New Miami Marlins Logo Leaked.

[Invader3K]

Uh-oh...SEC targets Marlin's shady business.

[jmeks23]

Heath Bell was wearing the uni and the cap on MLB Network today and my god are they hideous. I was on the fence on that original picture (just because it was "Miami" colors) but I'm off it. They are terrible looking.

[The Truth]

My wife and I were laughing at the Miami uniform during the Heath Bell interview but our 8 year old kid thought it looked "cool". So what do us old folks know, anyways?

[Warning Track Power]

I think we really need to spend a little time on the topic of how bad the Bernie Brewer Slide equivalent at Marlins Park is going to be. This article pretty much sums it up with pictures.

http://mlb.sbnation.com/2012/1/26/2737237/miami-marlins-home-run-feature-john-waters-directing-2001-a-space-odyssey

 

Additionally, it looks just as awful in MLB 12 The Show

 

Seriously, that Park looks a lot better than I thought it was going to. Reminds me of Minute Maid Park in Houston. However, that THING in CF is possibly the lamest thing I have ever seen in baseball history.

 

(As a question, hyperlink is not available on the new board or am I missing it?)

[TooLiveBrew]

Wow, the backstop wall behind HP is going to be an aquarium? That's pretty cool.

[owbc]

Just drove around the park about a week ago to take a look. The stadium is basically done. It stands in amazing contrast to the ugly Little Havana neighborhood around it. The park itself looks great, very modern, nothing like Miller Park at all or any other ballpark that I have been to. They did some smart things like tinting the outfield retractable windows to prevent glare and not putting any advertisements up to block the view of downtown.

 

It should play as a pitchers park since they kept about the same dimensions from Sun Life. Wind will blow in from LF when the roof is open in April and May and with the huge left-center power alley it will not be a fun place for RH power hitters. Roof should be closed for all of June-September.

 

I have tickets for the exhibition on 3/7 (just three weeks away!). They are letting 15,000 fans in for games against Miami and FIU (the first game is actually a high school game on 3/5). At that time I will take pictures and report back to BF.net on the stadium. I am very much looking forward to it.

 

As for the "thing" in center field, I hesitate to judge until I see it in person. Miami is a big, gaudy, bright, obnoxious kind of place, so the "thing" might actually be a decent fit. The aquariums behind home plate will be unique. The traffic/parking concerns are the biggest problem. Only season ticket holders get to park in the garages (only 5,700 spots). Everyone else has to fend for themselves, which probably means parking on a lawn or in a creepy ally.

[TooLiveBrew]

I have tickets for the exhibition on 3/7 (just three weeks away!). They are letting 15,000 fans in for games against Miami and FIU (the first game is actually a high school game on 3/5). At that time I will take pictures and report back to BF.net on the stadium. I am very much looking forward to it.

 

Looking forward to seeing some pics

[CheezWizHed]

Will they actually have marlins in the aquarium?

[Patrick425]

Love some of the reader responses in that article, especially the one about half way down with the "Ghostbusters" GIF.

[hawing]

Holy coincidences, Batman! I saw someone wearing a Miami Marlins cap this afternoon at the State Street University Book Store.

[owbc]

Seems like the Marlins giant statue might be a little too close to centerfield for left handed hitters.

 

LINK

 

I personally think the media is making a big deal of things prematurely, but in a ballpark that already has 390 foot power alleys, it could definitely be a problem.

[owbc]

So I took in a game at the new Marlins Park tonight.

 

First reaction: "Holy ---- that statue is HUGE!!!!"

 

Way bigger in person than in the photos. I took some pictures that I will post later that attempt to reference it, but the thing is literally 40 feet high. Furthermore, the rest of the outfield is boring so there is nothing else to distract your attention from it. I didn't hear anyone say they liked it, almost everyone thought it was ugly and some suggested it will be taken down later. They haven't actually turned the thing on yet, that is being saved for the big home opener. I think people will grow to accept it eventually, but for now it really sticks out in a bad way.

