Cleveland Game 11

The Cleveland home opener was...COLD, WINDY, RAINY, DELAYED....

(Penny)

But it was still fun and a great game!

Getting to the park is one big hassle. If you can avoid parking downtown and take public transportation, do it! We sat in traffic over an hour and a half and ended up parking up around 19th Street. It wasn't a terrible walk to the park, but sitting in traffic all that time had us on edge. I was the worst parking situation we have had.
It was raining as we walked to the park. The stadium website didn't specify the policy on umbrellas or bringing food in to the park. Several of us in the parking garage were asking locals and  no one seemed to know. Might be something they want to add. By the way the answer is yes to both!

Going in to the park I was curious to see the benches I read about that read  "Who's on First." They are right by the entrance to Gate C.

Right by the benches is a statue of Bob Feller, an Indians player from the 40's whom Indians fans consider to be the best pitcher, ever! You can read more about him here http://cleveland.indians.mlb.com/news/press_releases/press_release.jsp?ymd=20101215&content_id=16328458&vkey=pr_cle&fext=.jsp&c_id=cle

There was one lone saxophone player outside the stadium that we saw. I always love the outside-the-stadium excitement: vendors, music, local characters, etc. There isn't much of this in Cleveland.

It did quit raining and actually got quite nice. However, the powers that be decided to delay the game because there was another front moving through, so we waited. And waited. And believe me, the storm came through. It was a downpour. Everyone crammed into the concourse, no room to move around or explore. Just waiting. The rain stopped and everyone moved back to our appointed seats where the game began a little over two hours late. The rain brought with it cold temperatures, which got colder and windier as the game went on.

Randy can tell you about the details of the game, but our Parkersburg boy, Nick Swisher, made us proud with Cleveland beating Minnesota 7-2.

I wanted to see the plaque for Ray Chapman, but the crowds in the concourse were just too many to fight my way through to find it. Ray died as a result of hit to the head in 1920. If you are interested in the story you can find it here http://sabr.org/bioproj/person/c2ed02f9

Above the right-field seats are the retired Cleveland numbers. 455 is retired to honor the streak of 455 games sold out.

As far as food goes, same old stuff. Since we sat in traffic so long we didn't have time to eat before the game so we were forced to choose from ballpark offerings. For a vegetarian, the selection is not good. Randy thought the pizza was really good, while I had a pretzel with Stadium Mustard. Sad to say the mustard was my favorite "food' at the stadium. There is an interesting beer stand, "Your Dad's Beer Stand" that sells beers like Pabst and Stroh's.

The scoreboard is big, but kind of tacky with all the ads around it. The sound system is pretty bad, and there wasn't much effort toward putting in fun music to get the crowd going. There was not much in the way of fan cam activity. There were some games disbursed throughout, if you like that kind of thing. Slider, the mascot, didn't do a lot, although we did see him taking lots of pictures with kids.

The Drum Guy was fun and added to the atmosphere of the park. Apparently he sits with his wife in the bleachers and beats a drum when the Indians are in scoring position.
http://www.thepostgame.com/features/201207/cleveland-indians-drummer-john-adams-mlb
Pretty cool guy, huh?

Thumbs up
crowd patience and enthusiasm



Thumbs down
parking
food
stadium-inspired crowd enthusiasm
pitiful fireworks
mascot


All in all, it was fun despite frigid temperatures and the delay. It was better than my thumps up and down indicate. Would it be a stadium on our yearly rotation? Doubt it.