Heartland of baseball tour 2003
August 5, 2003
Game day in Cleveland. We drove through some residential neighborhoods in Westlake (where our hotel was) and surrounding areas. Very impressive older homes with BIG front yards. We stopped at a park along Lake Erie with a nice view of the lake and downtown Cleveland. There we had a picnic lunch and then headed for the ballpark. Cleveland overall is a surprisingly pleasant and inviting city. We parked in a downtown parking garage and walked to "The Jake".
Jacobs Field itself was a bit of a disappointment to me after all the good things I had heard about it. It was nice enough, but nothing special in comparison to other modern parks. The huge scoreboard in left field is a monstrosity. It is much too big and is mostly just advertising- a giant billboard. The worst thing about it is that it blocks what would otherwise be a nice view of downtown Cleveland. The concourse is rather bland and indistinctive. One other negative is that this was the only park that would not let us bring in water in sealed containers. The staff compounded my annoyance by insisting that "most other big league parks won't let you bring them in either", which I knew to be untrue because I had JUST visited four others that did let us in with them. So we had to dump our water bottles and pay the exorbitant $3 for one inside. (This by the way, was the only money we spent on concessions & souvenirs here- by far the least we spent in any park.)
This was the only game on the trip for which we bought tickets in the "aftermarket", having purchased them in an eBay auction. I have had good luck buying MLB tickets on eBay before, and was not disappointed this time either. We were in a season ticket section nine rows from the field just outside first base. Great view of the game.
The game itself was a good one. The Mariners scored in the first on a triple by Ichiro and a throwing error, then scored a second run on a bases loaded walk to John Olerud in the 3rd. C.C. Sabathia was obviously upset with himself for walking in a run, and it turned out to be the winning run. Cleveland answered in the bottom of the third with a solo home run by Peralta, but that was all the scoring as the Mariners won 2-1. Good pitching duel between Sabathia and Jamie Moyer. Jeff Nelson pitched the 8th and struck out three while walking one. It turned out to be his last appearance as a Mariner, as he was traded to the Yankees the next day. Hasegawa pitched a perfect ninth for the save.
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Our field-level seats at the Jake afforded a nice view of the action. Being from the Pacific Northwest, we cheered for the visiting Mariners in this game, one of the few times on the trip we did not root for the home team. Here, Mike Cameron leads off first. |