 

The game itself was boring, the opponent (FIU) was told only a few hours before the game that MLB was not going to allow them to use aluminum bats. The University of Miami was allowed to use aluminum bats last night so I'm not sure what changed. Not surprising, FIU had trouble scoring runs because they were borrowing bats from the Marlins that they acquired right before batting practice. Strange.

 

The roof was closed since there were some showers in the area. It was nice to have A/C. It's only March but it is already humid enough outside that it would be uncomfortable with that many people crammed together. It's a standard 3-panel roof, with all 3 panels sliding over the plaza outside the stadium. They opened it after the game but we didn't realize it until we were already driving away.

 

I've now been to 15 major league stadiums, so I have a decent background to compare this place to.

 

So first, the good:

-Traffic was great getting into and out of the stadium. There were only 15,000 for this game (and maybe only about 11-12,000 actually there), but I had no problems getting in and using my parking pass to park in the garage. The garages are well designed to get cars in/out quickly with one-way driving, angled parking spots, and large entrances. For a crowd of 37,000 I think the main problem will be that there isn't enough parking, which could create major headaches as people search around for a spot on someone's lawn.

 

-There is not a bad seat in this place. No obstructed view seats. No thick railings to block the view. The outfield is the best area. There is lots of room to walk around and several hundred people were watching the game from the walking area in the outfield. I hope they do not block that off. The outfield seats also offer a great view for the price. You can sit directly in center field which is very rare in newer ballparks. Also, about 1/2 of the seats are in the lower level. The lower level has about 35 rows (I think Miller Park is around 20). The upper level was closed but it doesn't have very many seats and appears to be a good view.

 

-At least as of right now, there is no advertising in the park at all. It is the first time I have ever been to a baseball game with zero advertising, period, not even on the scoreboard between innings. It was quite refreshing. I know they will add plenty before the season starts, but based on the available paneling for ads, it looks like they will be relatively few and far between compared with Miller Park. There will not be large advertising boards blocking view in the outfield like in Miller Park. The Marlins had relatively few in-game sponsors in the past, so it will be interesting to see if they continue to keep the advertising down.

 

-The moving outfield panels (like Miller Park) are really cool. They are tinted blue and the tracks are built right into the walkway in the outfield. So when they are open it will literally be completely open in the outfield with just a railing separating the fans from the Miami skyline (the outfield concourse is not at ground level, it is tall enough to see over neighboring buildings). It is a shame that the roof will be closed for most of the season because it will take away from a really unique aspect of the park.

 

The bad:

-The outfield statue is just too big and too obnoxious. It is good to be unique, but this was going to far.

 

-Minor issue, but the plastic for the seats is really cheap. They are not especially comfortable either. We were sitting almost directly behind home plate in seats that will usually cost almost $100, so I would have expected nicer seats. In contrast, the diamond club right in front has high-backed movie theatre chairs.

 

-The park is still overall kind of boring. The color scheme is nice but the light green in the outfield is ugly.

 

Other interesting notes:

 

-They had closed captioning on the edge of the ribbon board throughout the entire game. It wasn't working well, but it was something different.

 

-The backstop netting is too small. There were several balls hit over the net that went straight into the crowd.

 

-Dimensions (left to right) are approximately 345-385-420-390-345. The wall is at least 10 ft. high so there will be no home run robbing at this park. Definitely will play as a pitchers park, but you can get it out down the line and Jose Reyes is going to hit lots of triples this year. With the roof open I'm not sure what it will be like. Unlike Miller Park, this stadium isn't dug into the ground, so you have to go up from the entrance to reach the lower concourse. The result is that the outfield windows are very high up relative to the surroundings. The wind currents are going to be very strong when the roof and outfield panels are open. I am not sure how it will affect the ball current, but I imagine it will favor LH hitters.

 

-I can't comment on the concessions since most of the menu items (especially the local cuisine) was not open yet. Word is that there will be a number of local cuisine options. There was only standard ballpark food available tonight.

