Cat steals show at Marlins home opener strolling through outfield

MIAMI — The Miami Marlins’ first home game of the 2017 season included stolen bases, strikeouts and home runs, but one purr-formance stole the show.

During the sixth inning of Tuesday’s game against the Atlanta Braves, an unexpected visitor took a stroll along the outfield fence.

A gray cat wedged itself under the base of the wall, drawing the attention of Marlins outfielders Giancarlo Stanton and Christian Yelich. Both players approached the scaredy-cat, and Stanton tried to open a section of the wall so it could escape.

When a stadium worker reached down to pet the cat, it took off along the wall into centerfield, scaling an electronic video board, and eventually making its way on top of the Marlins Park Home Run Sculpture.

For the next several innings, the Fox Sports Florida broadcast of the game provided a video update of the cat, which relaxed along the base of the sculpture.

The Marlins Twitter account had some fun with the feline invasion, giving the intruder the name #RallyCat and posting several tweets containing cat puns.

Marlins Park provided an update on the cat following the game via its Twitter account, stating that the cat had been rescued but escaped and ran off into the night.

Cox Media Group