Alex's Baseball Across America: Miller Park Review

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M I L L E R P A R K

August 12, 2011

Pittsburgh Pirates v. Milwaukee Brewers

7:10pm

Milwaukee 7, Pittsburgh 2

WP: Greinke (11-4, 4.08 ERA)

LP: Maholm (6-13, 3.60 ERA)

Attendance: 41,820

Time: 3:01

76 degrees, overcast

Miller Park opened in 2001. It’s got a roof and no air conditioning, similar to Safeco in Seattle. The roof is different from the others in terms of its shape...it’s like an accordion fan. For the most part, it sits in a parking lot...nothing really around it. It has a TGI Fridays that is open year round. It actually cost $27 million more to build than Busch Stadium, which opened 5 years later...those roofs are expensive.

The gates are scheduled to open 1-1/2 hours prior to game time. Again, they opened about 10 minutes before that. They occasionally open 2 hours before...it’s a complex ordeal on the website to figure out. They really should just open 2 hours prior for all games, at least when the team is doing well. People were there early and ready to go! You can go where you want for BP. The bleachers are funny there, as you’ll see below.

The Atmosphere: In the past, Milwaukee has been known for small crowds, even in this stadium. The last couple of years, though, they have been packing them in. Tonight was the 20th sellout of the year, so that provided for a great atmosphere. I went here several years ago when they played the Cardinals. No one was there. Fair weather?

The Scorecard: They got ‘em. $2, which makes it the most expensive plain scorecard yet. It’s still cheaper than Busch’s, though. Good card, but one major flaw. Those pre-drawn diamonds in my boxes. Very little in terms of ads. Plenty of writing room. Rosters present.

The Hot Dog: They do have Kosher here, but I decided to try their “routine” dog. Klement’s brand. Nothing special. Should have had a Kosher, but I think it’s important to try what the “local special” is. They had no hot dog carts around, which I thought was strange for this kind of city. I thought there would be little sausage and dog carts all over, but there wasn’t. The place that has Kosher does not carry the regular dogs so it could be considered a specialty stand, but we all know by now the best dogs come from a single person or two flipping dogs in the middle of the corridors.

The Broadcasters: Former Cardinal Bob Uecker is at the helm here. He’s been in baseball for 50 years and played on the 1964 World Series Champion St. Louis Cardinals. Most people not familiar with baseball know him as broadcaster for the Cleveland Indians...”just a big outside”. He has a partner and they take turns calling the game, with Bob calling most of it. They reminded me a lot of Shannon and Rooney. They had to interrupt their stories to call the game. A good thing if you ask me. They spent several minutes talking about Shannon. They were just good to listen to.

Entertainment: You know something good is going on when they show a “Seinfeld” clip. Before introducing the Pirates lineup, they played a famous scene. Kramer: “You’re gonna be the first pirate.” Seinfeld: “But, I don’t wanna be a pirate.” I could have left then and been happy. They do the routine stuff between innings, except this is the home of the world famous Sausage Race. There’s 5 of them, and employees of the Brewers do the running. They really gained popularity when Randall Simon, a Pirate at the time, took a whack at the head of the Italian sausage, Guido. The Polish sausage, Stosh, helped up Guido while the others kept running. Simon was arrested, fined, and suspended by MLB for the incident. Now, that’s entertainment! They also sing some song about rolling barrels after the 7th inning stretch. I assume it’s either a beer drinking or beer making song. Bernie Brewer is the mascot. I assume he is a brewer, so I guess it makes since.

The Scorecard.

Hot Dog. No kiddin’. It really is.

They do have authentic items and, again, will call and try to get a ball from today’s game.

Views from Around the Park:

Other words: Hopefully, the Brewers will collapse down the stretch!

Gripes: None really. Nice place. Only complaint is that it’s not around anything.

M I L L E R P A R K

M I L W A U K E E , W I S C O N S I N

H O M E O F T H E B R E W E R S

The Brewers are fighting to keep their lead in the NL Central, and playing Pittsburgh works to their advantage. You have to win these games, and they know it. They took a 4-0 lead. Pittsburgh picked up a couple runs late, but then the Brewers went back-to-back and then tacked on another for a solid 7-2 victory. The Cardinals took care of business as well, so the Brewer lead remains at 4 games.

The Crowd: They’re there early and tailgating. A lot of tailgaters. I felt like I was walking on the War Memorial golf course, but this was a concrete lot. This is Packer territory so that may have something to do with it. They stuck around until the end and were into it the whole time. No scorekeepers or radios, however. I have to talk about the fans behind me. You can’t tell a whole city just by one or two fans but the way these two people yelled was so annoying it was hilarious. Our whole row was cracking up. It was always a loud “whooooo” at completely inappropriate times. And, no, it was not a “Whoooo Pig”. It was way more scratchy sounding and piercing. They were quiet after the third and we were hopeful, but they picked up right where they left off at some point in the sixth.

