each team’s success.
What are those themes, and are the Marlins following the path? Let’s take a look.
Hitting rock bottom while creating the foundation
The reigning World Series champions, the Braves, ended the 2014 season with a 79-83, which snapped a string of five consecutive winning seasons.
They bottomed out with three consecutive losing seasons of 90 or more losses from 2015 to 2017. During that time, they began assembling the team that would bring Atlanta its second ever championship including extending then-first baseman Freddie Freeman for eight years, signing Ronald Acuna Jr. a year after signing Ozzie Albies on the international market, drafting Mike Soroka, Ian Anderson, Austin Riley, and trading for Dansby Swanson and Max Fried.
After years of losing or mediocrity following the move from Montreal, the Nationals suffered back-to-back 100-plus loss seasons in 2008 and 2009. During a four-year span, they drafted core pieces of future success like Stephen Strasburg, Bryce Harper and Anthony Rendon and hung on to Ryan Zimmerman. Although the World Series title wouldn’t come until 2019, the Nationals experienced consistent playoff success by 2012.
The Astros sank even lower, losing more than 100 games for three consecutive seasons from 2011 to 2013 and going 70-92 in 2014. During that span, future MVP Jose Altuve and ace Dallas Keuchel made their debuts and the team drafted centerpieces such as Carlos Correa, George Springer and Alex Bregman in 2015 when they broke through to the postseason for the first time on their way to the 2017 championship.
The Cubs didn’t win more than 75 games in a season from 2010 to 2014 before a 26-win spike in 2015 and winning the World Series in 2016. During that span, they acquired Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, Javier Baez, Jake Arrieta, Kyle Hendricks, Miguel Montero and several key members of their bullpen during the championship season.
The Marlins perspective: Miami’s rebuild began before the 2018 season when it traded off the bulk of its high-profile players — Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich, Marcell Ozuna, Dee Strange-Gordon and, a year later, J.T. Realmuto — in order to build a weak minor-league system with prospects. Since then, the Marlins are 218-327 during the past four seasons and have lost at least 95 games in each of the three seasons in which a full 162 games have been played. They did make the expanded, 14-team playoffs in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
Winning the draft and international free agency
Successfully finding gems on the international market has been paramount as well.
The Braves are prime examples after signing Albies and Acuna Jr. in subsequent years just as the franchise hit rebuild mode. The Astros did the same with Altuve and have added key contributors such as Yuli Gurriel since. The Cubs did the same with Jorge Soler, now an outfielder with the Marlins, and Willson Contreras.
The Nationals have hit big in recent years with the signings of Juan Soto and Victor Robles.
You could point to the rebuild that led to the Kansas City Royals winning the World Series in 2015 and snapping the franchise out of a prolonged quagmire of losing to when they signed catcher Salvador Perez out of Venezuela in 2006.
But owning the draft — especially nailing your first-round picks — is a must.
In addition to the aforementioned example of the Braves’ draft success, the Royals drafted Alex Gordon in 2005, Mike Moustakas in 2007 and Eric Hosmer in 2008 — all in the first round — and all became starters on the teams that went to the World Series in 2014 and 2015. They also drafted starting pitcher Danny Duffy in the third round in 2007.
The Nationals drafted Strasburg in 2009, Harper in 2010 and Rendon in 2011 — three major successes — and even tabbed Lucas Giolito in 2012, whom they later traded for Adam Eaton. Erick Fedde, a starting pitcher on the 2019 title team, was also a first-round pick in 2014.
Correa, Bregman and Springer were all first-round picks for the Astros and Keuchel was a find in the seventh round in 2009 while Bryant and Baez each were first round hits for the Cubs.
▪ The Marlins perspective: None of the Marlins’ draft picks over the first four cycles under the Sherman ownership group has made a lasting impact in the big leagues at this point, but there is still time. Miami’s three most-recent first-round picks in outfielder JJ Bleday (No. 4 overall in 2019), right-handed pitcher Max Meyer (No. 3 overall in 2020) and shortstop Kahlil Watson (No. 16 overall in 2021) are among the top 70 prospects in baseball according to MLB Pipeline. Bleday and Meyer are starting 2022 in Triple A Jacksonville and could reach the big leagues this season. So, too, can outfielder Peyton Burdick, a third-round pick in 2019. Connor Scott, Miami’s first-round pick in 2018, was part of a package the Marlins sent to the Pittsburgh Pirates for catcher Jacob Stallings.