 

Overall:

 

-It's not as nice as 2011 Miller Park. But it is about as nice as 2001 Miller Park before all the improvements were made by Mark A. So the challenge for the Marlins is if they can continue to update and improve the ballpark and listen to customer feedback. All the locals think the place is awesome because they have nothing to compare it to. And it is really nice. I noticed that the crowd tonight was primarily young and Hispanic. That is important, since Miami is the capital of Latin America and the team has the potential to appeal to a huge international audience. The old Florida Marlins never reached that audience, but I think the Miami Marlins will. Even if the Marlins have a string of losing seasons, they will never go back to the bottom of the league in attendance again.

 

I hesitate to rate the park since it was a preseason game and not everything was fully running yet. But I think it will come in somewhere in the middle of the pack in the end. One of the main things that sets is back is that the surrounding neighborhood (Little Havana) is quite ugly with nothing to do around the ballpark.

 

The photos can be viewed here.

[Baldkin]

-The backstop netting is too small. There were several balls hit over the net that went straight into the crowd.

 

Were they going into the first deck? I know a lot of straight back foul balls end up in the 2nd deck (power pitchers vs RHB's, they usually end up in the Kohl's family section) at Miller Park.

 

And seriously, thanks for the writeup. I've only been to 8 parks (hoping to add two more to the list this year), and always appreciate hearing the unique and overall features from an unbiased perspective.

[1992casey]

I believe Miller Park has closed captioning too.

[owbc]

The last time I was at Miller Park was May 2011 and I don't remember seeing any closed captioning. Did they add it to the ribbon board since then?

 

The line drives over the backstop were only about 2/3 up the lower level. The top 10 rows of the lower level are vulnerable. This park might have the largest lower level in the major leagues, but it still needs to be higher. Usually at Miller Park the nastiest line drives hit the press box. Here, they were going straight into the crowd.

 

Also, there is more foul territory than usual here down the outfield lines. The stands do not come right up to the foul line, there is a cushion of a few extra feet.

[TooLiveBrew]

Thanks for the detailed recap of the new Miami park, owbc. Good read, & looking forward to the pics.

[PrinceEatMeat]

Miller Park does have closed captioning. It was new at the end of the season if I recall. Possibly even started as late as the playoffs. But they do have it now for sure.

[owbc]

Ok here are the photos:

 

LINK

[TooLiveBrew]

Hah, the aquarium wall behind home plate is for real. That's incredible.

 

The left field bleacher area looks designed for adding more seats if needed. And the centerfield... thing... looks like Loria lost an expensive bet to someone, or an odd attempt at psychological warfare.

[RightFieldCoder]

MP added closed captioning late in the season. I remember reporting on the change, but don't remember the specific date. I want to say late August or early September.

[Dragonbait]

As far as the CC at MP, I only remember seeing it during the playoffs.

[pitchleague]

I saw that green triangular "wall" in the RF bleachers in my 2k12 baseball game the other night and thought, "that's gotta be a glitch or something", but sure enough there it is in your picture surrounding one of the support poles. It looks so out of place in the game and in real life.

 

Thanks for the photos!

[RightFieldCoder]

Found it. September 13th, post #403

[Warning Track Power]

Great review OWBC. Thanks for posting it. I love everything about ballparks in general and your review was excellent.

 

My overall impressions from the pictures is the stadium is appears pretty boring. Maybe it is the lack of advertising or the lack of the need for an out of town scoreboard in Spring Training or that it was played at night without the downtown Miami sightlines to LF. I don't know. Something about it just seems pretty sterile to me compared to Target Field, Citi Field or new Yankees Stadium opened in 2010 and 2009. Maybe I'm wrong.

[jerichoholicninja]

Other than the monstrosity in the OF, i really like the feel of the park. It's not "brick-retro" like the parks from the late 90's/early 2000's. It's not "neo-retro" like the last bunch of parks build. It may seem small and insignificant but I love that the outfield wall is curved throughout the outfield. I don't think there is any park that has anything more that just a little bit of curvature in their wall.