The Stadium: I mentioned several things above. It’s a little tricky to walk around but you can. When you do walk around, you are stuck behind walls most of the time so it’s hard to keep tabs on the game. I was really hoping the roof would stay open because there was a nice breeze. They started closing it right at first pitch. The breeze was gone for good. It didn’t look like it had rained when I walked out, but my car looked like it had been rained on a little. The lower level bleachers are small and under a overhang. They have second level bleachers which is a little unusual.

Lower bleachers in right. I like the area below them...looks like some all-inclusive area. That’s a bullpen location in a lot of parks.

S T A T I S T I C S U P D A T E

MLB Games Seen

16 of 31

Days

42 of 86

(halfway point tomorrow!)

Driving Miles

10,227 of an estimated 18,735

States

Estimated Gallons of Gas

547 of an estimated 1,102

Hot Dogs Eaten

Too Many

Border Crossings

0 of 2

P R E D I C T I O N S U P D A T E

(AFTER 15 OF 30 GAMES)

Runs

135 of 249

(current rate: 270)

Hits

262 of 512

(current rate: 524)

Errors

21 of 36

(current rate: 42)

Home Runs

34 of 65

(current rate: 68)

Doubles

52 of 101

(current rate:104)

Triples

7 of 10

(current rate: 14)

Sacrifices (Hits & Flies)

13 of 31

(current rate: 26)

Strikeouts

234 of 415

(current rate: 468)

Walks

83 of 189

(current rate: 166)

Home Team Wins

10 of 17

(current rate: 20)

Complete Games

1 of 1

(current rate: 2)

Shutouts

1 of 2

(current rate: 2)

Saves

8 of 15

(current rate: 16)

Blown Saves

1 of 7

(current rate: 2)

Balks

1 of 2

(current rate: 2)

Wild Pitches

5 of 19

(current rate: 10)

Hit Batters

4 of 18

(current rate: 8)

Walk-offs

0 of 2

(current rate: 0)

Stolen Bases

14 of 40

(current rate: 28)

Caught Stealing

7 of 15

(current rate: 14)

Ejections

1 of 4

(current rate: 2...I’ll see Ozzie Guillen tomorrow)

Smallest Crowd

18,640

The Coliseum, Oakland

July 27th, Tampa Bay v. Oakland

Largest Crowd

44,111

Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Anaheim

July 9th, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim v. Seattle

B A L L P A R K R A N K I N G S

The Stadium

1. PETCO Park, San Diego

2. AT&T Park, San Francisco

3. Target Field, Minneapolis

4. Wrigley Field, Chicago

5. Safeco Field, Seattle

6. Minute Maid Park, Houston

7. Chase Field, Phoenix

8. Miller Park, Milwaukee

9. Coors Field, Denver

10. Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati

11. Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

12. Kauffman Stadium, Kansas City

13. Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles

14. Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Anaheim

15. The Coliseum, Oakland

The Atmosphere

1. AT&T Park, San Francisco

2. Target Field, Minneapolis

3. PETCO Park, San Diego

4. Wrigley Field, Chicago

5. Miller Park, Milwaukee

The Crowd

1. AT&T Park, San Francisco

2. Target Field, Minneapolis

3. Miller Park, Milwaukee

4. Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

5. Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles

The Scorecard

1. Target Field, Minneapolis

2. AT&T Park, San Francisco

3. Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

4. Minute Maid Park, Houston

5. Safeco Field, Seattle

The Hot Dog

1. Coors Field, Denver

2. AT&T Park, San Francisco

3. Wrigley Field, Chicago

4. Safeco Field, Seattle

5. Target Field, Minneapolis

The Broadcasters

1. Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles

2. AT&T Park, San Francisco

3. Miller Park, Milwaukee

4. Target Field, Minneapolis

5. The Coliseum, Oakland

Yount’s statue in front of the park. There is also one of Aaron that I passed. I suspect there are others.

BP. Roof open.

Upper and lower level bleachers.

Scoreboard with good info. Doesn’t report previous plays, though. This is how I discovered Ludwick was a Pirate. Not sure when that happened. He was a Cardinal and probably the best one we’ve given up in a trade since the Mo’ era begun.

They run too fast to get a good shot. The lighting in this place is noticeably darker than others...I guess I could have mentioned that in “The Stadium”.