And while the signing of the Mesa brothers (Victor Victor and Victor Jr.) signaled Miami’s intention to make a splash on the international free agent market, it very well might be Eury Perez who becomes the first international prospect signed under this regime to make his MLB debut. Perez, who signed as an international free agent in 2019 and doesn’t turn 19 until April 5, broke onto the scene in his first season of professional baseball in 2021 and is slated to start the season in Double A.
Beefing up payroll once the core is created
Sherman said at the outset of spring training that the team has money and it will spend.
Teams that have shed their losing ways have needed to place themselves at least in the upper half of the major-leagues in terms of payroll in order to keep their respective cores intact or consistently win with newly acquired talent.
The Astros payroll ranged from 27th to 29th in baseball once they bottomed out from 2012 to 2015, according to Cots Baseball Contracts. Then their payroll jumped in 2016 to 21st overall, 17th in 2017 when they won the World Series and to ninth by 2018. Houston has sustained it in the top 10 in recent years and played in three World Series overall.
The Braves’ payroll dropped to 27th overall at $86.5 million in 2016 in the middle of their three-year patch of 90-plus loss seasons. But by the time they jumped back to contention it was among the upper tier in the majors. While not as gaudy as the Dodgers or Yankees, according to Cots Baseball Contracts, the Braves’ payroll was $131.4 million and ranked 14th in the majors last season when they won it all.
The Nationals went from being ranked 27th in payroll in 2009 to 21st by 2011 to 17th by 2012 — the first year they started making the playoffs during their eventual run to a championship. The 2019 World Series championship team had the fourth-highest payroll overall ($197.2 million) and they’ve been ranked 11th or higher since 2013.
The Royals had the lowest payroll overall ($38.17 million) when Hosmer and Perez debuted in 2011. It rose to 17th ($112.85 million) during their 2015 championship season and 15th the following two seasons. But after 81-81 and 80-82 seasons, the team slipped back to the bottom third of the majors after breaking up the core of their squad.
▪ The Marlins perspective: Miami’s Opening Day payroll has been in the bottom four of baseball each of the last three seasons — 29th in 2019, 27th in 2020 and 28th in 2021. Their projected Opening Day payroll for this season according to Cots Baseball Contracts is $76.4 million, about a $20 million increase from a year ago. It’s not necessarily a massive jump in terms of pure numbers but could signal the first step toward a steady increase. Whether it was a one-year jump or the beginning of a trend will be good to observe.
Acquisitions for the final push
The Braves completely retooled their outfield ahead of the deadline last season, acquiring Adam Duvall from the Marlins, Joc Pederson from the Cubs, Eddie Rosario from Cleveland and Jorge Soler from the Royals.
The Astros got Justin Verlander at the Aug. 31 waiver deadline in 2017. They also traded for Brian McCann and signed Charlie Morton, Carlos Beltran and Josh Reddick going into that season.
The Royals signed Edinson Volquez before the season and acquired Ben Zobrist and Johnny Cueto in deadline deals that helped fuel their 2015 run.
The Cubs signed Jason Heyward, Zobrist and Jon Lackey heading into their 2016 title season.
The Nationals traded for Yan Gomes before the 2019 season and added Patrick Corbin, Anibal Sanchez, Matt Adams, Brian Dozier, Kurt Suzuki, Asdrubal Cabrera, Jeremy Hellickson and Gerardo Parra.
▪ The Marlins perspective: The Marlins’ prime example of a win-now trade during the course of the rebuild came at the deadline during the 2020 season, when they sent pitchers Caleb Smith, Humberto Mejia and Julio Frias to the Arizona Diamondbacks for Starling Marte. The acquisition shored up center field as they made their playoff run. Over moves they made at the deadline during their losing seasons helped them acquire Jazz Chisholm Jr. (their starting second baseman), Jesus Sanchez (their projected starting center fielder) and Lewin Diaz (a Gold Glove caliber first baseman), among others.
This story was originally published April 6, 2022 at 7:00 AM.
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