Wrigley Field

Florida Marlins @ Chicago Cubs
May 28, 2007

Marlins 5, Cubs 3

W: Byung-Hyun Kim
L: Sean Marshall
S: Kevin Gregg
HR: Reggie Abercrombie (FLA)
Attendance: 41,630
Time of Game: 3 hours, 18 minutes

Stadium Facts

Location: Chicago, IL
First Game: April 20, 1916
Capacity: 41,118
Type: Open
Surface: Grass

After my quick trip to Arizona, I flew to Chicago on Sunday morning of Memorial Day Weekend 2007. I took the train directly to U.S. Cellular Field to meet up with my family for an afternoon White Sox game. On Monday, I headed back to Chicago for my third MLB game in as many days in three different stadiums. This one took me into enemy territory, Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs. Even though Wrigley was the closest MLB stadium from where I grew up, this was only my third visit to the "Friendly Confines". I was originally going to go to Wrigley during my 2004 trip, but had to postpone it. I had little trouble talking one of my Cubs fan friends into going to this game with me.

This is probably the most difficult stadium review for me to write. I'll try not to belabor the point to much, so I'll just get this out of the way right now: I do not like Wrigley Field, the Cubs, or anything having to do with the franchise. I can understand why Cubs fans hold the stadium in such high regard due to all the history made there and memories of great championship teams that have called Wrigley home. Oh wait, that isn't true. The Cubs have not won a World Series in the 94 years they have played at Wrigley and haven't won a pennant since 1945.

On a more positive note, the best thing Wrigley Field has going for itself is its location. Situated in the heart of a city neighborhood, the ballpark is surrounded by bars, restaurants and anything else you could want to occupy your time before or after a game. It is easy to get to via the El as well, although if you choose to drive to the game, good luck finding somewhere to park. Overall though, I find the neighborhood to be the best part of Wrigley Field.

Built in 1914, Wrigley Field is the second oldest ballpark in Major League Baseball, behind Boston's Fenway Park. It was originally called Weeghman Park and was built as the home park for the Chicago Whalers of the soon after defunct Federal League. The Cubs moved in two years later (1916). It was also the long time home of the NFL's Chicago Bears (1921-1970). Until very recently, it held the distinction of having hosted more NFL games than any other stadium. That record was broken by Giants Stadium in New Jersey in 2003.

Being such an old stadium, Wrigley Field lacks most of the amenities found in modern stadiums. Electronic signage is almost non-existent. The manual scoreboard in center field is kind of cool for a nostalgic feel and has even been copied by a lot of newer stadiums. The narrow concourses beneath the seating areas are very cramped when the stadium is full. Also, you really get to know your neighbors in the seating area because the seats are quite small and the aisles are very narrow.

The distinctive features of Wrigley Field are the ivy covered outfield wall, the outfield bleacher seats and the rooftop seats across Waveland and Sheffield Avenues. The highly sought after bleacher seats have been expanded in recent years, but still make up a very small percentage of the overall seating in the stadium. I have not had a chance to experience a game in the Wrigley bleachers. There are only two levels of seating, which makes the upper deck seats extremely close to the action.

For this game, we sat near the back of the lower level, just beyond third base. In retrospect, this was a poor choice on my part because these are among the worst seats at Wrigley. There are probably more obstructed seats in this stadium than in any other MLB park due to the beams providing support for the upper deck. Unfortunately, we had one of these beams between us and home plate. Also, we could not see most balls hit in the air from this location. Lesson learned in case I ever decide to go back (not likely).

Wrigley Field has a reputation as a great hitter's park, but that is not always the case. Perhaps more than any other park, weather conditions play a huge role. When the wind is blowing in from Lake Michigan, it can be almost impossible to hit a home run. However, during most of the summer, the wind tends to blow out which leads to a lot of high scoring games. The power alleys are not deep at all and the basket separating the fans from the playing field winds up catching a lot of short home runs. The dimensions down the lines, however, are as deep as any stadium in baseball.

In my previous two visits to Wrigley, I did not feel out of place rooting against the Cubs since those games were against the White Sox and Cardinals, whose fans were well represented in the crowd. That was definitely not the case for this game against the Florida Marlins. So I kept my mouth shut and tried to go unnoticed.

