Miami ? Miguel Cabrera backs away from the plate, rubs his knee, arches his back, stretches his arms, spits, taps each shoe with his bat, steps back into the box, adjusts his helmet, scuffs the dirt, crouches and gives the bat a menacing waggle.

Then he swings and misses. The Florida Marlins have struck out again.

Cabrera and his teammates swing for the fences, and often they miss. Marlins hitters are on pace to set a major league record for strikeouts, and on Monday they fanned 14 times against Brad Penny of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

But the Marlins also began the week leading the National League in runs, slugging and total bases, and they have five players on pace to hit more than 20 home runs.

“What does that tell you?” hitting coach Jim Presley said. “If we cut down on our aggressiveness, I think that hurts us. We are a young, get-after-it, hacking ballclub. We like to swing that bat, and striking out is part of it.

“If that’s our only drawback, we’re going to be OK.”

The Marlins are struggling to stay around .500, but not because of their offense. Injuries have sent four starting pitchers to the disabled list, disrupting a rotation touted as the team’s strength, and newcomer Jorge Julio quickly became a bust in the closer’s role.

But with the youngest team in the majors, the Marlins are on pace to break franchise records for runs and homers set last year.

They’re also striking out an average of nine times per game.

“It’s the kind of hitters we have,” said first baseman Mike Jacobs, in just his second major league season.

“There’s that old saying in the minor leagues that you’re not going to walk to the big leagues, you’re going to get there by hitting,” Jacobs said. “And I think a lot of us still have that mentality that we’re going to stay here by hitting.”