Weekend in Review: Fish insist Juan isn't too far gone
The little guy was never this little.
One constant with the Florida Marlins over the past two years was that Juan Pierre, iPod-thin and dog-after-a-bone determined, always played bigger than six feet. Always.
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| Juan Pierre is frustrated by his uncharacteristic struggles at the plate. (Getty Images) |
He was never, ever the guy on the bench ... not until Florida manager Jack McKeon sat him down and snapped his streak of 386 consecutive games played one alarming day two weeks ago.
He was never just a guy batting seventh ... not until McKeon shuffled the deck a couple of weeks ago as the fly swatter came perilously close.
"I sat him out against tough left-handers because he was in a rut and he was trying so hard," McKeon said through thick cigar smoke the other afternoon in the Marlins dugout. "I decided to give him a breather. Rather than go 0-for-3 or 0-for-4, let him sit back and relax.
"That didn't work, so I tried him seventh in the order, figuring he was trying too hard to get on base. That didn't work, so I decided the hell with it, I'm going to go back to the opening day lineup and ride it out."
It is mid-June and getting later every day, and Pierre is in a place he never expected to be during all of those intense, early-morning workouts last winter. He is in a place where there are far more questions than answers, and the tough thing to swallow is that he's helped take the rest of the Marlins with him.
They have the best pitching in the NL East right now, and their staff ranks a sterling second in the NL with a 3.78 ERA. In Dontrelle Willis, A.J. Burnett, Josh Beckett (now sidelined with a blister on his finger) and Brian Moehler, the Marlins have been getting playoff pitching.
Yet they are lumbering along, fourth in the division, 4 1/2 games behind the steady Washington Nationals. No small part of that is due to the fact that their leadoff man, Pierre, currently is batting .253 -- 73 points below last year's .326. His on-base percentage is currently resting at .298 -- last year it was .374.
"It's definitely frustrating," said Pierre, whom teammate Luis Castillo calls the "key" to the offense. "But I'm not going to give up on the season by any means. It's just something you have to work through."
Pierre is certainly not the only reason Florida's offense isn't keeping pace with its pitchers. Third baseman Mike Lowell is batting just .227 with three home runs and 27 RBI after going .293-27-85 a year ago and .276-32-105 during the Marlins' championship year in 2003.
That these two players are in such deep holes has contributed to rumors that hitting coach Bill Robinson's job is in jeopardy. It also has contributed to the fact that the Marlins this month have conducted more meetings than your local school board. The players had their own meeting. McKeon held a team-wide meeting. Finally, owner Jeffrey Loria and general manager Larry Beinfest sauntered into the clubhouse to call a meeting.
