Roof Problems Force Pirates Fans To Move in Bradenton

Two roofs at need to be removed and repaired after an engineer determined they were unsafe, the Bradenton Marauders announced this week.

The historic baseball stadium's minor-league tenants were forced to move two of their home games, scheduled for tonight and Thursday this week, to Charlotte Sports Park in Port Charlotte to accommodate the removal of the roofs above the first- and third-base reserve sections.

Maintenance crews were doing routine work on the roofs at the stadium, the spring training home of the Pittsburgh Pirates, when they noticed some rusting of the steel structures, according to Trevor Gooby, the team's senior director of Florida operations. An outside engineer was brought in to examine the rust and concurred it was an issue.

"For public safety, it needed to be fixed," Gooby said.

The rust had likely been building up over a period of years, Gooby added.

The roof canopies and steel structure will be removed beginning Wednesday morning and hauled away for repairs. The organization hasn't determined yet if they will be reinstalled at some point during the Marauders' season while they are on the road for several days, or if the work will wait until the end of the team's Florida State League campaign in September.

"Having a sheltered structure isn't the most important thing in the world," Gooby said, since the Marauders play the majority of their home games at 7 p.m.

Season ticket holders will receive free admission to tonight's and Thursday's games against the St. Lucie Mets, to be played at 6:30 p.m. at Charlotte Sports Park. They can also use their tickets for any other regularly scheduled games at McKechnie Field.

The ticket office at McKechnie will be closed while the repairs are being made, the organization said. During the closure, fans may purchase tickets to future Marauders games at .

McKechnie Field opened in 1923 and has been the spring home of the Pirates since 1969.