Playing for fun

Young? Yes. Well-paid? No. Immature? Sometimes.

Productive baseball players? Absolutely.

Those words can only describe the 2006 Florida Marlins, who have surged the past month into second place in the National League East. The upstart club, a unanimous pick to finish last in the division before the start of the season, went 18-7 in June.

The Marlins have done it with plenty of color, enthusiasm and, at times, uniqueness, which showed during a recent trip through the visitor’s clubhouse in Baltimore late last month.

A rookie pitcher perused a men’s magazine and barely glanced away from the pictures as members of the media interviewed him.

At the other side of the clubhouse, two-time All-Star third baseman Miguel Cabrera practiced salsa dancing with outfielder Alfredo Amezaga, complete with the flare of tosses, lifts and spins. Shortstop Hanley Ramirez tried to break up the dance lesson by kicking a water bottle at the pair, bursting into a World Cup mocking “Goooaaalll” celebration.

But don’t be confused by the loose, jovial and even nonchalant pregame attitude. Their lighthearted approach is what has made them one of Major League Baseball’s most surprising teams.

Since May 22, when the Marlins stopped a seven-game losing streak with a 9-1 win over the Chicago Cubs, Florida has gone 24-11.

“Something obviously happened, but I don’t know what it was,” said rookie second basemen Dan Uggla, a Rule 5 acquisition from the Arizona Diamondbacks in December who entered last night with 13 homers and a .312 average. “Our pitchers have done an unbelievable job all year long. I think we just started getting some timely hits and we started keeping leads.”

Florida’s outburst of victories since late May include a 14-5 home record, yet the Marlins (35-42) suffer from the league’s worst attendance. Florida averages fewer than 11,000 fans every home game — more than 6,000 fewer than the worst team in baseball, the Kansas City Royals (26-52).

Even after the Marlins’ World Series run in 2003, they finished the following season 26th in the league with an average of slightly more than 22,000 fans.

“It doesn’t bother me and I tell the guys all the time, if you need a crowd to get you motivated then you are not a professional athlete,” said infielder Wes Helms, one of the few veterans on the team. “What separates us as a professional athlete is that we know how to control our minds. If you can pump yourself up to play in front of 5,000 people, then you’ve got no problem playing in front of 40,000 people.”

Maybe the lack of fan attention is the result of a slow start to the season in which the Marlins opened with a 1-6 record.

Or, it could be that the Marlins’ roster is cloaked in anonymity, a youthful team with an average age of 26. The only remaining players from the Marlins’ 2003 World Series champions are Cabrera and pitcher Dontrelle Willis.

Although the Marlins have won two World Series (1997, 2003) in the last decade, the team has faced severe roster cuts, leaving the team filled with rookies.

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