Heartland of Baseball Tour 2003
August 7, 2003
This being the final game on the trip, we splurged and paid top dollar for field level seats near home plate. Excellent choice, as the seats afforded us a fine view of the action and the stadium itself. Detroit's team is not playing well this year (and hasn't for quite a few years) so good seats in Comerica are not hard to come by.
We did not spend much time in Detroit, as we drove up from Cleveland that morning, then over to Ann Arbor to spend the night, giving us a jump on the next day's journey back to Chicago for our flight home.
The game was a Thursday afternoon game, which was nice, although a bit hot as our seats were in the sun. The matchup was the Tigers against the Oakland Athletics. We were sitting just to the first base side of home plate, near the vistors' dugout, and there were a number of A's fans in our section. We cheered for the home Tigers, who surprised us by winning the game. They scored three runs off Barry Zito in the 4th inning, on a three run homer by Eric Munson. This turned out to be enough, as Jeremy Bonderman and a host of relievers held the A's to two runs on five hits, the Tigers winning 3-2.
Comerica Park was a big hit with our family. We all really enjoyed the Tiger theme, and there are lots of concession options along a big, roomy concourse. The General Motors fountain in center field is a nice touch, and there is a decent view of the Detroit skyline in right field. Add a very helpful and courteous staff, and it added up to a very pleasant Major League experience.
Comerica, like Cleveland's Jacobs Field, has a much-too-big scoreboard in left field that has too much advertising in relation to scoreboard content. Its saving grace as compared to the Jake is that it does not block any significant view, the downtown skyline being in right field. About the only negative aspect of Comerica Park is that the surrounding area of downtown Detroit is in serious need of some urban redevelopment. We paid the exorbitant parking fee for the stadium parking lot because we didn't feel safe with street or garage parking off-site, the only park where we felt that way. The city needs to invest some money in the area so the park can develop a good game day atmosphere outside the stadium. Inside, it was great, and the family voted it our favorite park overall on the trip.
The "bonus feaure" of this game was that it was autograph day. The kids (who had brought baseballs just for this purpose) got their balls signed by A.J. Hinch and Shane Loux. The boys are veteran baseball fans and have gotten balls signed by a number of players (including some Hall of Famers), but they still get a kick out of meeting a big-league player, so this was a nice way to top off the trip.
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The Tiger theme predominates in Comerica Park. Tigers are everywhere, giving the park a distinctiveness that I rather liked. |