Return to Hadlock Field

All photos of Exeter Library and Hadlock Field available on Flickr.

Click here for Erik's original review from 2008 visit.

My wife and I took the kids to New England this past week for a much needed spring break vacation, during which we visited Erik's family in New Hampshire and some other friends in upstate New York.  Far be it from E and I to get together during the baseball season and not include a ballgame, so we checked the schedules and the closest team that was home was the Portland Sea Dogs in Portland, Maine.  And so with that, I visited my 2nd new ballpark of 2022, and Erik attended his first ballgame in nearly 3 years, this past Friday.  Our wives were gracious enough to stay home with the kids (or perhaps we were the ones that were gracious by not subjecting them to a 4-hour roundtrip to watch minor league ball in April), and we set out for Maine from Concord around 2pm.  We did attempt to make a quick stop in Exeter, NH to see the famous library by Louis Kahn, but unfortunately it was tightly secured from strangers like ourselves and we could only walk around outside.  On the way I learned that Erik's wife actually attended the Phillips Exeter Academy which the library was a part of, and spent many hours of her school days in that library.

We arrived at about 4:30 for a 6pm first pitch, to what I imagine a typical spring day on the Maine coast is like - windy, cloudy, and constantly shifting.  Even though the mercury climbed to 60° at first pitch, it felt much colder being that close to the water, sort of like how the Chinooks games in Mequon can feel really cold even well into the summer.  Portland is a city about the size of Appleton, WI and seemed to have a lot of character and history, as much of New England does.  We walked down some old brick sidewalks and past many old houses and buildings on the way from our car to the ballpark, including the 107-year-old Exposition Building where the NBA G-League Celtics play.  The Expo actually forms part of the right field corner of the ballpark, which I'll talk about later.  We got $15 seats right behind home plate and headed inside after snapping a few photos.

I've entitled this post "Return to Hadlock Field" because Erik had visited this ballpark several times in the Late Aughts during his campaign days, so even though this was my first visit here I won't recreate his entire post - I've linked it above.  In comparing his set of photos from 2008 to mine, other than some advertising changes really nothing has changed.  The most interesting - or some might even say charming - part of the ballpark is the fact that it feels a century old just like everything else in Portland, but it has actually existed as a minor league stadium for less than 30 years, and there are several factors that contribute to this.  First of all, it technically opened in 1994 as a "renovation" of a field previously used for high school baseball (and in fact still is).  I haven't been able to find anywhere how long baseball has actually been played on this site, but keep in mind if you go that the 1994 date is very misleading.  I would guess that the basic structure and bleachers have existed in some form long before that date, and the layout certainly would tell you that also.  It is the type of ballpark where the concourse is under the seating bowl and you ascend to the seats, like many older small parks were built - Eau Claire, Kenosha, and Duluth to name a few.  Another major factor that makes the park feel older is its scale and shape.  You figure out pretty quickly when visiting New England that straight roads and logical street grids are unheard of, and that shows itself in the shape of the field, particularly how it is wedged next to the aforementioned Expo Center in right field with short dimensions down the lines.  This gives it sort of an Asheville or Baltimore type intimacy.  Lastly, the "Maine Monster" that was added in left field after the Sea Dogs became a Red Sox affiliate about 15 years ago naturally makes the park feel older as it is intended as a near replica of the "Green Monster" at Fenway Park.  I'll also mention that Portland recently overtook Asheville as the "Craft Beer Capital of America" due to its having the most breweries per capita in the United States, so definitely make a visit to the beer stand if you make your way out here.

