MIAMI (AP) — Marlins president of baseball operations Peter Bendix called his team’s season “disappointing” and “frustrating” while expressing optimism for the future despite years of inconsistency and turnover.
In his end-of-season news conference on Tuesday, Bendix addressed the Marlins’ 2024 campaign in which they lost 100 games for the second time in six seasons and missed the playoffs. He declined to elaborate on what went into the decision to part ways with 2023 NL Manager of the Year Skip Schumaker.
“I have a lot of respect for Skip,” Bendix said. “I enjoyed working with him. I’m going to keep the private conversations that we had private. But I truly, I wish him and his family nothing but the best.”
The Marlins and Schumaker mutually agreed that the coach would not return for the 2025 season. He led a roster decimated by trades and injuries to a 146-178 record over the past two seasons.
Bendix declined to say if the Marlins made any efforts to keep Schumaker beyond this season. He added conversations with the rest of the coaching staff are scheduled for later this week, but declined to answer if anyone on the current staff would be in the mix for the manager job.
On what Bendix will be looking for when he makes his first managerial hire for the Marlins, he said “there’s a lot of different ways, a lot of different styles of being a great manager. And we’re going to run a thorough process, and we’re going to explore a lot of different candidates.
“No timeline on it because we want to really get the right candidate for us.”
The Marlins will be searching for their 17th manager in club history. Only Don Mattingly (2016-2022) has managed the team for more than four seasons.
The Marlins launched another rebuild this season, trading away three-time batting champ Luis Arraez, star outfielder Jazz Chisholm Jr., and other contributors with big league salaries in exchange for cheaper prospects.
“Conversations with Bruce (owner Bruce Sherman) are ongoing,” Bendix said of Miami’s payroll. The Marlins have consistently been among the MLB’s lowest-spending teams. “And he’s been incredibly supportive of giving us the resources, the space that we need to build this organization into a long term, successful organization. There’s a lot of different ways that we can do that.”
The Marlins had the second-worst team ERA at 4.73, playing without 2022 Cy Young Award winner Sandy Alcantara. They were also missing opening-day starter Jesús Luzardo most of the season. They were near the bottom of the league in on-base-plus-slugging percentage at .678.
Bendix pointed to a promising young position player core that includes infielders Connor Norby, Otto Lopez and Xavier Edwards, as well as Jake Burger, as reasons for optimism.
Alcantara, Luzardo and right-hander Eury Pérez are also expected to return in 2025. Bendix said the plan is for Alcantara, who is recovering from Tommy John surgery, to be ready for opening day.
He said his biggest pitch for potential players joining the team is to believe in what the Marlins are building.
“I feel like I have a really good understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of our organization,” Bendix said, “of what we need to get better. We’ve been able to make a lot of improvements over the last year. I’m excited about the foundation that we’ve been setting.”
___
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB