{"id":850783,"date":"2026-09-17T09:02:14","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T09:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/850783\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T09:02:14","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T09:02:14","slug":"sandy-alcantara-comes-out-of-the-bullpen-on-1-day-of-rest-and-earns-1st-career-save-for-marlins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/850783\/","title":{"rendered":"Sandy Alcantara comes out of the bullpen on 1 day of rest and earns 1st career save for Marlins"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHOENIX \u2013 Miami Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara has pitched more than 200 innings this season. None of them came in a save situation \u2014 until Wednesday night.<\/p>\n

With the Marlins clinging to faint playoff hopes, Alcantara came out of the bullpen for the first time in nine years and closed out a 4-3 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks.<\/a><\/p>\n

Just two days after throwing 101 pitches in a no-decision at Arizona, the 31-year-old right-hander worked a scoreless ninth inning for his first major league save and said he felt \u201cgreat.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I\u2019m here, I\u2019m going to do everything I can to help the team win,\u201d Alcantara explained.<\/p>\n

After going five innings Monday in Miami’s 8-7 loss,<\/a> Alcantara told pitching coach Daniel Moskos he could help out Wednesday if needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cDaniel passed that along to me. (Alcantara) headed down (to the bullpen) in the sixth inning or so and I told him he had the ninth,\u201d manager Clayton McCullough said.<\/p>\n

Miami used eight pitchers Tuesday during an 11-inning victory,<\/a> and the Marlins (76-77) are still fighting to stay in the pennant race. They trail San Diego by 7 1\/2 games for the final National League wild card with nine to play. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt speaks to Sandy in a lot of ways. This happened 10 days ago when he headed down there (between starts), but it didn’t work out,\u201d McCullough added. \u201cIt’s as much a testament to him wanting to win, what it means to this group. You saw the excitement from the group.”<\/p>\n

Alcantara, who leads the majors with 206 innings pitched this season, got two deep flyouts before walking Lars Nootbaar. Pinch-runner Jordan Lawlar attempted to steal second but was thrown out by catcher Joe Mack to end it.<\/p>\n

Alcantara has made 201 big league starts. His eight previous relief appearances all came as a rookie with the St. Louis Cardinals in 2017.<\/p>\n

A two-time All-Star and the 2022 NL Cy Young Award winner, Alcantara is 13-10 with a 3.84 ERA in 32 starts and now one relief outing this season. <\/p>\n

McCullough said Alcantara will start Sunday in San Diego as scheduled. But the pitcher said he’s ready if needed before then.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is my first one,” Alcantara said. “Hopefully they keep giving me the opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

\nSee AP\u2019s full MLB coverage here<\/a>\n<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX \u2013 Miami Marlins ace Sandy Alcantara has pitched more than 200 innings this season. None of them…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":850784,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[51050,359539,200994,93399,7644,363,17881,99],"class_list":["post-850783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-clayton-mccullough","tag-daniel-moskos","tag-joe-mack","tag-jordan-lawlar","tag-lars-nootbaar","tag-mlb","tag-sandy-alcantara","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=850783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/850783\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/850784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=850783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=850783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=850783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}