The game pitted the Sea Dogs against the Binghamton Rumble Ponies, whom we also saw play in Akron a few years ago but sadly no longer have Tim Tebow on their team.  Portland seems to be very heavy on pitching prospects but not much in the way of hitting, and that was pretty evident during the game.  The Red Sox #11 prospect, Brandon Walter, got the start and was stellar, giving up only 2 over 6 and striking out 10.  His fastball would be considered slow these days topping out at around 92, but his funky three-quarter lefty delivery and devastating breaking stuff got a lot of swings and misses.  A couple of 2-out RBI by Jeremy Vasquez and Matt Winaker were Walter's only mistakes and had him hooked for the loss when he left the game.  The minor league pitch clock really had the game moving and we were on pace for about a 2-hour game, but when it got to the 8th it slowed considerably as games often do.  The Dogs tied it in the 9th on a wild RBI groundout.  Pinch-hitter Izzy Wilson grounded to 1st with a man on 3rd, and the first baseman stepped on the bag for the 2nd out, but his throw home narrowly missed Elih Marrero dashing to home plate to tie the game.  It appeared from our view 5 rows back that Marrero did not touch the plate, but a combination of him ripping a hole in his pants and the coach arguing the tag led to distracting the R-Ponies from a formal appeal and the run stood.  We then of course entered the one thing we didn't want on a cold night with a 2-hour drive ahead of us - extra racks.  But the ghost runner made it a quick 10th inning and the Dogs won in their half on a single up the middle by Tyler Deardon.  Tyler was the offensive star of the day for either team, going 3-4 with a walk.

We had a great vacation and this was certainly one of the highlights.  I'm very much looking forward to visiting Erik as many times as possible over the years and crossing more New England ballparks off my list.

park stats and rankings (see original post from 9/5/08 linked above):
aesthetics - 7
views from park - 4
view to field - 7
surrounding area - 6
food variety - 6
nachos - increases to 4 (just chips in a bag, but points for ample cheese-to-chip ratio)
beer - increases to 8 (great variety but $11)
vendor price - increases to 8 (I thought prices were pretty fair by 2022 standards)
ticket price - decreases to 4 (GA should never be more than $10)
atmosphere - 8
walk to park - 5
parking price/proximity - 7
concourses - 5
team shop - 9

best food - Sea Dog Biscuit (local chipwich)
most unique stadium feature - Maine Monster
best jumbotron feature - first time I've ever seen exit velocity displayed
best between-innings feature - human Hungry Hungry Hippos

field dimensions - 315/400/330

starters - Alex Valverde (BNG) v. Brandon Walter (POR)
opponent - Binghamton Rumble Ponies
time of game - 2:52
attendance - 3918
score - 3-2 W
Brewers score that day - 4-2 L

STANDINGS AND UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 4/25/22:

Brewers 10-6; 1 v. Giants, 3 @ Pirates, 3 v. Cubs, 3 v. Reds, 3 @ Braves

Twins 8-8; 3 v. Tigers, 3 @ Rays, 4 @ Orioles, 3 v. Athletics

2022 GAMES ATTENDED:

Erik - 1

Peter - 3

Tour 2018: Canal Park

All photos of Canal Park available on Flickr.

After settling our night's bar tab that I mostly remember, Sunday morning began with a stop at the old Forbes Field, which is a few miles east of downtown in the Oakland neighborhood (see PNC Park photos).  Today the majority of the former site has been engulfed by the Carnegie Mellon campus, which is perhaps most well-known for the 42-story neo-Gothic Cathedral of Learning tower.  All that remains of the former home of the Pirates is a portion of the outfield wall and the flag pole that was famously in the field of play due to the vastness of the outfield.  It's sad that this historic park is gone, but the fact that anything remains at all is more than you can say about a lot of old parks.  We played catch near the wall for a few minutes until we realized we were too out of shape to continue, and then headed out for the 2-hour drive to Akron.

