Marlins will play their next ‘home’ series at Miller Park in Milwaukee

Unlike the Tampa Bay Rays, who needed to make a decision on whether games were playable in Florida right away in the wake of Hurricane Irma, the Marlins had a bit more time to prepare thanks to their series away in Philadelphia this week.

Despite the extra days to allow Miami to recover from Hurricane Irma, the Marlins won’t be heading home for their weekend series against the Brewers after all. Instead, they will play in Miller Park as the home team for this series before going back.

Although Marlins Park is confirmed to be in good enough shape for a baseball team to occupy it at this stage of things, the team made the decision after considering how much of an undue burden it would be for important personnel to support a baseball game rather than seeing to other needs in Miami.

A statement from Marlins president David Samson about the choice is as follows,

Major League Baseball in conjunction with the Miami Marlins agreed that it is in the best interest of our community to relocate this weekend’s Marlins games against the Milwaukee Brewers to Milwaukee. Marlins Park stood ready to host the games, but we all agreed that burdening public service resources was not the proper course of action. Following Hurricane Irma, the Miami Marlins realize that all of our employees, as well as our entire community, have other needs that must take a priority at this time. The Miami Marlins look forward to returning home on Monday to play the New York Mets.

After the Mets series next week, which as Samson states is expected to be played in Miami at this time, their only other home games come at the end of September against the Braves to wrap up the season.

While the devastation in Miami will take much longer than a month to recover from, the city should be back on its feet enough at that point that hosting games should not be an issue or take away integral resources from recovery efforts.

It will be the third time the Marlins have moved a home series to another ballpark.

Tickets will be discounted for the series at Miller Park and due to last minute staffing issues because of the change, attendance will be capped at 10,000 for Friday’s game and 23,000 for Saturday and Sunday.