Took a day off from write-ups Wednesday, but Thursday brings us a play down in Marlins Park. The Rockies and Marlins will play day baseball to finish out the four-game series. Colorado looks to get a win away from Coors to open up the season with a solid split away from home. Franklin Morales goes against young and intriguing Jacob Turner for Miami. And the Rockies are slight -108 favorites.
Free Pick
Jacob Turner may end up being Florida’s second-best starter this season. He also might find himself in the minor league’s sooner rather than later if his pitches as poorly as he ended 2013 to begin this season. Some might remember Turner as the main piece in the deal that sent Anibal Sanchez from Miami to Detroit. He made his debut in the last 
day of May last season and began his shortened season brilliantly – holding his ERA under 2.00 through June and keeping it under 3.00 through the middle of August. But the wheels kept coming off for the young righty and he gave up 13 earned runs in his last three starts. Turner was rarely able to pitch through the sixth inning, which wasn’t often good enough to earn a win for the Marlins. But Turner pitched pretty well against Colorado twice last season and has shown the stuff to think he could be very good tomorrow.
Turner is throwing at home, against a team he’s had some success against at a point in the season where his arm certainly feels fresh and ready to go. It’s certainly reasonable to think Turner hit a bit of a wall at the end of last season, but that shouldn’t be a concern here. And when Jacob Turner is throwing the ball with lively movement and velocity, he’s one of the better young arms in the game.
The Rockies will trot out Franklin Morales, who has filled in nicely with just about every club he’s been with. But there’s a reason he’s bounced around the league as much as he has. Morales is a nice arm to have on a competitive club, but he doesn’t really do anything special. He’ll give up runs at a fairly predictable rate by this point in his career. So picking a winner on Thursday basically becomes a question of whether or not Jacob Turner pitches well. I think he does and I’ll take the Fish as basically a pick’em at home.
2014 YTD: 1-0 +1.00
colorado rockies • miami marlins • MLB