New Siebert Field

All photos of Siebert Field available on Flickr.

My April NCAA ballpark tour continued this week at Siebert Field in Minneapolis, home of the Minnesota Golden Gophers of the Big 10 Conference.  The ballpark takes its name from Dick Siebert, a former head coach who led the team to three national titles in the early 1960s during the program's heyday.  This is actually the 2nd iteration of Siebert Field that has existed at the same exact site, replacing the old facility in 2013.  Despite Erik moving to Minneapolis in the summer of 2004 and living there for the better part of a decade (while obtaining multiple degrees from the UofM nonetheless), I've somehow never made it to either of the Sieberts, but it certainly wasn't for lack of trying.  Towards the end of the O.G. Siebert's existence, it was becoming so dilapidated that the Gophers started playing almost exclusively at the old Metrodome.  I actually recall Erik going to many of those games when he was a Twins usher there.  And there was at least one time we tried going to the new park and the game was cancelled due to too much snow on the field.  We did make it out to see Goldy at their early season home of U.S. Bank Stadium in 2017, but I finally got to one of my white whales this past Tuesday.

I made the 15 minute drive from my office in St. Paul, and found some free street parking a couple blocks away from the park within what appeared to be a large off-campus housing area.  The ballpark is situated on the north end of campus, amongst the glut of their other athletic facilities.  It is oriented southeast and wedged between an active rail line to the north, the track & field stadium to the east, the softball stadium to the south, and Athletes Village to the west, which is another BWBR-designed project.  It seems like every single men's and women's sport has their own dedicated playing and practice facility in its own separate part of campus, and being my first time to this part of campus, it felt odd to me.  When I was at the University of Cincinnati, there was something special about the ceremony of at arriving to the football stadium in the center of campus and how buildings were arranged around that, instead of just stumbling upon this back baseball field next to a set of train tracks as in the case of Siebert Field.  Once I got inside it even felt cramped on the site.  I'm not complaining about the perils of an urban campus - density is a good thing - but the entire area could have just been organized and connected better with some sort of cohesive athletics master plan.  I did like how other buildings and infrastructure consciously make up some of the boundaries of the field.  The types of parks that do this are always the most intimate, unique, and memorable - Hadlock Field in Portland and Jackson Field in Lansing spring to mind as recent examples for me.  Aside from its position and location on campus, the rest of the ballpark was pretty status quo.  It has about 5 sections of fixed seats that are 15 rows deep, some bleacher sections above the dugouts, and then two small berms further down the lines adjacent to the bullpens.  It has an open concourse at the top row of seats with a concessions building behind home plate with press box above, a small outbuilding with bathrooms and I assume lockers down the 3rd base line, and an indoor batting cage and training building down the 1st base line.  I've implied that this field is shoehorned into its site, and that means the concourses basically stop at the foul poles and there is no access beyond the outfield fence.  It certainly wasn't horrible, but I was expecting a little bit more out of a Big 10 facility, particularly when compared to the beautiful D3 St. John's ballpark I was at a couple weeks ago.

I was definitely spoiled by the mild weather I experienced in Omaha and Collegeville earlier this month, because this game was a harsh reminder as if to say "hey, it's still April."  It had just stopped raining when I got to the park which pushed back first pitch about 20 minutes, and after that rain ceased it cooled considerably, dropping down into the low 40s by the time I left.  Minnesota would go on to defeat intercity rival St. Thomas by a 7-6 score in 11 innings.  My joints were literally freezing stiff by the end of the 7th, and I also had an 80-mile drive ahead of me back home, so I did not get to see the thrilling conclusion, but there was plenty of action in the 7 innings I saw.  The Tommies jumped out to a 6-1 lead in the 4th, and the Gophers scratched and clawed back the rest of the way, ultimately winning on a walk-off single by 2B Brady Counsell in the 11th, who you can probably guess is the son of former Brewers manager and noted traitor Craig Counsell.  The other exciting name in the game was Jack Spanier, mainly because he is from Cold Spring and was ROCORI's starting quarterback a couple years ago (no, I am not into local small town high school football now...yet).  He went 2-5 with 2 RBI starting at SS in the 9-hole.  Both starting pitchers were pretty awful.  Walker Retz for St. Thomas walked 5 over 4 innings with only 1 strikeout, and Nick Argento for Minnesota gave up 4 runs in just 2.1 with a walk and 3 hit batsmen.  He was also just as wild off the mound, as 2 of his runs were unearned due to an errant throw from him to first base.  As an aside, I've always felt that if a pitcher commits an error that leads to a run scoring, that the run should be earned and charged to him - he's the one that made his own mistake!

With the college baseball regular season wrapping up in the next couple of weeks, I am eagerly awaiting the start of the town ball and Northwoods League calendar!

park rankings and statistics:

aesthetics - 4
views from park - 6
view to field - 8
surrounding area - 5 (student housing and other athletic facilities)
food variety - 5
nachos - 5 (cheese was ok, good ratio, points deducted for bag of chips)
beer - n/a
vendor price - 8 ($2 Tuesday)
ticket price - 9 ($10 behind home plate)
atmosphere - 4
walk to park - 6
parking price/proximity - 7 (free street parking 2 blocks away)
concourses - 4
team shop - 4 (good amount of stuff but it was a stand not a shop)

kids area - n/a

best food - nachos
most unique stadium feature - site/campus location
best jumbotron feature - Categories game

best between-inning feature - Guess the Stretch

field dimensions - 330/390/330

starters - Walker Retz (STT) v. Nick Argento (UMN)
opponent - St. Thomas Tommies
time of game - 3:59
attendance - 501
score - 7-6 W (11)

Brewers score that day - 2-1 L

STANDINGS AND UPCOMING SERIES AS OF 4/26/24:

Brewers 16-8, +0.5; 3 v. Yankees, 3 v. Rays

Twins 11-13, -6.5; 3 @ Angels, 3 @ White Sox

Orioles 16-8, --; 3 v. Athletics, 4 v. Yankees

2024 GAMES ATTENDED:

Erik - 1

Peter - 4