Less than two months away from completion, Marlins Park is coming along nicely with the addition of colorful touches. The amazing progress of the park can be viewed on the New Ballpark Webcam at Marlins.com.
I was unable to load shots directly from the webcam to this site, but the link above will take you directly to the webcam page.
The jumbotron in right-centerfield is on, or at least has been on, and features what appears to be lineups on either side, a shot of the stadium in the middle, and statistics along the bottom. Also, the out-of-town scoreboard on the left-centerfield wall has been on, in the standard out-of-town scoreboard format.
The ribbon LED boards along the facade of the building between seating decks are lit up, as is the scoreboard above the Marlins bullpen in left field. The home run structure in centerfield has color, and is also surrounded by palm trees.
The new park is receiving finishing touches as it nears completion. It is really beginning to look like Miami’s pearl, as Jeffrey Loria dreamed of.
Other notes:
-In his regular inbox column, Marlins beat reporter Joe Frisaro addressed a fan’s question regarding the naming rights of the new park. He said that it is unlikely that a sponsor will be named by the April 4th regular season opener, and until a contract is established the building will be called “Marlins Park.”
-I was reading my AP US History textbook recently, and was astounded to find out that by the late 1890s, baseball had become a booming business that attracted “ten to twelve thousand people to large stadiums [around the country].” Twelve thousand people in the 19th Century!!! That’s better than Sun Life Stadium in 2011!!! I hope the new park improves that figure.
The Top Step 