Ultimate Baseball Road Trip (99 page)

The field at Arlington Stadium was forty feet below street level, and before yet another set of bleachers in the upper deck was constructed, fans entered the stadium at the highest level. The Stadium had the most expansive bleachers in baseball, which gave it a symmetrical and very bowl-like outfield look. Aesthetically, it was nothing too impressive. The most distinctive ballpark feature was its massive scoreboard, a large section of which featured a cutout of the state of Texas. But the many billboards gave the park a minor league feel that it never really overcame. Much like Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, the signs at Arlington Stadium served as windscreens. At the old yard these spanned from foul pole to foul pole. One advertisement of note was an enormous Marlboro Man, leaning, smoking, standing watch like a sentinel, and seemingly caring about very little other than his smooth-as-smoke Cancer Stick. In the land where football rules supreme, neither the Marlboro Man nor the Texas fans seemed too concerned about the local nine. Of course, the Rangers didn’t help their cause by going twenty-four seasons before their first postseason appearance. What’s more, Arlington Stadium was never chosen as the site of an All-Star Game, a fan-building tool often used by MLB to showcase new facilities.

But the true seam-heads in Arlington were treated to plenty of great players and wonderful baseball moments, under such colorful managers as Ted Williams, Whitey Herzog, Billy Martin, Don Zimmer, and Bobby Valentine. One such moment came when eighteen-year-old pitching phenom David Clyde made his Major League debut, beating the Twins 4-3, just twenty days after graduating from Houston’s Westchester High School in 1973. Another was the time Dave Nelson stole second base, third base, and then home—all in one inning—on August 30, 1974. And who could forget August 4, 1993, when forty-six-year-old Nolan Ryan beat the stuffing out of Chicago’s Robin Ventura, who had charged the mound after Ryan beaned him.

But Ryan did much more damage to batters while they were still in the batter’s box. Ryan holds a special place in the hearts of Texas sports fans, even football fans. Ryan is a Texan and the most overpowering pitcher of his generation and arguably of all time. When Ryan pitched, fans packed Arlington Stadium. The hard-throwing right-hander treated the home crowd to his seventh and final no-hitter, as well as his five thousandth strikeout. In 2008 Ryan became team president, then in 2010 he and his business partner Chuck Greenberg scored the winning bid to purchase the Rangers from Tom Hicks after the much-maligned Rangers owner had nearly run the franchise into the ground by tossing Texas-sized contracts at players like Chan Ho Park and Alex Rodriguez without the local gate or television revenue to really make the investments worth the Rangers’ while. As part-owner and team president, Ryan has a hands-on approach. He has worked with pitching coach Mike Maddux to implement a new pitching program whereby Rangers prospects and big leaguers do a lot more throwing than most teams’ hurlers to build arm strength. The plan is designed to not only help pitchers last deeper into games with higher pitch counts but to help them withstand the summer heat in Arlington. The throwback approach to managing mounds-men paid off big-time in 2010 when a cadre of power arms—belonging to the likes of C.J. Wilson, Colby Lewis, Alexi Ogando, and Neftali Feliz—combined with crafty port-sider Cliff Lee and other veteran arms to lead the Rangers to their first World Series appearance.

Josh:
In addition to all that, Ryan has been an ardent supporter of Texas Republicans.

Kevin:
Please toss info like that in the “Kevin Doesn’t Need to Know” file.

Before the upstart Rangers of the new century, there were some pretty good teams back in the 1990s when Johnny Oates was the manager. Two years after moving to Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, the Rangers and their fans got to taste post-season champagne for the first time when the team posted its first-ever division title in 1996. Led by players like Rafael Palmeiro, Ivan Rodriguez, Juan Gonzalez, Will Clark, and Rusty Greer, the big-swinging Rangers defeated the Yankees at home in their first-ever postseason game, a 6-2 win on October 1, 1996. But the Yanks took the next three games to win the series. The Rangers got another shot at the Yankees in the 1998 Division Series, but were swept, with the final insult coming at home in the form of a 4-0 blanking. In 1999, the Rangers and Yanks squared off in the first round of the playoffs again, and New York made it another clean sweep, handing the Rangers their ninth straight playoff loss.

