Avisail Garcia hears you booing, Marlins fans. Here’s what he has to say about that

As Avisail Garcia rounded the bases on Sunday following a fourth-inning home run, he heard something that he hadn’t heard in the early goings of the Miami Marlins’ season.

Fans cheered for him.

Up to that point, fans at loanDepot park had to let Avisail Garcia know their feelings toward him — and it wasn’t pretty.

It began with player introductions on Opening Day. As he made his way down the third-base line for player introductions, the crowd let out a smattering of boos. They continued that day when he stepped into the batter’s box as a pinch hitter with two outs in the seventh inning and struck out to strand two runners in Miami’s eventual loss on Thursday to the Pittsburgh Pirates to begin the season.

They haven’t stopped since, except for his home run in Sunday’s 9-7, 10-inning loss to Pittsburgh that has Miami 0-4 to start a season for the first time since 2001.

“It’s part of the game,” Garcia said postgame Sunday. “Like everybody here, [you] hit a home run, everybody’s happy and they cheer for us.”

Garcia, in his 13th MLB season, knows why Marlins fans are frustrated. Garcia, who signed a four-year deal with the Marlins ahead of the 2022 season with the hopes of being a power bat in the heart of the lineup, knows his first two seasons in Miami have not lived up to his standards. Injuries have limited his time on the field, only playing in 135 games over those first two seasons, and he failed to produce even when he was on the field with just a .215 batting average with a .576 OPS and 11 home runs.

He knows he has something to prove. He is working to produce.

But he would be remiss if he said he didn’t hear the criticism coming from the stands each time he steps on the field or makes his way back to the dugout.

“We want to have results. I want to have results,” Garcia told the Miami Herald ahead of Sunday’s series finale. “Last year, I was hurt. This year, I’m healthy. Every time they put me in the lineup, I want to do my best, of course, but it’s not good for players to hear that the first at-bat of the season. I strike out and they boo? That’s not good. I don’t like that. It’s the first time in my career that happened. Fans are fans. The game looks easy from the stands. I understand it, but it’s not fair.”

While the results haven’t been there for Garcia, it hasn’t been for a lack of effort. He has put in time each of the past two offseasons to put himself in position to succeed.

Heading in the 2023 season, he focused on losing weight and getting his body right. Last offseason, he spent three to four days a week working on hitting with Luis Arraez in Miami. Garcia also tweaked his stance at the plate, opening his left foot with the hope that it puts less pressure on his back.

“I’m working,” Garcia said. “I mean, that’s the only thing that I can do. ... I’ve just got to keep focused and try to do my best every at-bat.”

Marlins manager Skip Schumaker said he is planning to put Garcia in the best position possible to get off to a strong start. For now, that means putting Garcia in a platoon situation, only starting against left-handed pitching.

“He’s done a lot of things to try to get his swing right, whether it was working with Arraez in the offseason to going different places to shortening up his swing and try to be better for us and for himself,” Schumaker said. “He had a lot of injuries the last couple years. He feels really good right now health-wise.”