MIAMI -- The combination of a struggling offense and an opposing southpaw pitcher led Miami Marlins manager Mike Redmond to tweak his lineup for Sunday's series finale against the New York Mets.
After getting shut out just twice over the first 64 games of the season, the Marlins have been held scoreless three of their past 10 contests. They are 3-7 during that span.
With Jonathon Niese on the mound, Redmond stacked the order with righties and proven track records. Jeff Baker started at first for Garrett Jones and Reed Johnson in left. Baker and Johnson are .467 and .381 career batters, respectively, against Niese.
"We haven't really been beating the cover off the ball the last five or six games," Redmond said. "We've got to get a couple guys a day off and see if they can get it back together and get some other guys in there. See what happens.
"We need everybody. When you struggle offensively you just keep plugging other guys in there until they get hot. Sometimes guys just need a day off or two days off to clear their mind, and that usually gets the other guys going. Right now we need a spark, we need somebody to get some big hits. This is pretty much our lineup against lefties anyways. We havenât seen this lineup because we haven't faced a whole lot of lefties."
Over the past week, the offense is batting .203 with a .295 slugging percentage, 14 runs, three homers and 12 RBI in six games.
It has been a mix of tough at-bats, solid starting pitching and unfortunate luck. On Friday, Garrett Jones missed his second two-run homer of the homestand by inches. Twice on Saturday Tom Koehler failed to advance a runner with sacrifice bunts.
"It's a long season," Koehler said following Saturday's loss. "We play so many games that you're bound to go through something like this. The good news is we have a long way to go still and we've got a great group of guys, a lot of high-character guys and guys that don't give up. I don't see this being something that's going to bury us because we're in a little bit of a rut.
"I have a feeling we're going to get real hot soon. We've just got to continue to do the little things right -- whether that means getting bunts down when you've got a chance to do it to move runners up and those timely hits and timely pitches. That's what we were doing early. Just the little things. I think we're going to be in good shape and turn this thing around pretty soon."
Shortstop Adeiny Hechavarria sat out a second straight game with soreness in his right elbow but is available should the club need him on Sunday.
Hechavarria was seen rubbing his elbow after warm-up throws before batting practice on Saturday. He was a late scratch. Both times Ed Lucas has taken his place at short.
"He's better today, but we figured we'd give him another day to make sure he's fully recovered when we hit that Philly series, but we'll see tomorrow," Redmond said. "He's feeling better but still not great."
You can follow Christina De Nicola on Twitter @CDeNicola13 or email her at cdenicola13@gmail.com.