Canal Park takes its name from the Ohio and Erie Canal (which unfortunately is just out of sight behind the stadium) and it sits right in the middle of downtown Akron.  It was a much larger and denser downtown than I was expecting, sort of like a Dayton or a Rochester NY in terms of architecture and feel.  I couldn't help but laugh when I noticed that the block the ballpark sits on was renamed "King James Way" and my trusty navigation device refused to call it that.  Canal Park is only a couple of years younger that UPMC Park, but paradoxically, the newer "retro style" makes it feel more contemporary.  A very strong and dominant brick and stone façade fronts the main street and really serves to tie it into the downtown area well, and gives it a powerful street presence and proper sense of scale.  So many "retro style" ballparks are just retro for the sake of replicating a style, but in this case it actually serves a purpose.  The main entrance leads you onto the 1st base side on grade with the concourse, and the field is sunken below.  The concourse was a fairly standard concourse of a ballpark this size but was very busy.  The park wasn't super crowded because of how hot it was, so it wasn't a huge factor, but I could see with a full park that the concourse would get congested very quickly due to all of the extra standalone concession booths crammed in there.  Canal Park uses just about every square inch of space under the shade of the suite level to fill with anything and everything they can staff to make extra money.  It's not at all due to the lack of built-in concession stands either; in fact, there are a ton of those with a remarkable variety.  So if distractions and eating are your thing at a ballgame, you will not be disappointed here, but to me it just made an otherwise beautiful park seem chaotic and noisy.  Other than that, I really enjoyed the layout and look of the stadium.  There were a couple of bar areas in right field that provided refuge for many sweaty patrons - one was an outdoor tiki bar similar to the setup in Nashville, and the other an indoor bar that looked to be more private and nature.  It actually looked like an ordinary bar on the street that just happened to access the stadium, rather than vice versa, so probably a nice non-gameday option for the people of Akron to see the ballpark on their lunch.  We had seats behind home plate again, but spent a fair amount of time behind both base lines, and the views from all sides was surprisingly beautiful.  I think I appreciated the experience and uniqueness of Erie more, but in terms of classical beauty and function, Akron was very approachable and a nice place to watch a ballgame.

Erik and I had a dilemma in that we had both not eaten all day by the time we got to the game, but with the temperature in the mid-90s, also could not bear the thought of anything super hot or heavy.  I decided to go with a Jet's meatball sandwich and Erik a cheeseburger, both of which we knew would be room temperature at best under the stadium concession warming lamps.  With full bellies and large cold beverages, we settled in for a matchup between the newly renamed RubberDucks and Rumble Ponies.  The RubberDucks, formerly the Aeros, take their name from the local economy largely built on tires - Goodyear, Firestone, and Bridgestone were all founded in Akron - but don't ask me what the hell a Rumble Pony is.

The star of the show and clearly the reason most fans came out to the park was to see former Tim Tebow stuff his former quarterback frame into a Binghamton uniform and see if he was any better than Michael Jordan.  He started out as nothing more than a publicity stunt when he signed with the Mets last year - and he still is - but he has turned in a respectable season thus far that was good enough to make the Eastern League All-Star game last week.  He was hitting .276 with 6 homers and 36 RBI as of Sunday and went 1-4 as the DH out of the 7-hole.  It was crazy how many people were there wearing an assortment of Denver Bronco and minor league Tebow shirts.  The other recognizable name in the game was the starter for the RubberDucks, Triston McKenzie.  He is the Indians' top prospect and has been moving through the system fast at age 20.  He pitched into the 6th and gave up 3 runs while striking out 7, but his stuff was much better than his pitching line indicated.  There was also a dude named Logan Ice on the Ducks who for some reason did not use "Ice Ice Baby" as his walk-up song, and I am seeing now on MLB.com that he is not just a cool name and is actually their 20th ranked prospect.  Tyler Krieger, another Indians top 30 prospect, was the offensive star of the day going 3-4 with a stolen base and an RBI.  We ended up having to leave in the 8th so Erik could catch his flight out of Cleveland, and it looks like we missed another 5 runs after we left.  Of course the one time in our entire lives we left a game early and that would happen, but we still saw an impressive 49 innings in less than 72 hours so I can't really complain.  Akron held on to win the see-saw affair 9-5 with the help of their 4 runs in the 8th.

