Why Miami Marlins should jump into the Juan Soto market

If the Washington Nationals are foolish enough to deal Juan Soto, the Miami Marlins need to make a big push to reel in the superstar.

According to ESPN’s Buster Olney (subscription required), there is a chance that Juan Soto, baseball’s best hitter, could be on the move this summer.

If that is indeed the case, Miami Marlins front office officials should be tripping over themselves racing for the phone in an attempt to land the superstar.

Before going any further, please let me be clear on the following: Under no circumstances do I have any illusions about the Miami Marlins being able to sign Soto to a long-term contract. Just this offseason, Soto turned down a $350 million extension from Washington — $25 million more than the at the time record contract the Marlins gave to Giancarlo Stanton in 2014. Turned that down … and was largely praised for realizing he was worth way more than that. So seeing as how essential current Marlins ownership found it to unload Stanton’s deal, there’s zero reason to believe they would ever commit even close to that much to a single player.

The only things I’m more certain of than that fact is how little I care, and how little that should matter to the Miami Marlins if they can make the right deal.

Because per that same Buster report, the price tag doesn’t seem nearly as crazy it should be to land a player of Soto’s stature. The two likely contenders thrown out in the article were the very much in contention Blue Jays and Padres, with the suggestion being that a trade built around a couple well regarded Top 100 prospects could get the job done. Prospects, not proven players. Prospects.

The Miami Marlins have plenty of those. If you go by MLB.com’s farm rankings, their system is substantially deeper than that of San Diego or Toronto. Granted, both those teams each sport a truly elite prospect that come in as Top 10 on most lists. Miami can’t claim that. So make it an even three Top 100 prospects, and some useful to a rebuilding team MLB talent. Khalil Watson, Edward Cabrera, J.J Bleday, Garrett Cooper, and Jesus Luzardo for Soto? Miami would be crazy to say no. And if the Nationals are determined not to sign Soto long-term, they just might be crazy to turn it down.

Why should an under .500 team make such an offer? Easy. Because they have a short window to be great, and are already in danger of wasting a year of it.

Right now, at this moment, the Miami Marlins have championship caliber starting pitching. That’s even with hot prospect Max Meyer still at Triple-A, and Elieser Hernandez still present on the MLB roster. Add just one of Meyer, Cabrera, Eury Perez, or Jake Eder to their existing Big 3, and we could be talking about the best starting rotation in the majors. Add two, and it’s not even a conversation. Meyer should be in Miami already, Cabrera should be in June, and Perez and Eder could both debut in 2023. All those pitching riches without even mentioning Sixto Sanchez, another Top 100 arm for Miami.

But by 2025, things start to change. Pablo Lopez is a free agent. Sandy Alcantara gets into the more expensive years of his contract. Trevor Rogers and Jazz Chisholm Jr. will be earning arbitration salaries. Money will be tighter, as will the roster space for the pitching surplus that is the team’s current strength. Even prospects can’t be stashed in the minors forever. Miami needs to divest, badly. Particularly as the offense has been underwhelming, again, so far in 2022. There are only so many games you can win with runs so hard to come by. Pitchers can’t do it all by themselves … not even Shohei Ohtani.  Only Watson among Miami’s offensive prospects is currently showing anything like superstar upside, and he’s probably not going to be of any help to the big league club until some time in 2024.

Miami’s 2022 offense has been underwhelming, but also not terrible. The team’s Pythagorean projection has them as a 20-16 team. The run differential shows they’ve been rather unlucky. They’re actually tied for eighth in MLB in OBP. A single star hitter could vault the Marlins into Wild Card contention this season. A superstar like Soto might just make them a shoo-in.

Then as for beyond 2022? Two years of Juan Soto with this Miami Marlins starting pitching rotation, and Jazz Chisholm is a must-watch product. Something fans will routinely tune in to watch. Something fans will even pay to see in person. Something that will make the Marlins truly and unmistakably relevant, both in a very competitive South Florida market, and across MLB in general.

Ultimately, this is the kind of opportunity teams build a great farm system for. What’s more, the Marlins themselves would appear to agree with this assessment. According to Barry Jackson and Craig Mish of the Miami Herald, the Marlins did check in on Cleveland superstar Jose Ramirez when he was rumored to be available this offseason. In that instance, the reason Ramirez wasn’t moved was ultimately just the fact that Cleveland wasn’t foolish enough to let Ramirez go at any price.

If Washington is that foolish, the Miami Marlins need to pounce.