Going into the 2020 MLB season, the Miami Marlins were ranked 27th out of 30th in MLB.Com's official power rankings. A team ranked that low is expected to lose over 100 games, and is most likely going through a team rebuild. The franchise has sold all-star players such as J.T Realmuto, Christian Yelich, Marcell Ozuna, and Giancarlo Stanton in the last 3 seasons under new owner Derek Jeter and manager Don Mattingly. The new roster lacked power, quality hitting, young quality prospects, and veteran starting pitching. The season ended up getting delayed due to COVID-19, and the delay might as well have been time on death row before the execution of the dumpster fire franchise lacking a fan base. Once the season started up, a miracle happened. They were winning games. No one was hitting home runs, and it wasn't flashy power baseball. The wins were from scratch runs, solid hitting, and emerging young starting pitchers. Let's take a quick look back in history. In 1991 the Marlins were established, and they have made the playoffs twice as a wild card team as they never had enough wins to take home a division. In both those years, they just so happened to have won the World Series. They have never lost a postseason game, and they are the only franchise in baseball to accomplish that feat while making the playoffs multiple times. Let's go back to 2020. The season was shortened to 60 games, and the Marlins came out running. They clinched a playoff berth as a wild card team, a feat seeming almost impossible before the season started. They drew the cubs in the first round and managed to pull off a sweep due to dominant pitching performances from ace Sandy Alcantara and Sixto Sanchez. The sweep extended their incredible feat of zero postseason series losses. They are currently set to play the Braves on Wednesday and are huge underdogs. They have been branded with the nickname "Bottom Feeder" Marlins because of their lack of spending money on players. Crazier things have happened in sports, and the Marlins will keep on fighting. What's your favorite underdog story?
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