Dead Fish & Petty Revenge: Miami Marlins Taking the Mets With Us

Miami Marlins: “Hey, At Least We Tried” 2025 Postmortem

The Miami Marlins — what a weird, wonderful, stupidly fun run.

This season’s Fish died how they lived: scrappy, chaotic, and somehow still swimming in late September when everybody buried them by June. The Fish got cooked. Baked Marlin, served fresh with a side of “well, at least it was fun.”

Elimination came courtesy of a 1-0 Phillies loss. Normally, that’s when Miami baseball fades into background noise with Dolphins highlights on mute. But not this year. Nah — this squad dragged its zombie body through 162 like it was straight out of The Walking Dead.

Thirteen rookies. One All-Star (Kyle Stowers, an absolute menace before his oblique went poof in August). And still, the Marlins forced the whole damn NL to keep hitting refresh on the standings.

Call that failure? Please. My AP Calculus score was failure. This? This was progress with a cafecito shot.

And now? Oh baby — it’s revenge season. It’s pettiness season. It’s spoiler season.

The Mets are hanging onto October by dental floss, and Miami gets three swings at cutting the cord. That’s not just baseball. That’s Miami’s World Series. Ruin the Mets’ year, spray the locker room with champagne like we just won the East, and ride into 2026 with receipts in hand.

Let’s Go Fish.

Young, Dumb, and Fun as Hell

The youth dragged this team further than anyone thought possible — and they did it with Miami swagger.

Jakob Marsee? Dude was basically Miami’s emotional support base hit. Always on base, always swiping RBIs, always making it look way too easy for someone who should still be figuring out how to pay rent on time.

Augustin Ramirez? The second coming of Pudge, except scarier. Bro swings like the bat owes him money. He’s a tank behind the plate, a menace at it, and the kind of player you already imagine hosting his own BBQ joint in Hialeah someday. Beast.

Griffin Conine? Not too shabby for the son of an MLB legend. Griff had his “hey, maybe nepotism isn’t so bad” moments this season. Couple of big hits, couple of clutch swings, and at least three nights where fans yelled “Holy Conine!” in the bleachers.

And then there’s Tyler Phillips. Loud doesn’t even cover it. This man’s a certified psycho in cleats. He doesn’t just pitch — he stares through hitters like he’s auditioning for a Netflix true-crime doc. Striking out batters is fun. But terrifying them? That’s his hobby.

Here’s the kicker: the Marlins didn’t just hang around. They leveled up. Fifteen more wins than last year. Third-biggest jump in franchise history. FanGraphs gave them a 1.3% shot to make the playoffs in March. They turned that lottery ticket into meaningful September baseball.

That’s not nothing. That’s the prequel chapter of a dynasty. One minute it’s “lol, the Marlins are fun.” The next, you blink, and they’re the team making you cry in October.

Manager Clayton McCullough summed it up best after they swept the Rangers:

 

As cliché as it is, ‘one at a time, and as long as we have a pulse, it adds a little bit to what we have left here… it feels good to win. I think it’s more like the way we’ve been playing and how guys have really come together.”

This wasn’t smoke and mirrors.

It was pitching, hustle, and a young core that never folded.

The Zombie Fish Refused to Die

Every time Miami got buried, they swam out of the grave like zombie fish in baseball cleats.

August? 11 losses in 14 games. September? 7 losses in 8. That’s when most teams call U-Haul and start golfing. Not the Fish. We got our second shot at life and woke up like Uma Thurman getting stabbed with the adrenaline needle in Pulp Fiction.

Instead of rolling over, they rattled off seven straight wins, 11 of 12 overall, and turned the entire NL Wild Card race into a drunk group chat no one could follow.

Even when the Phillies cooked them 11-1, then slammed the coffin shut with a 1-0 elimination game, Miami still refused to die. Janson Junk — yes, Janson Junk — went from random minor-league free agent to finishing third on the team in innings pitched. Guy barely walked anybody, like he was allergic to ball four. That’s zombie-fish energy. You can’t kill what’s already been declared dead.

Sure, the Phillies advanced. Congrats, whatever. But the Marlins already won by making September baseball unhinged, chaotic, and messy as hell. Miami didn’t just stay alive — they made the whole league feel uncomfortable about it.

Spoil the Mets, Win the City

Here’s the beauty of baseball: can’t win it all? Then ruin someone else’s life, especially if they are from New York!

The Mets sit on that third Wild Card like they’ve already printed their playoff napkins. Don’t call Vistaprint just yet because Miami plays them three times to finish the year. Mission: make New York miserable, then celebrate like we just stole their bacon egg and cheese order.

Sandy Alcantara draws Game 1 like destiny. Sandy’s 2.98 ERA vs. the Mets reads like a threat letter — dude loves nothing more than making Queens fans cry in real time. He doesn’t just pitch; he torments. Miami might be technically out, but they still get to play god with the bracket. That’s peak petty and I’m here for it.

And this ain’t some paper-scrap rebuild either. Peter Bendix didn’t throw darts at a roster sheet and call it a plan. He built something real. On the flip side of the field you’ve got Rueben Bain Jr., Malachi Toney, Mark Fletcher Jr. — hometown maniacs who grew up on Miami heat and cheap BBQ. On the diamond, the Marlins stitched together an identity that gives off a redolent smell of the former championship teams South Florida has already seen.

This Marlins team had every excuse to mail it in and they yielded to that idea. They scrapped, they clawed, they made September schizophrenic in the best way. The rebuild?

Consider the sewing done. The kids? They’re not prospects anymore — they’re the roster. The culture? It finally stuck like salsa on a good pair of sneakers.

The Mets? They think they’re safe. They don’t know South Florida baseball revenge is a thing.

They’re about to find out.

Let’s go fish — and bring the pain.