After the game, it was a quick 45-minute jaunt to the Cleveland airport and then another 6 1/2 hours of driving for me back to Milwaukee.  I got home about 11pm CT, but thankfully I'm an adult with a reasonable amount of vacation now so I was able to take off Monday as well.  That's about it on the new ballpark front for me this year, but rest assured that Erik and I are already talking about next year's trip!

park rankings and statistics:
aesthetics - 8
views from park - 7
view to field - 6
surrounding area - 7 (downtown Akron, for whatever that's worth)
food variety - 10nachos - 8
beer - 7 ($4.50 for 12oz domestic, 20 & 32 oz also offered)
vendor price – 8 (bonus points for souvenir refillable Duck Mug)
ticket price – 7 ($13 behind home plate)
atmosphere - 7 (Tebow Time!)
walk to park – 6
parking price/proximity – 9 (free street parking on weekends or $5 lots)
concourses - 4
team shop - 4 (points deducted for no rubber ducks!)

best food – Nice 2 Meat U Grill

most unique stadium feature – tiki bar in right field, randomly angled wall in center

best jumbotron feature – Webster v. Rubberta go-kart race

best between-inning feature – Erik and I refusing to participate in the multi-inning Lip Sync Battle

field dimensions - 331/400/337

starters – Harol Gonzalez (BNG) v. Triston McKenzie (AKR)

opponent – Binghamton Rumble Ponies

time of game – 2:57

attendance – 3,770

score – 9-5 W

Brewers score that day – 7-6 L

Tour 2018: UPMC Park

All photos of Erie and UPMC Park available on Flickr.

It was about a 2-hour drive from Cleveland to downtown Erie and we arrived around 4pm. We stayed at the Avalon Hotel just a couple blocks from the ballpark, a slight upgrade from our Cleveland accommodations but that's still not saying much.  We had found out earlier that morning that the SeaWolves were actually playing a doubleheader, so after grabbing a quick road beer, we hustled to the ballpark for the 4:35pm Game 1 first pitch.

UPMC Park (formerly Jerry Uht Park) was built in 1995 to house the relocated Erie SeaWolves, who started as a NY-Penn League franchise in Ontario in the 1980s.  The moniker "SeaWolves" in in reference to their original parent team - the Pirates - and, much like the Utah Jazz, the name just stuck even after Detroit took over the affiliation.  The ballpark is part of Louis J. Tullio Plaza, which also includes the Erie Insurance Arena right next door.  And when I say next door, I literally mean next door - one of the walls of the arena actually forms the left field wall and has a painted yellow stripe on it indicating the boundary line.  It was this and several other unique quirks that made this park stand out to me.  Not only is the park wedged down the left field line, but behind the entrance and out past right field are residential streets, so the architect definitely had a fun time fitting this stadium into its site.  It features a very brutalist exposed concrete framework, which certainly dates the park to a bygone ballpark era.  The 2nd floor "party deck" along right field had pretty cool semi-private picnic areas, not fully enclosed like a suite but enough to distinguish your seating area.  My favorite feature was how small the lower section of seats was.  The 100-level sections of the park is only 6 rows deep, which keeps the capacity down and makes the park feel much more intimate, and as an added result, brings the main concourse super close to the field of play.  This is something I've not seen at any other ballpark other than maybe Five County in Zebulon.  Rather than looking down to the field from the concourse, you almost feel like you're in the field of play sometimes when walking around the perimeter.  Whether this was a conscious design decision or just a result of site constraints, it really added to my experience and opinion of the ballpark, even despite it showing its age now in its 24th season.  It's this age and grittiness that gives UPMC Park a little bit of character and helps it stand out among the glut of modern ballparks.  A beat-up, poorly attended ballpark in a beat-up city is certainly not going to win any fan favorite awards in the Eastern League, but I've said time and time again that when you go to as many ballparks as me, you appreciate anything different and memorable.

Beyond the architecture, the concessions offerings were fair of a ballpark this size.  They had a couple of local beers but mostly large domestic varieties.  Yet another tour staple of ours is to enjoy a margarita on Day 2 of our trips (I've probably said that before - I repeat myself a lot, deal with it), so I located the jumbo frozen yard o' marg stand and they were quite refreshing on a hot evening.  We shared philly cheese steak fries for dinner, which was probably my favorite ballpark offering of the entire weekend.  Our seats were literally front row center behind home plate among season ticket holders and scouts alike, and we settled in for what ended up being 18 innings of baseball.

The SeaWolves were playing the Altoona Curve on this night, a nearby AA affiliate of the Pirates.  Game 1 was a back-and-forth extra innings affair won by Erie in 11 innings.  The game was 4-3 Curve heading into the 7th inning (minor league doubleheaders are only 7 innings each), until the SeaWolves tied it in the bottom half.  Altoona once again took the lead in the 8th, only to be tied up again.  Altoona took the lead for the 4th time in the 11th and Yeudy Garcia gave up 2 runs in the bottom half to shoulder the loss.  Sergio Alcantara went 4-5 with 2 RBI in the win.  Game 2 was pretty uneventful until Altoona put up a 5-spot in the 5th and held on for the 5-1 victory.  1B Will Craig hit an absolute bomb 3-run shot that landed on the roof of the arena.  Despite being a AA game, there weren't too many top prospects or big names I recognized for either team.  Daz Cameron was the obvious one for Erie, who is the son of former big-leaguer and former Brewer Mike Cameron.  The SeaWolves also for some reason have former Blue Jay and Met catcher Josh Thole on their team in his age 31 season.  The only name I recognized on the Curve was Cole Tucker, who was a first round pick of the Pirates a few years ago.

After over 7 hours at the ballpark, and with a 6AM wake-up call awaiting us for another busy day on Saturday, we were again boring adults and hit the sack immediately after the doubleheader.

park rankings and statistics :

aesthetics - 5 (unique but not attractive...just like Erie)

views from park - 7 (Erie Insurance Arena)

view to field - 10 (concourse super close to field)

surrounding area - 4 (downtown Erie)

food variety - 5

nachos - 9

beer - 5

vendor price – 7

ticket price – 8

atmosphere - 5

walk to park – 8

parking price/proximity – 7 ($5 across the street...we parked at hotel for free)

concourses - 9 (very close to field)

team shop - 7

best food – Philly cheese steak fries

most unique stadium feature – arena forming left field wall

best jumbotron feature – guy who refused to participate in Kiss Cam

best between-inning feature – child chases random guy in hot dog costume

field dimensions - 316/400/328

starters – Cam Vieaux (ALT) v. A.J. Ladwig (ERI); Scooter Hightower v. Alfred Gutierrez

opponent – Altoona Curve

time of game – 3:33; 2:18

attendance – 4,541

score – 8-7 W; 5-1 L

Brewers score that day – 7-3 L

Prince George's Stadium

All photos of Prince George's Stadium available on Flickr.

It's pretty much impossible for me to go on a summer vacation and not somehow fit a ballgame into it. I was in the DC area this past weekend with my fiance Lauren visiting friends and attending a wedding, and of course I immediately checked the local ball schedules after we booked our flights. The closest game I could attend in a stadium I hadn't yet been to was in Bowie, Maryland. Lauren stayed behind playing with her friend Claire and her baby, while Phil and I drove about a half-hour from Silver Spring southeast to Prince George's Stadium, where we met up with my friend Emilie from grad school for a little Sunday Night minor league ball.

Bowie is about 20 miles east of downtown DC, just beyond the Beltway and the end of the orange line, and is host to the Baysox, the AA-affiliate of the Orioles. As we read in the gameday program, all of the Orioles' affiliates are within about 4 hours of Baltimore, with only AAA-Norfolk actually playing outside of Maryland. It must be nice to be able to cut down on the moving and traveling if you're an O's prospect; however, Bowie seems to be just a huge suburb and nothing to write home about. The stadium is located off of a major highway and shares a parking lot with a restaurant and a Home Depot, which is a large indicator of just how rapidly the city has grown. For once, this was actually a stadium I was glad was not in an urban setting, because ballparks in outlying areas are generally cheaper, safer, and easier to get to. It was far enough outside of the Beltway that we didn't have to contend with the frustrating DC traffic, the free parking lot was a welcomed rarity in the metro area, and Prince George County does not exactly have a stellar reputation, so the lot also made me feel safe walking back to our car at night.

