And just like that, the Fish are hitting the ball again. At 61-60, they are also back over .500. It has been a see-saw season (say that three times fast) for sure, but there are things to watch for of course. Sure, the Marlins aren’t going to make the playoffs but look at it this way, the Braves will and will quickly exit in the first round like they always do (they are always a fragile team just a hiccup away from the cellar).

Tonight was a reason why you tune in – back to back jacks from Cody Ross and Hector Luna. Yeah, Hector Luna. What, you don’t think the guy can hit the ball? He had 16 homers this season at AAA when he was called up and was batting .294. What, don’t believe me? Man, you’ve got trust issues, buddy!

Anywho, after what was looking like a disastrous road trip, the Marlins rebounded against the Pirates – where usually PNC Park is a house of horrors for Los Marlins – and continued to hit the ball pretty well here in South Florida. 9 runs on 12 hits ain’t nuthin’ to scoff at and the Fish certainly didn’t. By the way, Anibal Sanchez got his 10th win of the season and is sporting a pretty nice 3.16 ERA. So, that is three starters with 10 or more wins. Anibal quietly struck out 5 in 7 innings and also threw only 88 pitches. Very efficient. This is the kind of thing you also want to tune in and see. Even Ronny Paulino was tuning in – he has to serve a 50 game suspension for violating MLB’s drug policy.

Marlins have their work cut out for them, though, if they want to hit 80 wins. Only 41 games left and they have to win 19 of those to hit 80 wins, but they really need to up it a bit to reach into the mid 80′s to have a mildly successful season. After all, you can’t fire Fredi and then finish with less wins than he lead the team to the past few seasons.