Report

I was at last night's game, on a rather beautiful night weather-wise. Even the heavy breeze seemed more playful than annoying.

Parking was still $10 as announced but the rest of the prices were up as expected. A frozen lemonade now sets you back $5. A bottle of Bud was $7, Heineken $8.

The announced crowd of over 38,000 seemed about right. I haven't seen that big of a crowd there in a long time.

And the whole crowd, not just Marlins fans, gave Jeff Conine a couple of standing ovations as he was given a presentation and threw out the first pitch to Andy Fox. That, and the scenes of his Marlins career that flashed by on the Jumbotron, got to me emotionally.

Of course there were several tons of Mets fans there to see the beginning of the Santana era. And he didn't disappoint them.

Speaking of several tons, the Manatees made their debut for all the world to see. In some ways they seemed to me to be a liitle too accomplished, if that's possible. I guess their dancing instructor got them to the point where they wouldn't be boisterously bumping into each other while performing, which was something I was waiting to have happen. Oh well.

As for the game, the quick-and-easy impression is if Hendrickson could take back that one inning then the Marlins could've made a game of it. Batters he was able to deal with both before and after tagged him in the 4th. I wondered if the 'one-inning collapse' has been a pattern with him in the past.

The Fish only made one error, a throwing error by Treanor that scored the last run. But Treanor threw out both David Wright and Jose Reyes when they attempted to steal. And it wasn't as if he made the error by throwing the ball into the outfield - it just got away from and went behind the intended receiver.

Good thing Willingham hit the homer. Now on to Tuesday - only 161 more games to go. I even got a ticket to tonight's game.