I arrived at the Marlins Ballpark site at 8:30 AM and found a line about 300 deep. According to Marlins.com, that number ended up at over 1,500 fans. As they shuffled us through at 9:35, all I could think about was taking photos for you fine folks, so here we go. (Dial-up users beware. Also, crawl back in your holes.)

More after the jump…

The “field” looked nice before the festivities started.

The minority of fans who got there early enough to get bleacher seats were pumped.

Billy was there, having his daily brunch of a child.

The event started at about 11:15 AM and was co-MCed by the voices of the Marlins, Dave Van Horn and Hall of Famer Felo Ramirez.

They announced Charlie Hough throwing out the first pitch on the site to Benito Santiago.

Hough of course threw a knuckleball.

After the pitch, Hough and Benito posed. That worked out for me.

Throughout the entire thing, Selig and Loria were whispering things to eachother, probably a plan to destroy baseball in Florida. Ricky Nolasco doesn’t seem to like whatever it is.

If there is one thing I learned, it’s that people love to talk. 5 County Commissioners showed up and patted themselves on the back for how awesome it goes.

City Commissioner Joe Sanchez was out there early, before the event even started, doing the hand-shaking, baby-kissing thing. When he went up, he was one of the rare people to talk without notes, and his message was quick. I love him for it.

All the important people get up about 2 hours in and sing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”.

David Samson came out to a ton of cheers. He actually did pretty well out there.

Hanley Ramirez acknowledges the crowd when Samson mentions him.

Dan Meyer, Chris Volstad, Brett Carroll and Chris Coghlan got up after Hanley did. Ricky Nolasco, Matt Lindstrom, and Brian Sanches were to the left and were standing very briefly.

Trader Jack gets up to tons of cheers.

Bud Selig didn’t seem to be able to speak without looking like he smelled something bad.

Some fan brought his own shovel, which is good for the soon to come groundbreaking…

…which no one who waited in the sun got to see.

I’m going to pause my regular post real quick. Many people got there 4 hours before the groundbreaking happened, spending it all in the sun just so that they could see this incredible occasion. Instead, we got to see the backs of people who had been in an air conditioned tent for the previous 3 hours, who only came out to take a picture at the end. Joe Frisaro of MLB.com “reported” that the fans chanted “Let’s go, Marlins!” as the ground was broken. What really happened was a ton of booing. Fans who were in 90+ degree sunshine, many wearing baseball jerseys, with no shade in sight, got to see the “special people” remind us that they are better that the rest of us and and killed the moment.

Eventually some of them kinda moved off the to left, so with some maneuvering of my own, I was able to get this shot.

And after waiting 30 minutes for the “special people” to take their turn, and their time, with the shovels, the peons who braved the heat eventually got a shot.

Sadly, my friend took the photograph at the worst moment, so my face doesn’t appear.

All in all, besides the brutal heat and the brutally long speeches from just about everyone, it was extremely cool, especially taking the bat-shaped shovel myself and seeing the original Marlins battery one more time.

I’ve got video, but that’s going to have to come later.