Hip hip hooray, they're the most profitable team in baseball. That doesn't make them admirable by inconveniencing a baseball fan's trip to their ballpark. No starting lineups? No out-of-town scoreboard? What the eff? Not sure how everyone else feels, but I for one think these are MUSTS for the major league fan going to the ballpark and following the team and their position in the standings. Come on Davey boy. It's like the poor college student that drives around in the summer without the AC because he can't afford gasoline, gotta make a sacrifice in the name of money.

BTW Craig, you were great on WFAN on Friday. I like Carton's show and all, but he kept interruptin' which was not cool...

The people who run/own the Marlins are the same people who pretty much killed the Expos. The 1994 strike didn't help, but when Loria came in acted like a savior and promised a new ball park. Instead the team went off the air on local TV and English Radio.

When he sold the team to MLB and took over the Fish, he took ALL of Montreal's laptops and computers that contained their scouting info.

Just google 'Jeffrey Loria Expos' and see what comes up.

Here's just one example:
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/118868-how-jeffrey-loria-destroyed-the-montreal-exposnationals

My problem is that I don't want to be bothered with my phone going off like an eight-day clock, so even though it will do texting and e-mail, and that it's a two and a half year old razor, I would depend on baseball-related info on a scoreboard at the park.
Signed, Your favorite Luddite

Yeesh. The only other incident like this I can recall was Marge Schott dumping the Reds' subscription to the out-of-town wire service, and it was done for her classic reason of being a cheapskate. There was an outcry, and she relented and re-subscribed.

There may very well still be a subscription service today, but anyone with a wireless-enabled laptop can probably do almost as good a job sitting in the scoreboard and clicking on ESPN, Yahoo, or MLB.com during the game and posting what they find.

Loria is beyond shameless.

Not to defend the Marlins, but this is what happens when you go by newspaper reports. I attended the Marlins/Dodgers game last Sunday. Saw the MLB Network adds over the out of town scoreboard and was disappointed. And thought that was the end of it.

Ok, so no starting lineups. Get over it.

However, MLB scores were posted throughout the game electronically in two corners of the stadium. Besides the score and pitchers, it gave hitters, men on base and outs. Actually much more than the previous scoreboard did.

Maybe just once a blogger can do some follow up before believing everything you read.

And yet this damn team keeps winning games at a nice pace. They have a fire sale every couple of years and sell of their roster for owner profit. Take at look at the empty seats in the home stadium next time your team plays them on TV. Than look at the Phillies with almost 50 straight sellouts and two straight NL Pennates and a WS titles and All Stars up the butt.

Pennants ...my bad spelling...sorry

Umm....Mr.Samson and Mr.Loria. When I am paying a small fortune to enter a ballpark, I expect YOU to provide me with the starting lineups and out of town scores, not me. What's next, not putting a team on the field because we can watch a game via our handheld devices. You will just let us in the stadium to buy $7 hot dogs and look at an empty field while we have the game going on our IPHONES.

How ****ing cheap can you be ?

Cheap beyond the wildest imaginings of H. P. Lovecraft. If it were possible to spend less than nothing, you could count on Scrooge McLoria to spend it. He is indeed fortunate to have his little Chihuahua to come forward and yip stupid comments about cellphones, even if he does have to clean the executive skybox carpet every so often. Be aware, though, that he makes his money by (a) bleeding the franchise the way Frank Lorenzo bled Eastern Airlines, (b) broadcast revenues - the Feesh have among the highest per capita television fan bases in the game, and (c) the luxury tax he collects from the teams who are actually trying to build themselves and their fans a winner.
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On the other hand, when you have, say, twenty two hundred fans in Joeprodolsharklife Stadium on a good night, I suppose that statistically speaking it might be possible for adverse selection to take hold. Knowing that the out-of-town board and the lineups won't be there, those who show up anyway are indeed more likely than the average distribution to have a smartphone since they know that without it they won't be able to figure jack shit of what's going on on any given night. Of course, anyone pusillanimous enough to spend money going to the stadium so McLoria can piss on their heads, flaunt his cave troll avarice and his contempt for his fans like this probably should have a phone that's smarter than they are. Once McLoria realizes that by filling in as many doors as possible he'd have additional wall space to hang more ads, maybe the fans will need access to Mapquest so they can find their way out of there.
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I suspect that part of the problem here is that it suited Bud Light and the gaggle of inbreeds he represents to have a financial lightweight like Scrooge McLoria treat the moribund Montreal club with leeches and tourniquets, originally in the Brahmins' hopes of contracting it altogether but eventually to expedite the decay of its fan base and justify its move to Washington. As a reward for his Victor Posner impersonation, Loria then got to clean up the mess John Henry left when he couldn't figure out how to go mano a mano with the Macondo and Tallahassee backroomers. But no one from the Commish's office seems to have taken Loria aside and said "OK, you whined your way to a new stadium; now let's build a real franchise." Probably just an oversight, but plainly some of the big-spending teams, who are watching their potential profits winding up in the pouches of the Macondo marsupials in the name of competitive balance, are starting to get fed up with this charade. And so is the Player's Association, who in McLoria's case this spring discovered for themselves that a gun and a kind word got you further than a kind word. There's a collision coming at this intersection sooner or later.

