But once the camera is off and practice resumes, so do the blunders.
Jeff Stern, a 52-year-old accounting teacher, keeps starting left when he should go right. Abraham J. Thomas, the oldest Manatee at 61, doesn't do knee-bends out of fear he won't be able to get up again.
At 320 pounds, Joseph Love takes his Manatee membership seriously. He looks shattered if he turns the wrong way. When the others rest, he goes over the steps alone.
For all their effort, the guys will get two tickets to every home game, a staff pass to the stadium, free parking, game-day meals, their Manatee uniforms -- for starters, black shorts and long T-shirts -- and other minor perks.
Love, a casino security guard, wants to make the Manatees something more than a gag that wears thin after a game or two.
"I've been a fan since Charlie Hough beat the Dodgers on the first day. I met my wife at a Marlins game. We had our first kiss during a Derrek Lee at bat," he recalls. With a rakish eyebrow flutter, he says: "Lee got a double. I got a home run."
After practice, Martinez-Huff calls a huddle to get a list of sizes and nicknames for the uniforms. (The squad will perform once per game for the first few weeks, then more frequently if the fans respond.) Dress rehearsal is just three days away, she reminds them, and they'll be introduced alongside the firm-bodied Mermaids and a peppy teen cheer group, the Minnows.
All long legs and flowing hair in their skin-tight tap pants and halter tops, the Mermaids flutter by with their silver pompoms on rehearsal day. The Manatees are getting a pep talk from Martinez-Huff, but as they eye the Mermaids, they have that "What were we thinking?" look on their faces.
As they wait their turn to perform, Ramos and Heredia swap Iraq war stories. Ramos served in the ongoing war, and Heredia is a veteran of the 1991 invasion. Both blame their weight gain on the sedentary years that followed their service.
Their reverie is interrupted by the stadium announcer.
"Ladies and gentlemen, the Florida Marlins present the Manatees!" Ramos has lost his standing as the least rhythmic. Stern, the accounting teacher, turns the wrong way for the umpteenth time, muttering, "I'm an idiot!" Bauer and Robinson collide when the two lines of dancers are supposed to change places.
