Marlins 8, Padres 6: Fish outslug Friars

The Padres opened Players Weekend with a bang, but unfortunately Giancarlo Stanton and the Marlins opened it with an even bigger one. While Carlos Asuaje and Jabari Blash both went yard tonight, Miami lit up their metal monstrosity three times. Stanton slugged two of those bombs while going 3-for-3, and Marcell Ozuna hit the game-winning 3-run bomb in the seventh.

Stanton opened the slugfest with a two-run jack in the first, bringing Dee Gordon home after his leadoff single. MLB’s home run leader did it again in the third, taking Travis Wood deep to start the inning. It was the fourth inning when the Friars finally got to Marlins starter Adam Conley.

Manuel Margot led off with a line drive single, and then the speedy center fielder gave Conley the spooks. He made two pickoff attempts before even throwing a pitch to Asuaje. Maybe he was stalling for a good reason, because Carlos took that first pitch all the way out.

The Friars didn’t hold onto those gains. Mike Aviles hit a one-out single in the bottom of the fourth, and a two-out walk to the pitcher put him into scoring position. Gordon singled again to load the bases, and Stanton took advantage of it. He laced a double into left and erased the runs the Friars picked up in the top half of the inning.

A big ol’ rally in the top of the sixth got the Pads back in the game. Margot led off with a single, and Asuaje kept things moving with a double. Jose Pirela brought the hit streak to three with his RBI single, and Wil Myers hit a sacrifice fly to plate Asuaje and narrow the deficit to one. That chased Conley from the game. He was replaced by Dustin McGowan, who did not have a good time against Blash.

Some days, that one run is enough to get the win. Not today. Kirby Yates opened the seventh by allowing yet another single to Gordon. A walk to Stanton put the tying run in scoring position, though that may have been preferable to letting him swing away. On the other hand, maybe he would have grounded into a double play, which Ozuna didn’t. He took a 2-0 slider and lifted it into the stands, and that was that.

Players Weekend continues tomorrow as Dinelson Lamet takes on our old friend Odrisamer Despaigne at 4:10 PM.