The Cubs were coming off of a miserable last place finish in 2006 and were struggling a bit to this point of 2007 under new manager Lou Piniella. The Marlins were only a couple games better, so this was a matchup of sub .500 teams. The pitching matchup wasn't particularly compelling either. Sean Marshall got the nod for the Cubs and former washed up closer Byung-Hyun Kim started on the mound for the Marlins.

The Marlins struck first with an unearned run in the top of the first. A single by Josh Willingham knocked in Dan Uggla to give the Marlins a 1-0 lead. The Marlins scratched out another run in the fourth, but overall, Marshall and Kim were extremely effective. Kim pitched six scoreless innings, surrendering just three hits and struck out five. Marshall's day ended in the seventh after surrendering a solo home run to the guy with the funny name, Reggie Abercrombie. Another single run for Florida in the eighth gave them a 4-0 lead.

Things got a little more interesting in the ninth. In the top half, Abercrombie reached on a walk and promptly stole second and third base and scored on a sacrifice fly to put the Marlins up five. The Cubs finally came to life in the bottom half. They started the inning with a walk and a pair of singles to get on the board. Then the Marlins turned to Kevin Gregg to get them out of the jam. He struck out the first two batters he faced, but then surrendered consecutive singles to cut the lead to 5-3 with the tying runs on base. The second of those hits was a two run single by Cliff Floyd. However, the rally was put to rest when Gregg struck out Aramis Ramirez to end the game.

The Cubs dropped to 22-27 with the loss. It was a tough 1-5 home stand for them, but the turning point of their season came at the tail end of the week when Piniella was thrown out of a game with one of his patented melt-downs the day after Carlos Zambrano and Michael Barret fought in the dugout. The Cubs rebounded to win the NL Central, but were promptly swept out of the playoffs by Arizona. Meanwhile, the Marlins improved to 24-27, but wound up finishing in last place in the NL East.

Perhaps I should go to games at Wrigley Field more often since the Cubs are yet to win a game I've seen there. However, I think it is best for me to keep my distance. I can't imagine a less enjoyable sports experience than seeing the Cubs win a game at Wrigley Field. Wrigley has some charm and has certainly become a "must-see" tourist destination. However, one has to wonder how much longer the Cubs will put up with playing in an outdated ballpark that has seen better days. Overall, it was a fun Memorial Day weekend trip with an interesting triangular route (DC to Arizona to Chicago and back to DC). The rest of my 2007 stops were not until a couple months later.

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Next stadium: Safeco Field, Seattle

Chase Field

Houston Astros @ Arizona Diamondbacks
May 26, 2007

Diamondbacks 5, Astros 4

W: Brandon Webb
L: Chris Sampson
S: Jose Valverde
HR: Carlos Lee (HOU)
Attendance: 27,836
Time of Game: 2 hours, 33 minutes

Stadium Facts

Location: Phoenix, AZ
First Game: March 31, 1998
Capacity: 49,033
Type: Retractable roof
Surface: Grass

2007 was the sixth and final year of my 30 ballpark tour. It was also the most ambitious leg of the tour. I intentionally left these ballparks for the final year because they were the hardest for me to get to in terms of proximity to one another combined with the distance from where I live. It wasn't realistic to do it all in a single trip, so I actually had three distinct baseball trips in the summer of 2007. In addition to all of that, I had an extra park to visit since I was unable to make it to Wrigley as planned in 2004. The first part of the 2007 tour was a Memorial Day weekend trip to Arizona and Chicago.

I had been to Arizona a couple times prior to this for Notre Dame football games at the Fiesta Bowl. Those were January trips though, so this was my first experience of Arizona in the summer, albeit a couple months before the oppressive summer heat. I had not spent much time in the city of Phoenix in those prior trips though. So this trip to Chase Field in downtown Phoenix was a brand new experience. I was very surprised at how dead downtown Phoenix was on this particular Saturday afternoon. Perhaps everyone left town for the holiday weekend. Or maybe people just don't spend a lot of time outside in the summer months. A friend came down from Las Vegas to join me for this game.

Chase Field, originally known as Bank One Ballpark, was built just in time for the Diamondbacks inaugural season in 1998. It was the first retractable roof stadium built since SkyDome in Toronto and the first ever built in the United States. It was also the first retractable roof stadium to feature a natural grass playing surface. A roof was a completely understandable and necessary feature for a ballpark in Phoenix.

