A recent court filing by the Derek Jeter Marlins’ ownership group raised eyebrows: it claimed that the Miami Marlins were citizens of the British Virgin Islands (BVI) and not Florida. This filing drew questions as to how the Miami Marlins could be considered a citizen of a foreign country. Moving past the superficial oddity of a baseball team in Miami claiming BVI as home, the Jeter Marlins’ ownership group might actually have a good chance of prevailing on its legal arguments.

The Miami Marlins are currently embroiled in a public dispute with Miami-Dade County and the city of Miami regarding whether the Jeter group and former-owner Jeffrey Loria owe the county a share of the profits from the sale of the team. The disputed provision appears in an ironically named “nonrelocation agreement,” negotiated in order to bind the team to the county and city that helped pay for the team’s Miami ballpark, which also contains an arbitration provision at the center of the Jeter group’s recent court filing. Relying on this arbitration clause, the Miami Marlins sought refuge in federal court by removing the state-court lawsuit in order to compel arbitration of the parties’ dispute.