Incidentally, it's true that the Feesh are wisely constructed, given their asphyxiated payroll budget, by Larry Beinfest and his generally astute crew, but the fact is that there's only so much you can do on a shoestring and that this team is simply not competitive for the long haul. We can surely enjoy a well-pitched couple of games like the last two, especially at the expense of the Feelies, but when August and September roll around and the real contenders start getting serious, you'll see how inexorably this deeply flawed and lunkheadedly managed team swan-dives out of contention.

Hey buddy how'd it feel to get embarrassed on the top listened to morning radio program in all of NYC? HAHAHA you are such a tool i loved it. Anyway I just wanted to say you suck.

I've been to a couple of Marlins games this season and I must admit...it's a bit disappointing not seeing the Teal Monster in LF anymore.

However, this blog post is erroneous as the lineups are indeed displayed at the stadium. In fact, the lineups are displayed bigger and flashier now than it was before...on one of the giant HD displays.

As far as the out of town scores go, they are scrolled on the ribbon displays...major downgrade.

Come on Craig...fix this crappy post with some crappy albeit true info.

David Samson is an out-o-touch hack who has absolutely no business running a professional baseball team at any level. His days were numbered before this idiotic decision. Bye-bye, you dingbat.

Signed, an ignorant and classless Mets fan.

check the local papers on this, it was the stadium's responsibility for upkeep and they made the decision not to keep it (or at least that's how the team is spinning it)

http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/04/10/1572663/left-field-scoreboards-are-replaced.html

Left-field scoreboards are replaced by ads

Scoreboard watching at Sun Life Stadium won't be as easy it used to be for Marlins fans.

The Teal Monster out in left field, once home to two large electronic out-of-town scoreboards, has been replaced by large advertisements for the MLB Network this season. And the space where lineups used to be posted has been filled with Marlins ads, including one with team mascot Billy The Marlin.

Marlins president David Samson said the stadium, which is owned by Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, was no longer willing to pay for repairs. And the Marlins were not willing to pay for them either.

``It couldn't be serviced in an economical matter,'' Samson said. ``It broke all the time.''

Fans will have to turn to the ribbon scoreboards (the electronic ones that wrap around the stadium) for out-of-town scores and to the large electronic scoreboards for lineups.

Asked if he will miss the old scoreboards, Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria said: ``I won't miss it all.''

Well, the Feesh may not be particularly generous with money, but they seem to have a different excuse for everyone, free of charge. Of course Scrooge McLoria won't miss something for which he would have had to pay real money. Buddha forbid that they fix the damned thing properly instead of an eternal concatenation of patchwork fixes.
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Those additional ads are like more billboards desecrating the view from a highway. Uhhhhh-glee. I remember thinking on opening day that the place looked unusually crass, and that's not the way I used to feel about it. I'm afraid that when it opens, the ambiance inside Macondo Banana Massacre Field is going to look like one of those advertising inserts in the paper formerly recognizable as the Miami Herald that you either throw out on Sundays - or save for paper training puppies.

A. who cares

B. we just took 2 out of 3 in philly and the astros have been awful, so we should win another series

C. another cheapshot at loria/samson? wow...how original...maybe you guys should brag about how the red sox are playing with all that "defense"

I bet there are signs on the walls of the bathrooms at marlins ballpark that begs everyone to turn off the lights when they leave. Hey they still have a better team than the Mutts with half the payroll. It shows someone does a standup job with the Farm system for Fla.

Jeemy, the only kind of shots you can take at Scrooge McLoria and his Chihuahua are cheap ones. He won't pay for the sophisticated shots. Too expensive.

Replying to comment from Johnny5: There are also signs asking you to place your beer cups and peanut shells in the recycling bins, along with the extra onions you took off your hamburgers so Scrooge can sell them to ethanol processors.
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Yes, the Feesh do indeed have a fine farm system. But remember how it gets that way: they keep restocking it with EYPs by trading away the last bunch of EYPs who become arbitration eligible. So, the farm system is always impressive, the callups, sophomores and junior classes are always exciting, and the trades are always deflating and bitter. Welcome to Macondo, which has its own special rhythms.

As others have written above, Mr. Calcaterra does not provide the entire story. The lineups are posted on both HD screens in the stadium (meaning everyone can see them), and the out of town scores are located in multiple areas.

Perhaps it makes sense to actually attend a game in the stadium before commenting. Just a thought.

Looking on the bright side, Python Season has opened.

I hear they're also thinking of changing the name to the Fish. That way they save the charge of sewing those 3 extra letters onto the jerseys. I can't believe they've expelled one of the cooler things about going to the ballpark. The old lightbulb type of out of town scoreboard.