Florida Marlins Baseball

Marlins 6 Diamondbacks 5

Ricky Nolasco increased his win total to 11 after pitching 7.1 innings Sunday in the Arizona heat. Nolasco left a three run lead to the bullpen that was nearly blown in the ninth. The former Cubs prospect struck out four batters while giving up two homers in front of 30,974 at Arizona's Chase Field.

Miguel Cabrera's biggest fan on Sunday had to be the 6'2 pitcher. Cabrera went two for four Sunday driving in four Marlins runs. Cabrera's seventh inning two run homer gave the Marlins and Nolasco a commanding 6-3 lead.

Entering the ninth with a three run lead, Marlins closer Joe Borowski lacked control on Sunday and nearly cost Nolasco his 11th win, which put him three behind Dontrelle Willis' team rookie-high victory total of 14 set in 2003. Borowski gave up a leadoff double followed by a triple to start his day. A sacrifice hit by Shawn Green put the Marlins lead at one and caused Nolasco to chew on his nails a little harder. The Marlins closer settled down and ended the game on a strikeout and fly out to pick up his 26th save. Borowski's career high was 33 set back in 2003.

Josh Willingham led the Marlins offense with a 3-4 day at the plate, a day which saw 10 Marlin hits. Dan Uggla went 2-5 but scored three times.

Series Wrap-Up
The Marlins took two out of three from the third place Diamondbacks and are currently seven games under the .500 mark and 5.5 games behind the Wild Card leading Cincinnati Reds. The upcoming series against the NL West leading Dodgers is important in showing that we can come back from being swept by a first place team. Dontrelle Willis will look to take a series opening victory in his home state.

Wacky Stat of the Night: The Tank faced one batter in the eighth yet pitched 0.2 innings thanks to a double play.

Posted by Brian Saal on Monday, August 14, 2006 at 12:57 PM | Permalink