While most suburban ballparks boast ample parking and accessibility, they generally lack in aesthetics and context. Approaching the monumental front gate from the lot, I remarked to Phil how it actually reminded me of another O's affiliate park we'd been to in Aberdeen. I'm not sure if that's a coincidence or not. The inside was in a lot better shape than I thought it would be and gave the illusion of being "nestled" into a site because of the many trees beyond the outfield wall. It had the press box on concourse level behind homeplate like in Appleton, but unlike in Appleton there are actually suites, which look almost like motel rooms since they for some reason had curtains. The seating bowl is very tall and separated into an upper and lower section with an intermediate walkway halfway down. There is a a huge wall a few feet beyond the outfield wall laden with advertising that had to be at least 25 feet tall, which further contributed to that "nestled" feeling. There were only about two main concession stands, both of which featured the same items, but the food and beer they did have was very original and it was very hard to find even just your standard hot dog and light beer. The most unique part of the park was a children's carousel and an orange-and-white-striped, mini-golf-sized lighthouse in the right field corner. We got seats in the 2nd row right behind the 3rd base dugout and got to watch the carousel spin the whole game. Overall the setup was fairly memorable for a ballpark of that size.

Another unique thing about the ballpark is that it is pretty close to Fort Meade, so a bunch of guys from the military were there to present the colors and sing the National Anthem, which was pretty cool. It was also supposed to be "Happy Un-Birthday Night" at the ballpark but I never heard anything mentioned over the PA system about it, so that was kind of disappointing, but overall it was still a nice night for a ballgame after the rain subsided. The Baysox moved within a half game of first place in the Western Division with a win over the Fisher Cats, 5-3. I spent a fair amount of the game chatting with Phil and Emilie, whom I haven't seen in 4 years - much to the dismay of the sweaty old guy sitting in front of me that kept giving me the stink eye - so there were a few subtle aspects to the game that I missed. For instance, I see from the box score now that 2B Greg Miclat had 4 steals for the home team, giving him 46 on the season and putting him only a few away from breaking the all-time team record. Also, I knew that the starting pitcher Mike Ballard had a great game but had no idea that he racked up 10 strikeouts, en route to his 7th win of the season. Most of the offense came from 1B Joe Mahoney, who had a 2-run double in the 5th and also a sac fly. Steven Lerud also rang one off the right-field foul pole in the 6th for his 5th dinger of the year. One thing that didn't go unnoticed by me personally was the quality of the men in blue; it was such a relief to see good umpiring after what I've been subjected to in the Northwoods League for the past 2 months. The best part of the game was that former Phillie backstop Sal Fasano is the manager of the Fisher Cats and was also coaching 3rd right in front of us. His mustache is as glorious as ever, but he is not nearly as agile as he was in his playing days.

It was about an hour drive to Claire's house in Fairfax after the game, and what a wonderful way to cap off my vacation weekend back in my former city of residence. Random August stadium trip #2 is this coming Friday in La Crosse, Wisconsin.

park rankings and statistics:
aesthetics - 6 (outside blah, inside not bad)
views from park - 4 (trees)
view to field - 10 (not much protective netting)
surrounding area - 2 (DC about 20 miles away)
food variety - 7 (bonus points for unique items)
nachos - 4
beer - 5 (about 10-12 kinds but expensive)
vendor price - 5
ticket price - 4 ($14 behind dugout)
atmosphere - 3
walk to park - 2
parking proximity - 10 (adjacent lot for free)
concourses - 4
team shop - 5

best food - giant hot dog w/ sauce + grilled onions
most unique stadium feature - carousel
best jumbotron feature - turtle shell shuffle
best between-inning feature - tee-ball homerun derby

field dimensions - 309/405/309
starters - Deck McGuire (NH) v. Mike Ballard (BOW)
opponent - New Hampshire Fisher Cats
time of game - 2:40 (0:29 delay)
attendance - 2156
score - 5-3 W
Brewers score that day - 7-3 W

STANDINGS & UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 08.08:
Brewers 65-50, +3.0 (3 @ Cardinals, 3 v. Pirates)
Reds 55-59, -9.5 (4 v. Rockies, 3 v. Padres)
Twins 51-65, -10.5 (3 v. Red Sox, 3 @ Indians)

2011 GAMES ATTENDED:
Erik - 11
Peter - 33

Hadlock Field

All photos from Portland are available of Flickr.

