By Charles Elmore, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

Sunday, January 18, 2004

JUPITER -- The Florida Marlins, last year's leftover slice on the Grapefruit League menu, commanded a king's buffet line that stretched into the predawn darkness Saturday.

More than 400 people stood in front of Brenda Whitaker and her Marlins T-shirt by the time spring-training ticket sales began at 9 a.m. at Roger Dean Stadium.

"I can't believe this," Whitaker said. "I thought nobody goes to their games. I guess this is because they won."

George Domsky of Boynton Beach, the first Marlins fan in line, set his alarm clock for 3 a.m. He arrived at 5 to buy seats behind the dugout of the defending World Series champs. He arranged time off from his medical supply company in March and wanted to make sure he got his spots at 10 particular games.

"They're a championship team," Domsky said. "I love baseball. They've been burning up the field. I didn't get a chance to go to a lot of games last year, and this is a good chance to see some games up here."

One World Series title later, the Marlins have been transformed from a perceived marketing mistake (too close to their summer home at Pro Player Stadium, bringing few hotel visitors) into a real-teal attraction.

Flash back to early 2003: The Marlins barely sold 2,000 tickets to their first spring training game in a stadium that holds about 7,000. This spring, overall ticket sales shot up 62 percent a month and a half before the first game -- and before individual-game tickets went on sale Saturday. Season tickets and mini-plans (five games or more) are running nearly 50 percent ahead, and sales to groups of 15 or more have ballooned by 336 percent.

"I think it's twice what we had last year," stadium General Manager Robert Rabenecker said of Saturday's crowd. "Ninety percent of it is the World Series championship. It's a club a lot of people didn't get a chance to see or chose not to see last year. It's been night and day as far as people having embraced the Marlins. The Marlins are now Palm Beach County's team."

It isn't only walk-up purchases. The Marlins sold $13,000 worth of individual game tickets on the Internet the first day of availability last spring. They sold $18,180 worth by five minutes after 9 a.m. Saturday, Rabenecker said.

The St. Louis Cardinals, who share Roger Dean Stadium with the Marlins, still sell more season tickets, but the Marlins are pushing ahead in certain categories such as group sales, he said.

Still, Marlins fan Domsky was not first squatter on the scene Saturday. A sleepless Cardinals fan arrived at 1:30 a.m., 7 1/2 hours before ticket windows opened.

"I've been a Cardinals fans since the '40s," explained Bernie Salzberg, 71, who winters in Boca Raton. "I woke up at 11:45, and then 12:45. I said this is ridiculous. I'll just go."

Craig Ober, 10, and his mother, Tracy, of Tequesta arrived at 1:45 a.m. to sleep in a tent. They sought tickets for two visiting Red Sox appearances. The family has New England roots, but "the Marlins are my second-favorite team," Craig said.

Domsky hopes increasing attendance in Jupiter may cause the Marlins to look more seriously at locating a new regular-season stadium farther north than downtown Miami.

"I'm still crossing my fingers and legs and hoping they'll talk with Don King over here in Mangonia Park," Domsky said. "Hopefully, some of those guys with big bucks would take an interest and look at that and say, hey, maybe there is a good fan base here and there's a money-making opportunity."

Boxing promoter King hopes to interest the Marlins in building a stadium on land he owns around a defunct jai alai fronton in central Palm Beach County. The Marlins say they are concentrating on a proposed ballpark in downtown Miami, on the grounds of a rebuilt Orange Bowl.

The Marlins still have more than 100,000 tickets remaining for the spring, so nobody's talking complete sellout anytime soon, Rabenecker said. But it sure beats last year. By 2 p.m., the Marlins had sold 3,582 tickets Saturday, 75 percent more than on the comparable day last year. For their part, the already-strong Cardinals were up 27 percent.

The Marlins showed the quickest way to change a rep from flaw to draw is to give the stadium announcer new things to say. As kids ran the basepaths Saturday, the P.A. system welcomed them to the spring training home of the world champions.

"It makes it a lot easier for the people trying to sell tickets," Rabenecker said.

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