The roof remains open most of the time to allow the grass to grow, but more often than not, the roof is closed for games during the summer months. On this night though, it was exactly the opposite. The roof was closed when we arrived at the park to allow the air conditioning to cool things off. Then they opened the roof just minutes before the first pitch. Surprisingly, it remained relatively pleasant for the duration of the game despite the 90 degree heat outside the stadium.

While I'm not a big fan of domes, this one is pretty nice. It helps that they are able to open the roof for games when the weather allows for it. Also, the grass surface is a nice touch. The exterior looks more like a basketball/hockey arena than a baseball stadium, but the interior is much nicer. This was the first retractable roof stadium I had been to since 2003, so I didn't have a lot of recent experiences to compare it to. I think it is very similar to Miller Park in Milwaukee though.

This is a very large ballpark for a baseball only facility. It seats nearly 50,000 people, almost all of which are in foul territory. There is just one level of seating in the outfield. The upper deck around the rest of the stadium is massive. The seats at the top of the stadium have to be about as high as you can sit at a MLB park. There is enough overlap with the lower levels to keep the upper deck relatively close to the field though.

Perhaps the signature feature of the stadium is the swimming pool in right-center field, which can be rented out for private parties for games. Our seats were in the second row in right field, not far from the pool, although we could not see it from our seats. The only problem with our seats is that we could not see a few parts of the outfield near the wall due to the unique layout of the outfield wall. Normally, this wouldn't be a big deal, but coincidentally there were several balls hit into these outfield corners during this game. They were very nice seats though.

There is a lot of ground to cover in the outfield of Chase Field. It is well over 400 feet to the wall in dead center, and even further to the corners a little left and right of dead center. Despite the lengthy dimensions, there are still plenty of home runs hit in this park. The ball carries extremely well. Another interesting feature of the playing field is the dirt strip running between home plate and the pitcher's mound. The only other park with this feature is Detroit.

I have always known that Arizona is a second home or a retirement destination for a ton of people from the Chicago area. This was very much proven to be the case at this game. Besides my buddy and me, there were a bunch of other people in our section who lived in the Chicago area at some point, including several Cubs fans. It is no wonder the crowd is so mixed when the Cubs come to town. I would not have expected this for a game between the Diamondbacks and Astros though.

The Diamondbacks entered this game in third place in the competitive NL West, but not far out of first. They sent their ace, Brandon Webb, to the mound for this game. Meanwhile, the fifth place Astros countered with Chris Sampson. Webb had his typically good outing, but Sampson kept the Astros in it and this turned out to be a very exciting game.

The Astros scored a quick run in the first. It took the Diamondbacks a little longer to get their offense going. In the bottom of the third, Chris Snyder doubled to right field, knocking in Carlos Quentin to tie the game. Snyder later scored on a Chris Young sacrifice fly to give Arizona a 2-1 lead.

Webb had his sinker working all night, forcing the Astros into a ton of ground outs and strike outs. He received a bit of a scare in the sixth though. Lance Berkman lined one off his left arm. Fortunately, he was able to stay in the game. He did surrender a run in that inning on a sacrifice fly by Carlos Lee. The Diamondbacks added yet another sacrifice fly in the bottom half to retake the lead.

A two run double by Erik Byrnes in the seventh seemed to give the Diamondbacks a commanding 5-2 lead, but the Astros were not done. Lee knocked in two more runs for the Astros with a home run off reliever Tony Pena in the eighth. Jose Valverde shut the door in the ninth inning to secure a 5-4 victory for the Diamondbacks. It was already the 18th save of the season for Valverde.

The Astros dropped their seventh straight game on their way to a disappointing 89 loss season in 2007. On the flip side, the Diamondbacks moved closer to first place with the win. They wound up edging out Colorado and San Diego by a game to win the NL West. The Diamonbacks swept the Cubs in the first round of the playoffs, but then got swept in the NLCS by their division rival Rockies.

Arizona was fortunate enough to win a World Series in just their fourth season of existence in 2001. Since then, they have been up and down, but remain a pretty successful franchise. Chase Field has been an ideal home park for a team in the desert of Arizona. After this short stay in Arizona, I hopped on a plane the following morning to head to Chicago.

