BASEBALL / ROSS NEWHAN : Marlins’ Hough, Harvey Prove That They Aren’t Done Yet

Call it Miami heat.

It is the one thing, perhaps, that distinguishes the Florida Marlins from the Colorado Rockies, their expansion brethren, and the 10 expansion teams that preceded them.

As Charlie Hough noted Monday, after the Marlins had officially joined the National League with a 6-3 victory over the Dodgers before 46,115 at Joe Robbie Stadium:

“The games we’re in position to win, we should go on and win. The bullpen is one of our strengths.”

Hough put the Marlins in position to win their debut with a still baffling knuckleball that resembled the ceremonial first pitch lobbed up by Joe DiMaggio.

The Marlins led, 4-3, when Hough, 45, left for a pinch-hitter in the sixth inning.

Bryan Harvey ultimately delivered the heat in the twilight of an 80-degree afternoon, blistering the ray gun. He hit 95 m.p.h. with one fastball, was generally in the 92-93 range and averaged 86-87 with his forkball.

“He’s pretty close to the old Harv, and that ain’t bad,” said the Marlins’ pitching coach, Marcel Lachemann, who was also Harvey’s pitching coach with the Angels.

Harvey saved 46 games in 1991, and 25 in both 1989 and ’90.

The Angels, however, exposed him to the expansion draft after last summer’s elbow surgery, claiming he would be unable to recapture his previous form.

Monday’s performance disputes a theory that Harvey believes was spurious to start with. He maintains that the Angels were only looking to reduce their payroll, as they also did in the cases of Jim Abbott, Wally Joyner, Dave Winfield and Junior Felix.

“To me, it was a situation where they were looking to cut salaries, and they cut them,” said Harvey, guaranteed $10.75 million for the next three years.

“Then they tried to justify it in my case by saying my elbow wouldn’t come back. It doesn’t bother me, but I wish they’d just let it go.

“I mean, the way I feel, if Abbott wins tomorrow, it will have been a very good two days for us.”

Abbott gets his first opportunity to send a message to the Angels when he starts for the New York Yankees against the Cleveland Indians today.

Harvey sent his in the ninth inning Monday. He yielded a single to Mike Piazza, got Jody Reed on a fly to left, held his breath while right fielder Felix made a difficult catch of Dave Hansen’s sinking, twisting liner and then struck out Jose Offerman, while the crowd was on its feet, savoring this long-awaited moment.

It was the first victory for the Marlins and the first save for Harvey since midsummer.

“I don’t even remember the last one,” he said, adding that his adrenaline count was off the chart and his heart was beating to the rhythm of the crowd and the realization, he said, of a dream--the first-game save.

How many more games he will be here to close remains uncertain.

It is still believed by many that the Marlins will take a hard look at the average expansion record of 59-103 and trade Harvey and his contract to a contender for a package of prospects.

“I have no control over that,” he said. “I’d just as soon stay here. I think it’s going to be exciting.”

“Fantastic!” was the way owner Wayne Huizenga described it Monday.

“It’s so much more than making a big business deal,” he said. “This affects so many people. All of south Florida. Maybe all of Florida. I’m happy. I’m excited. I hope everyone is.”

It cost Huizenga $95 million to buy in, but he didn’t raise high expectations when he talked to his team before the game.

“I told them they were going to be part of history and to just go out and have fun,” he said.

Rene Lachemann, his manager, has been putting it another way.

“Play hard, play right and you’ll have a chance,” is the theory Lachemann learned while coaching for the Oakland A’s Tony La Russa.

“We played as well today as we could play,” Lachemann said of the opening victory. “It was an emotional day and a big relief to get the first win.

“I mean, until we won that first one, everybody was going to wonder if we were ever going to win.”

Here is how they won Monday:

--Center fielder Scott Pose, up from double A in the Cincinnati organization, raced to the base of the center-field fence--in the corner where it is marked 434 feet--to make a breathtaking catch of Offerman’s drive in the seventh inning.

--Jeff Conine, a former UCLA first baseman and power prospect in the Kansas City organization now coming back from two wrist operations as the Florida left fielder, went four for four.

--Lachemann used the bunt, steal and hit and run as the Marlins got 10 hits against Orel Hershiser and 14 in all.

A graduate of nearby Hialeah High, Hough was making his first professional start in his hometown, having bought 40 tickets for family and friends.

He was pitching against his original team in his first opening-day start since 1989, and he was pitching against his first manager in organized baseball, having broken in under Tom Lasorda in 1966. He had vowed to Lasorda last winter that the Dodgers would open 0-1.

“Now I’ve got something to ride him about all year,” Hough said. “I mean, we murdered ‘em, didn’t we?”