Last Friday brought me the opportunity to watch some more New England minor league ball. After clocking out for the day, I hit the road for the two hour drive to Portland, ME. New England is a popular tourist destination in the fall for big city residents looking to get out and see the leaves changing colors, and on my drive I could see why. The scenery is beautiful and even in late August there were quite a few trees that were already yellow, brown, and red.

I arrived in Portland shortly after the start of the game and parked in a nearby lot. The Portland Sea Dogs are the AA affiliate of the nearby Boston Red Sox and they do everything they can to play up this connection. The teams colors are the same, a switch from the early days of the Sea Dogs when they were are Marlins franchise and wore teal. The lettering and numbers on the jerseys are the same. In addition, at the team store, you can by t-shirt jerseys of many current Red Sox like Kevin Youkilus and Dustin Pedroia but instead of saying Red Sox on the front it says Sea Dogs. The Sea Dogs even have their own Green Monster, except they call it the Maine Monster. The one in Portland is five feet further away from the plate than the one at Fenway and is 80 feet shorter in lengther but is the same height and topped by the same Citgo sign and Coke bottles that sit on top of the wall in Boston.

The main structure of Hadlock Field features a concrete shell upon which aluminum bleachers have been place. This design makes the stadium very loud. For example, when an opposing hitter has two strikes on him, instead of doing the strike out clap, everyone stops their feet, building from a low rumble to a much louer one, distracting the batter. Also, in the middle of the 8th inning, the Sea Dogs play the ChaCha Slide over the PA system and everyone stomps on the bleachers in unison. Its quite the experience when you're in the mens room, barely able to hear the music, and all of a sudden the whole stadium erupts, BANG! BANG! In the outfield, near the foul pole, is a narrow section of steeply terraced boxes, toped by a giant LL Bean boot.

The game featured the lowly New Hampshire FisherCats, at the bottom of the Eastern League standings, and the Sea Dogs who were fighting for a playoff spot. Portland's starter Kris Johnson was looking pretty good for the first 4 innings but was surprisingly yanked with two outs in the 5th, having given up only two runs on five hits while also striking out 5. The FisherCats starter, Jo Matumoto did not fare as well. The Sea Dogs got on the board first with back to back doubles in the 2nd and DH Aaron Bates hit a three-run homer in the third to chase Matumoto. RF Jared Stanley also added a three-run shot in the fifth and the Sea Dogs bullpen shut down the FisherCats to earn the 9-2 victory.

park stats and rankings:
aesthetics - 7
views from park - 4 (Portland municipal auditorium down the right field line, other than that cant see out)
view to field - 7
surrounding area - 6 (downtown Portland is quaint, but a little run down)
food variety - 6
nachos - n/a (i had to get a Sea Dogs helmet sundae)
beer - n/a
vendor price - 4 (pretty steep for a minor league park
ticket price - 6 ($7 GA)
atmosphere - 8 (Red Sox fans who cant make it down to Fenway)
walk to park - 5
parking price/proximity - 7 (surrounding streets for free if you get there early enough, otherwise $5 lots)
concourses - 5 (cant decide if i love the noise from stomping feet or hate it)
team shop - 9

most unique stadium feature - Maine Monster

starters - Jo Matumoto (NH) v. Kris Johnson (POR)
opponent - New Hampshire FisherCats
time of game - 3:12
attendance - 6923
score - 9-2 W
Brewers score that day - 3-1 W