Chase Field

Soooo here I am at Chase Field!

Hooray! HKHWR has done it, parking his butt in a seat at the ballpark of all 30 Major League teams. And, let me first say that...IT IS HOT! Wow! HKHWR doesn't do well in this type of weather, and really is just stymied by temps this high at any time of year, let alone in Autumn. I had noted two or three other weekends where both the Padres and Diamondbacks were home the same weekend, but one of two main reasons I opted for this last weekend of the baseball season was to hopefully avoid some of the famous Arizona heat...no dice. Thankfully, the 10-minute walk from the hotel wasn't too stifling.

Going back to the 70s, when I saw my first Yankee game at Shea Stadium (yes, the Yanks called Shea home for a spell in the 70s) to today, I have seen all 30 teams play in 38 or 39 ballparks. It was in 1991 when I first hit the road for a ballgame, first traveling to Baltimore, and then a few weeks later making a day trip to Boston. It wasn't long before deciding I wanted to get to all of them. And today brings a partial close to that journey. I'll post an updated roster of ballparks I've hit and the date of each game when I return.

Next season, I will hit the last three ballparks I haven't visited--in Miami, Cincinnati and Detroit. Sun Life, Riverfront and the old Tiger Stadium are fine placeholders on my list. What's next after that? Finishing the football stadium tour, first seeing each team at home, and then any newer stadiums I haven't seen. I'm making some nice progress on that, but give me about 5 or 6 years. After that? Maybe the hockey rinks for the original six teams, and then the Canadian teams. Then I have this outlandish notion of seeing a sporting event (including MiLB or college football games) in all 50 states. Hell, I recently realized that I am at least halfway there, which has led to that last idea. We'll see...

So, it was black team-neutral gear yesterday, and it's hot-weather friendly white team-neutral gear today. HKHWR planned wisely for this 90+ degree nonsense. Cubs fans are well represented, though not to the extent that Giants fans made the trip to the game yesterday.

Oh yeah, the other reason I picked this weekend? The schedule gods hooked me up again this weekend. Check back tomorrow if that last sentence needs explaining...

Anyway, let me sit back and watch this game.

Location: Chase Field, 401 W Jefferson St # 3, Phoenix

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

25 AAA ballparks visited, 5 to go!

Image
A snapshot of the current AAA venues where I've seen a game. The funny thing about AAA ballparks is I can't think of a single one I didn't really like. Well, at least not after a renovation gave me a second chance to form a first impression. Nor until attendance at unseasonably cold or damp April and May games in some of the northeast stadiums was remedied with second and third games at them in the summer months, rectifying any lukewarm perceptions I may have previously had. Yes, it may have taken a couple of ballgames at them, but each AAA ballpark left me with a very favorable impression. Unlike MLB ballparks, where my journey to see them all started 20 years earlier, my AAA chase is a more recent undertaking. With 5/6 of the AAA ballparks now under my belt, I thought I'd take a look back at the journey so far. Not long after moving up to the Hudson Valley in the mid 2000s, my MiLB ballpark chasing got underway, much like a ballplayer's journey might progress, fro...
Read more

That top-32 National Park list I once created

Image
I'm enjoying watching a few friends near the completion of their National Park quests. Earlier this year, while traveling through the three Florida National Parks, it was likewise enjoyable but also encouraging talking to fellow travelers pursuing their own such journeys: a father and son were hitting their 40th, and one woman was at her penultimate with plans to finish in September. That's all great stuff to me.  These quests also lead to questions from interested observers. "What's the first  #NationalPark  you'll be visiting when this is over?", "What's your favorite National Park?", "What are your top 3/5/10?" These are some of the questions I see posted and get asked. With 44/62 seen, I don't know if it's fair to assemble such a list, but here's how I ranked the top 32 I've visited. Yeah, if I redid it, many spots could flip, but the top 4 or so are pretty well locked in, until one of the 18 I'm missing changes ...
Read more

Tipping and ripping the cap

A belated tip of the cap to this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame inductees. I know the NFL and NBA Halls had their 2010 inductions more recently, and an eventual nodding of the helmets to the former may follow. It’s just that a recent conversation prompted this post. In this era of free agency, the need for players to don one team’s cap over another when their plaque is created seems to be something of a relic, especially when a player has left an indelible mark on multiple teams. Even if the bulk of his career or prime numbers rest mainly with one team, should that team be solely associated with that player when he gave another some great years? Conversely, if, say, a contract or personal quarrel leaves bad blood between a player and the team where his HOF numbers were earned, should that player have the right to select some team where he had less impact? Admittedly, most inductees do lean to one team or another in terms of career dominance, and Wikipedia, under the "Players with mu...
Read more