Miami, FL – Jason Kubel had three hits, three runs batted in and a run scored as the Arizona Diamondbacks handled the Miami Marlins, 8-4, in the third contest of a four-game set on Sunday.
Cody Ransom drove in two runs, Justin Upton scored twice and every player in the starting lineup recorded a hit for Arizona, which has won 2-of-3 in the wraparound series.
Wade Miley (3-0) followed his excellent first start of the season Monday with another fine performance. He allowed just one hit and one unearned run with six punchouts over 6 1/3 innings, lowering his earned run average to 1.29 in the process.
Josh Johnson (0-3) once again failed to record his first victory in over a year, surrendering five runs on 10 hits and two walks. He struck out eight and only gave up one extra-base hit but the singles came in bunches during his 5 1/3 innings.
"We made him throw a lot of pitches," Kubel said, adding, "We just chipped away at him. He's got some good stuff so the more pitches we can see, [the more we] can make him work, then we have a good chance of him not go deep."
Giancarlo Stanton hit his first home run of the season, a three-run blast in the ninth, and drove in all four runs for the Marlins, but they could not muster a comeback victory like they had on Saturday as they dropped their seventh in eight tries.
Miley's smart baserunning got Arizona on the board in the third. He roped a one-out single down the line, went first-to-third on Willie Bloomquist's base hit, and trotted home on Gerardo Parra's opposite-field liner.
The visitors added two in the fifth before erupting for five in the sixth.
After Parra worked a one-out walk in the fifth, Upton, Kubel and Miguel Montero followed with consecutive singles, and Parra and Upton eventually came around to score.
Aaron Hill extended his reaching-base-safely streak to 17 games with a soft liner to lead off the sixth. Miley bunted him to second, and Bloomquist's grounder up the middle made it 4-0 Diamondbacks.
Mike Dunn spelled Johnson and got Parra to ground out before intentionally walking Upton to get to Kubel, who lined his 3-0 fastball to the warning track for a two-run double.
Another two-run double came off the bat of Ransom two batters later, scoring Upton and Montero, who drew a walk, and pushing Arizona's lead to 8-0.
After being held hitless through the first five frames, Miami finally got on the board in the seventh.
Hanley Ramirez walked, went to second on Lyle Overbay's error on Logan Morrison's grounder, and moved to third after Bloomquist's throw in a lineout- double play attempt was errant. Stanton then plated Ramirez with a groundout.
Stanton took reliver Mike Zagurski's pitch over the dead center-field wall after a single by Morrison and an Omar Infante double in the home ninth, but Bryan Shaw entered and got a pair of groundouts around a walk to prevent further theatrics.
"This is the first game [that] we didn't have a chance. Every game we've been playing, we've had a chance," said Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen. "This game was kind of different."
Game Notes
Ransom committed an error...Kubel recorded an outfield assist, doubling Infante off at first base after Gaby Sanchez's flyout...The probables for Monday's finale are Patrick Corbin, making his major league debut, for Arizona against Mark Buehrle (1-3).