Miami Marlins settle in after Griffin Conine home run to sweep Seattle Mariners
Griffin Conine is about to be in line for extended playing time.
And he gave a glimpse Thursday of what he hopes to do with it.
Conine hit a solo home run in the second inning that swung the momentum in the Miami Marlins’ favor and finished a triple shy of the cycle in an eventual 8-4 series-sweeping win over the Seattle Mariners at loanDepot park. The Marlins are now 52-42 on the season and just a half-game behind the Chicago Cubs for the National League’s top wild card spot with three games left before the All-Star break.
The sweep was Miami’s fifth in 11 series since the start of June, a stretch in which the Marlins have gone 26-8 to catapult up the standings. They won the first two games of the series 6-5 in 10 innings on Tuesday and 2-0 on Wednesday.
“Everyone’s doing their part,” Conine said.
Conine certainly did his part to keep the Marlins’ winning ways going after Miami had a rocky start to the game on Thursday.
Right-handed pitcher Janson Junk was erratic in the first two innings of his return from a six-week injured list stint for right shin bone inflammation. He walked three batters, had a pair of throwing errors and had three stolen bases against him. Despite all that, Miami made it through those frames only down 1-0 to Seattle (47-47).
Conine immediately tied the game in the bottom of the second, sending a 95 mph middle-in four-seam fastball from Mariners starter Bryce Miller a projected 373 feet that just cleared the wall in right field.
It was a big swing for Conine, who was making just his 12th start since being sidelined for a little more than two months following surgery to repair his left hamstring. He is one of several players set to see an uptick in playing time over the next few weeks after rookie Owen Caissie was put on the injured list pregame Thursday with a right calf sprain. For the finale against Seattle, Conine started in left field while Esteury Ruiz started in right. Heriberto Hernandez and Kyle Stowers, Miami’s other primary options to start in the corner outfield spots, were respectively the designated hitter and first baseman.
Conine followed up the home run with a leadoff single in the fifth inning and a one-out double in the seventh.
“Griff hits the ball hard,” Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said. “I think we were really excited to get Griff back into our lineup after the missed time because these are the kind of nights that he can have. Griff is very capable of doing damage and slugging.”
Beyond what it meant for Conine individually, his early home run was a big swing in momentum for the Marlins overall. Miami took the lead later in that second inning on a Liam Hicks RBI double down the right field line that scored Jakob Marsee and never looked back.
Junk settled in after the erratic first two innings. He ultimately went five innings, giving up two runs (one earned) on three hits and four walks while striking out five.
Miami scored four more runs in the sixth on a double error by Seattle shortstop Colt Emerson on a Hicks ground ball, an Otto Lopez two-run triple and a Stowers RBI single.
A Marsee RBI single and Leo Jimenez RBI groundout in the seventh tacked on two more runs.
Lake Bachar, William Kempner, Calvin Faucher and Tyler Zuber threw four innings of relief to seal the win.
“It was big,” Conine said of the home run. “Junk just was settling in. We know he’s gonna be great for us and obviously he went back out and gave us five good innings. Just settling the score was big.”
The Marlins close out their pre-All-Star break schedule this weekend with a three-game series against the Cleveland Guardians.
This story was originally published July 9, 2026 at 9:27 PM.
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