Safeco Field Review

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S A F E C O   F I E L D

July 30, 2011

Tampa Bay Rays v. Seattle Mariners

1:05pm

Seattle 3, Tampa Bay 2

WP:  Pineda (9-7, 3.53 ERA)

LP:  Cobb (3-1, 2.79 ERA)

Attendance: 24,985

Time:  2:24

66 degrees, sunny

 

Safeco Field sits just south of downtown Seattle.  It has a retractable roof, which serves a different purpose than the roofs in Phoenix and Houston...here it’s to keep out the rain, not the heat.  In fact, this stadium has no air conditioning.  It provides a good view, and though it’s a few blocks off the beaten path, it’s a nice walk.  It sits next door to Qwest Field...home of the Seahawks.  Since it’s not surrounded by restaurants and bars, many vendors setup shop outside...it’s like walking through a county fair or Toad Suck Daze.

The gates officially open up 2 hours prior to game time.  You can get into an area called “The ‘Pen” 2-1/2 hours prior...I did not go here but it has different activities and places to eat.  They let you go wherever you want to take in batting practice.  A lot of balls flew into the stands and the players threw a bunch up.  The place to be is in the right fieldbox area  The left field porch is much smaller.  The bleachers sit up high in left-center and don’t see much action.  Ichiro stroked several line drives out...I would not sacrifice my body to try and catch one of those screamers.

The Atmosphere:  This place is a great place for baseball.  Great weather.  Great stadium.  Great scenery.  A bunch of seagulls if that’s your thing.  I imagine the roof is open most of the time here, whereas in Phoenix it’ll probably stay closed the rest of the season.  It’s nice to have the open air with the view.

The Scorecard:  A good one.  $1 and it’s a real scoreCARD.  Again, though, they try to hide it.  They are good at advertising the $3 program, but I had to ask specifically if they had a separate card, and the guy went digging for it.  It had the rosters printed on it, just like Busch does.  It has the diamonds in the boxes, which I don’t care for...my only complaint.  For now, it’ll be placed at #4.

The Hot Dog:  Good enough for the second spot!  The main dog here is...any guesses?  Yep, you guessed it...the “Mariner Dog”.  I went with the Grilled Footlong Dog and had it topped with onions.  The dog itself was good.  The onions were finely chopped which made it a little harder to eat.  It is a distant second to the dog I had in San Francisco but a good one nonetheless.

The Broadcasters:  Good crew.  Again, I don’t know who they were.  One of the guys talked about being traded from Boston to Milwaukee, or vice versa, for Tom Brunansky (a former STLer).  I didn’t listen to them as much because I actually had someone to carry a conversation with at this game, but they seemed to call a good game.  Spent some time talking about Pujols and his 2,000th hit, and then went into detail about the few Cardinals to have accomplished that feat.

Entertainment:  Not a whole heck of a lot.  Cap dance.  They race some speed boats on the scoreboard.  Their mascot is a moose...again, I don’t get it.  I did come across a lot of elk crossings driving up here...no moose, though.

The Scorecard.

The Grilled Footlong Dog.

They have an authentics store.  They even took my name and will call me in a week or two so I can order a ball from the game I was at.  We’ll see how that works out.  They had a McGwire signed bat and ball for sale.

Views from Around the Park:

Other words:  Would love to be here when they have a winning team on the field, though they managed to pull out a win today.  Second time I’ve seen Pineda pitch.  I was impressed both times, but he struggled both times after the sixth inning.

Gripes:  None really.  Location could be a little better but it’s worth walking to.

S T A T I S T I C S   U P D A T E

MLB Games Seen

10 of 31

Days

29 of 86

Driving Miles

6,136.6 of an estimated 18,735

Estimated Gallons of Gas

323 of an estimated 1,102

Hot Dogs Eaten

9 of 30

States

10 of 35

Border Crossings

0 of 2

P R E D I C T I O N S   U P D A T E

(AFTER 9 OF 30 GAMES)

Runs

88 of 249

Hits

150 of 512

Errors

13 of 36

Home Runs

22 of 65

Doubles

24 of 101

Triples

4 of 10

Sacrifices (Hits & Flies)

9 of 31

Strikeouts

143 of 415

Walks

59 of 189

Home Team Wins

7 of 17

(the home team is 7-2 on this trip!)

Complete Games

0 of 1

Shutouts

1 of 2

Saves

4 of 15

Blown Saves

0 of 7

Balks

1 of 2

Wild Pitches

3 of 19

Hit Batters

3 of 18

Walk-offs

0 of 2

Stolen Bases

13 of 40

Caught Stealing

3 of 15

Ejections

1 of 4

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

I’m limiting this to the Top 5,

so some places will start to drop off.

I’ll keep a running tab on “The Stadium”, however.

The Stadium 

1.  PETCO Park, San Diego

2.  AT&T Park, San Francisco

3.  Safeco Field, Seattle

4.  Minute Maid Park, Houston

5.  Chase Field, Phoenix

6.  Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

7.  Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles

8.  Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Anaheim

9.  The Coliseum, Oakland

The Atmosphere

1.  AT&T Park, San Francisco

2.  PETCO Park, San Diego

3.  Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

4.  Safeco Field, Seattle

5.  Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Anaheim

The Crowd

1.  AT&T Park, San Francisco

2.  Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

3.  Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles

4.  Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Anaheim

5.  PETCO Park, San Diego

The Scorecard

1.  AT&T Park, San Francisco

2.  Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Arlington

3.  Minute Maid Park, Houston

4.  Safeco Field, Seattle

5.  PETCO Park, San Diego

The Hot Dog

1.  AT&T Park, San Francisco

2.  Safeco Field, Seattle

3.  Minute Maid Park, Houston

4.  Chase Field, Phoenix

5.  The Coliseum, Oakland

The Broadcasters

1.  Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles

2.  AT&T Park, San Francisco

3.  The Coliseum, Oakland

4.  Safeco Field, Seattle

5. Angel Stadium of Anaheim, Anaheim

S A F E C O   F I E L D

S E A T T L E ,   W A S H I N G T O N

H O M E   O F   T H E   M A R I N E R S

This was one of the better games I’ve seen on this trip.  Almost a National League feel with some small ball and a quick 3-2 Mariner victory.  The pitchers dominated with 23 strikeouts.  Pineda had a no-hitter through 5-1/3.  Former Cardinal Brendan Ryan was in the lineup.  The atmosphere is a little off here because the Mariners are in the cellar, but you can imagine how this place would have been hoppin’ in 2001 when they won well over 100 games.

The Crowd:  A smaller crowd than you’d like for a Saturday afternoon game, but when the team has done as poorly as they have, you can kind of understand.  They are coming off a 17-game losing streak...17!  It really was a lack-luster crowd, though.  Even when the scoreboard did the “Get Louder” junk, it really didn’t get loud.  They did realize enough to give Pineda a hand after he gave up his first hit.  The person in front of me was keeping score and listening to the game.

The Stadium:  Great.  I’ve already mentioned some of the pluses.  It’s easy to get around.  It’d be nice if you could move it a little more into downtown, but frankly there’s no room for that.  A manual board in left keeps up with the game.  You can view other scores on a digital board in left.

Out near The ‘Pen.

BP

The manual board.

Their banners hang in right.

The main scoreboard.