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Emma Clement<\/a><\/p>\nThe Miami Marlins and Tampa Bay Rays, Florida\u2019s two MLB teams, perennially lag behind the rest of the league in attendance. What a shame that is. Florida is clearly crazy about the greatest sport on Earth.<\/p>\n
From the retirement communities of the Southwest Floridian coast to the Hispanic and Latino-heavy Miami area, each of Florida\u2019s demographically diverse regions finds its own passion in the game.<\/p>\n
It was clear from the moment my dad and I stepped off the plane in Florida that the state was ready for Grapefruit League Spring Training baseball. Fans of franchises across the eastern U.S. flocked down south for early looks at their teams. Hats and t-shirts adorned with the logos of the Phillies, Astros, Blue Jays and more abounded \u2014 signaling Florida\u2019s status as baseball\u2019s Mecca, and I was making my pilgrimage alongside the others.<\/p>\n
After the early-morning flight from Connecticut, it was straight to JetBlue Park at Fenway South, the Spring Training home of my Boston Red Sox. We had tickets to the game against the visiting Philadelphia Phillies, but entry to the complex was free. Only a crudely simple security check stood between us and the Red Sox\u2019s major and minor-league Spring Training invitees.<\/p>\n
Fans arrived as soon as 10 a.m. \u2014 prior to a 1 p.m. game \u2014 to watch the players take batting practice and run fielding drills. Children too young to remember Boston\u2019s 2018 World Series championship swarmed even the Sox\u2019s minor-league players \u2014 whose names they had no way of knowing \u2014 clamoring for autographs.<\/p>\n
The Philadelphia fans filed in closer to game time, and we entered the gates. Here, baseball\u2019s return was celebrated with live music, beers that quickly warmed in the Florida heat and the first Fenway Franks of the year.<\/p>\n
And the people of Fort Myers flocked here, the void left by the distance from their Northern teams now filled: The Maine-born Florida resident, the retired Rhode Islander, the old security guard who \u2014 upon learning I was from his home state \u2014 regaled me with tales of working at the old Hartford, Conn. Civic Center, breaking up scrums between Hartford Whalers and Boston Bruins fans.<\/p>\n
This little colony of New England, hundreds of miles to the region\u2019s south. It was beautiful.<\/p>\n
It was just over two hours from Fort Myers to colorful Miami, though it seemed a world away. While JetBlue Park welcomed a crowd of predominantly older white people, my dad and I must have been the only non-Latinos in the Marlins\u2019 loan Depot Park that night, set to take in Nicaragua and Venezuela\u2019s bout in the World Baseball Classic.<\/p>\n
There was a live band fueling an impromptu dance party on the concourse. There was a dancer with an elaborate headdress showing off in front of a pack of drummers. And there was more passion in that building than any MLB fanbase could dream of.<\/p>\n
Miami, which is home to large portions of the Nicaraguan and Venezuelan diasporas in the U.S., showed out. Thousands of fans, rife with patriotic fervor, bobbed up and down for every hit.<\/p>\n
That night\u2019s crowd outdid any I\u2019ve seen at an MLB ballpark. I\u2019ve exited Fenway Park triumphantly over a sweep of the New York Yankees, \u201cDirty Water\u201d and \u201cTessie\u201d blaring, sulked my way out of Yankee Stadium among the jeering Bronx faithful after the inverse and sung along to \u201cGo, Cubs, Go\u201d at a packed Wrigley Field. I didn\u2019t even have a rooting interest in Nicaragua vs. Venezuela, and I\u2019d take the WBC fans over the MLB fans every time.<\/p>\n
Most in the building were rooting for Venezuela, and left happily. Though Nicaragua\u2019s Cooperstown-bound manager Dusty Baker gave his best, his squad could not top the nine major-leaguers in the Venezuelan lineup.<\/p>\n
The tone was set early when Ronald Acu\u00f1a Jr.\u2019s third-inning home run incited a thunderous roar from the Venezuelans.<\/p>\n
The party never stopped. The Nicaraguans still smiled. Though each team\u2019s fans were furious nationalists that night, there was only passion and love in the air.<\/p>\n
Venezuela won in a 4-0 shutout, eventually besting the U.S. in the championship to take home the first WBC championship in the nation\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
There was deafening noise after the final out, and the Venezuelans\u2019 ecstatic chants didn\u2019t stop on the way to the doors. Though my rusty grasp of Spanish didn\u2019t help me understand what was being shouted, I didn\u2019t need to. I understood: This is what baseball really means.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll be a fan of the game for the rest of my life, but from now on, even the greatest of Red Sox victories might feel a little hollow. For the baseball fan in me, I don\u2019t think anything would mean more than another trip to Florida.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"My spring break trip to the Sunshine State for MLB Spring Training and the World Baseball Classic changed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":206228,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-206227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206227\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}