Busch Stadium

Scheduling more than one visit into enemy territory during one baseball season doesn't sound like the world's best plan.  However, when the alternative was staying at home to watch your team drop 34 of 38 games, then by all means, it was time grab our friends, Sheri and Tim, and hit the road.

This is the third go-round for a St. Louis stadium to take the name Busch Stadium.  It opened up in 2006, a season after the Astros assisted in turning out the lights on Busch II by beating the Cards in the NLCS.  Since the last edition was a relic from the cookie-cutter ballpark era, this one is a sure upgrade. 

Promotions:
The best thing we could score with the price of our admission was a voucher for a free visit to Mermac Caverns if you were 15 or younger. Granted, most teams don't need to rely on a hot promo to keep the turnstiles moving on Friday nights, but we don't think a fireworks show would have been too much to ask.  Besides, doesn't holding back on Friday fireworks violate some sort of baseball law? Grade: C

Food:
It seems that the more stadiums we've been to, the more difficult it is to find any stand-out items at the concession stands.  St. Louis isn't much different in this department. There wasn't really anything all that unique. The only item not previously seen elsewhere was the mac and cheese bowl with about 4 different mix-in options. 

As you also might guess from the stadium's naming rights, there is an offering or two from the giant beer monolith just down the highway.  They did have a decent selection of craft beers including: New Belgium, Boulevard, and locals Schlafly and O'Fallon, but those stands were few.  Prices overall were about average as well. Grade: B

We didn't take many food photos.  Here's a list of their girly drinks.

Overall Gameday Experience:
This is the category where the stadium really shines.  From the moment we walked in, there wasn't much that left us for wanting.  Concourses were spacious.  Restrooms and concession stands were numerous.  And since we purchased seats on the upper concourse behind home plate, we got a view that was tough to beat.  The only real complaint was that there was a premium placed on all of this when it came to ticket pricing.  Then again, it's somewhat to be expected because filling seats for baseball in St. Louis has never really been a problem.

Just where did they get the idea for the goofy design in the outfield grass?

Behind home plate on the main level is the massive team store.  A few nice memorabilia pieces are on display in there, or if that's not your thing, you can build-a-Clydesdale.



Stan Musial's final game-worn jersey



Can't believe Toby didn't wind up with one

Wandering out to the concourse in the outfield offered the opportunity to take a picture with the 2011 World Series trophy.  Beyond that, is perhaps the world's greatest team store.  Well, it could be, if they offered more than Cardinals-related inventory.  All kinds of memorabilia ranging from game-used baseballs, bases, and jerseys to old pads from the outfield walls are for sale.  One of the workers in the shop said there are currently a few similar stores in other cities that recently opened with hopefully more on the way.

Cardinal fans have the self-proclaimed distinction of being baseball's best fans.  While we didn't feel awash with new enlightment for the game by any of the fans in our vicinity, most everyone was wearing hometown gear. Plus, they didn't have to necessarily be prompted by a scoreboard to get loud at key moments.  However, no fanbase is immune to criticism.  Case in point below:

The Wave started sometime in the 7th inning of a 3-2 ballgame.

All in all, we were pleasantly surprised by how much we enjoyed watching baseball in St. Louis.  A return trip in the future won't be ruled out, especially if a disappointing Cards loss is in the offing. Final grade: B+

Turner Field

Following the Astros' playoff failures of '97, '99 and '01 to the Atlanta Braves, I was loathe to ever set foot in Turner Field.  Alas, if we are going to knock out all 30 parks, a trip to the ATL at some point was going to be unavoidable.  Luckily, a friend's wedding took us to there, rather than having to dedicate a vacation to this endeavor.

Turner Field's first season was 1997.  Originally, it was built as the stadium that hosted the track and field events for the 1996 Olympics, with the plan to convert it to a full-time baseball facility once the games were over.  Visually, it's difficult to tell that it was anything other than a baseball stadium. 

Once we arrived, it appeared there were a very limited number of gates, which seemed strange considering the stadium holds 49,500. Ordinarily, it probably isn't too much of a problem, but a full-capacity opening day crowd led to the mess pictured below.  Not fun!

Extensive pregame tailgating meant most everyone pictured here is hammered

Promotions:
Free foam tomahawks were handed out to all fans that wanted them, so everyone could properly do the Chop.  Needless to say, we passed.  We were there on a Friday night, so they had a nice post-game fireworks show and a short musical performance by the Civil Wars.  We'll bump the final score a notch for the surprise "concert" and the fact they were at least not stingy with their giveaway.  Grade: B

Concessions:
All of the standard options are widely available all over the park, but in the night's recurring theme, the stadium seemed under-equipped to handle a sell-out.  Lines were extrememly long at most stands.   Some of the less-traditional standouts were gyros, sushi, and crepes.  We opted for the gyros, which turned out to be a pretty solid selection.

No lack of soda variety, though few were interested

The wild card is Chick-Fil-A was served at a few stands, which begs the question, can those be open on Sunday games?

If you want Chick-Fil-A, you're going to have to deal with a giant cow somewhere

Beer selection wasn't overwhelmingly diverse, and prices were consistent with most other MLB parks we've visited.  Grade: B

Overall gameday experience:
Braves fans have not been widely known for packing the yard.  Afterall, there were divisional playoff games in the early 2000's they couldn't sell out.  Over and over, though, it felt cramped and crowded most everywhere we went, although this is supposedly far from the norm. 

The incessant Tomahawk Chop that started up with seemingly every Braves' hit got old in a hurry.  Ryan Braun's first Turner Field appearance after his off-season steroid accusation did add some fun.  Fans made sure to boo him heartily on every at-bat and play he made.  For whatever reason, everyone also seemed to take great pleasure in booing former Brave Alex Gonzalez, though we weren't sure why exactly a journeyman shortstop's departure would inspire that much wrath.

There were a few interesting features to be had.  We entered the stadium through the centerfield concourse, which is the one area that provided a large area for milling about.  There's a large video board where fans could watch the game while standing in line for concessions or consuming their favorite beverage, which a surprising number were doing.

On the main concourse on the 3rd base side, there's a Braves museum.  There was a nominal $2 entry fee, but it houses some pretty cool, albeit Braves-related memorabilia.  Inside are awards and artifacts from Braves' Hall of Famers, lockers representing each season of their record consective playoff appearance run from '91-'05, and even an old railroad car you could walk through that was used by the Milwaukee Braves from the early 50's. 

Playoffs from '91-'05...

But only 1 title!

While all of this was pretty cool, the design of the stadium is fairly generic and certainly not well designed for large crowds, while also lacking the character of many of the other stadiums we've visited.
Final grade: B-