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Next stadium: Wrigley Field, Chicago

Petco Park

Florida Marlins @ San Diego Padres
June 11, 2006

Marlins 7, Padres 3

W: Brian Moehler
L: Jake Peavy
S: Taylor Tankersley
HR: Cody Ross (FLA), Dan Uggla (FLA)
Attendance: 31,090
Time of Game: 2 hours, 53 minutes

Stadium Facts

Location: San Diego, CA
First Game: April 8, 2004
Capacity: 42,445
Type: Open
Surface: Grass

Following the Saturday night Angels game, I spent one last night in Anaheim before heading down the Pacific Coast once again. My buddy and I took off early Sunday morning in order to arrive in San Diego for a Sunday afternoon game at Petco Park, home of the San Diego Padres. The final game of my 2006 California trip was at another one of the best parks in baseball.

Petco Park is located in downtown San Diego, just a short walk from the San Diego Bay and the Pacific Ocean. It was built in this area in an attempt to revitalize a neighborhood, and from what I can tell, it has done just that. Unfortunately, I didn't have much time to explore in San Diego, but my limited impression was very positive. This is definitely a city I need to visit again. Not surprisingly, it was a beautiful summer afternoon in San Diego with barely a cloud in the sky.

Petco Park didn't go with the retro ballpark look and feel like many of the other stadiums built in the 2000s. The only significant retro feature is the Western Metal Supply Co. building in left field. This old brick building now houses suites, a restaurant and some bleacher seating. The 100+ year old building was scheduled to be demolished to make way for the stadium, but was declared a historic landmark and eventually became a trademark symbol of the ballpark.

The rest of the outfield seating is quite unique as well. There are two levels of seating in both left and right field, but the wide open center field area gives the park an open feel. Lawn seating is available in center field. Our seats were in the lower level in right field. Interestingly, most of those seats in right field are not covered by the upper deck, which means the right field upper deck is pretty far away from the playing field. Our seats were very nice though.

Another distinctive feature of Petco Park are the two tall light towers just beyond first and third base that also house luxury suites. These towers separate the main seating areas into a few different sections, much like they have in Philadelphia and the new Washington stadium as well. There are three distinct seating levels in those areas of the park.

None of these California ballparks are hitters' paradises, but Petco Park is probably the best pitcher's park in all of baseball. The relatively deep dimensions, especially to right field, combined with the typical wind patterns, makes this a very difficult place to hit home runs. It is almost always at or near the bottom of the league in home runs surrendered. There were a pair of home runs in this game, but both of them would have been long gone in any stadium.

For the second time on this trip, I saw the woeful Florida Marlins play. In fact, I witnessed two consecutive starts by Marlins pitcher Brian Moehler. After getting rocked in San Francisco six days earlier, he was much more effective in this one. Meanwhile, the Padres sent their ace, Jake Peavy, to the mound. Peavy was not having a particularly good season though and 2006 probably wound up being the worst season of his career to date.

The Padres struck first in the bottom of the first inning. Three hits, an error and a wild pitch led to a pair of Padres runs. Brian Giles knocked in the first run with a single, scoring Mike Cameron who bowled over Marlins catcher Miguel Olivo. Adrian Gonzalez also added a RBI single in the inning. Peavy surrendered the lead in the next half inning though. Olivo connected for a two run single to tie the game. It was the first of four hits on the afternoon for Olivo.

For the second consecutive game on this trip, an intentional walk proved to be very costly. Peavy gave a free pass to Miguel Cabrera to put two men on with two outs in the top of the fifth. Cody Ross made the Padres pay for that decision, launching a towering three run home run into the upper deck in left field. This gave the Marlins a 6-2 lead. Peavy didn't make it past the fifth inning, yet managed to strike out ten Marlins in addition to the eight hits, three walks and six earned runs.

Moehler, on the other hand, had a nice outing. He only surrendered those two first inning runs in seven innings of work. Dan Uggla capped off the scoring in the ninth with a solo home run to the top level of the Western Metal Supply Co. building in left field. Taylor Tankersley pitched 1 1/3 innings to record the save. The Marlins won by a final of 7-3.

The Padres dropped to 32-31 after this game and found themselves in third place. However, the NL West was quite weak this season and the Padres wound up winning the division with 88 victories. They lost to the Cardinals in the '06 NLDS.

As I mentioned before, my only regret about this trip was that I didn't plan more time in the beautiful city of San Diego. Petco Park fits in very nicely with its surroundings in downtown San Diego. The entire 2006 California trip was a blast. Along with my first major trip in 2003, this was definitely one of the best baseball trips I've done and one I would highly recommend to others.

That's it for 2006. This brings me to 2007, when I crazily flew all over the country going to the remaining ballparks.

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Next stadium: Chase Field, Phoenix