Josh:
That’s almost three sweeps in a row.

Kevin:
Nearly.

Josh:
Three-Sweep. I like that. Maybe I can get a trademark on it.

After the ill-fated A-Rod experience, which lasted just three years during which the juiced Rodriguez led the AL in homers three times while the Rangers finished dead last in the AL West, and a middling first decade of the new century that was capped by the revelation of the Rangers precarious balance sheet, a new potential dynasty seemed on the cusp of emerging as the Rangers enjoyed a glorious 2010 season. After failing to make the October Classic in their first fifty seasons as a franchise (counting the first eleven years in Washington) the Rangers relegated the Seattle Mariners, who debuted in 1977, to the status as longest-running franchise that’s never made a trip to the Big Dance. Those 2010 heroes of Arlington were led by the amazing Josh Hamilton, who got himself clean, resurrected his career, bashed his way to Mid-Summer glory in the 2009 Home Run Derby at Yankee Stadium, and wrote a best-selling book along the way to winning the 2010 AL MVP and 2010 ALCS MVP.

Joined by longtime Rangers hit-machine Michael Young, the multi-dimensional Ian Kinsler, and the flashy Elvis Andrus, Hamilton led an offense that batted .276 to rank first in the big leagues. In the first round of the playoffs, Texas dispatched Tampa Bay in a grueling five-game tilt in which the road-team won every game. That first post-season series victory in franchise history left just the dreaded Yankees standing between the Rangers and the World Series. This time, the Rangers delivered on their home turf, winning all three of the games played at Rangers Ballpark, including the Game 6 clincher in which Lewis and Feliz combined to hold the Yankees to three hits in a 6-1 win. Fifty-one thousand and four hundred fans turned out to watch the Rangers finish off the Yanks and raise the AL Pennant. But that Rangers Ballpark attendance record didn’t last for long. Some 52,419 claw- and antler-bearing fanatics jammed the Ballpark to watch the Rangers win Game 3 of the World Series against the Giants. But that 4-2 victory would turn out to be the only highlight for the Texas nine which fell in five games to a pitching-rich San Francisco squad that held the Rangers’ big bats in check.

Still, the excitement of the 2010 season lingers. On the heels of that success, applications for 2011 season tickets spiked and Arlington was officially stamped on the baseball map as a bona-fide big league city. Led by Ryan’s management, the Rangers returned to the World Series in 2011, only to twice come within a strike of a series victory before losing an extra-inning heartbreaker to the Cardinals in Game 6, and then also falling in Game 7. Sad as it is to do so, we would be remiss not to mention that one of the worst ballpark tragedies in recent memory occurred at Rangers Ballpark in 2011. Shortly before the All-Star break Hamilton tossed a ball toward a fan in the outfield seats and, attempting to make the catch, the gentleman fell over the thirty-four-inch-high railing and suffered head wounds that caused him to die later that night. The man had only been trying to procure a keepsake for his six-year-old son. Hamilton had been trying to do the right thing by being a sport and making a child happy. This should be a lesson to us all not to go too overboard trying to get our hands on a ball. After all, it’s only a ball. It should be a lesson to the big league teams too. They need to do a better job of making sure their stadiums are safe for fans. We’re guilty in this, too, we know. When we find our view of the game blocked by retaining walls or railings, we complain about it in our book. From now on we’ll try to be more understanding. And all MLB teams, we suspect, will be more vigilant in their safety inspections of their facilities. As for the Rangers, within two weeks of the horrific accident, they raised all of the railings at Rangers Ballpark to forty-two inches high.

This is a park where you want to shoot for the first level. The upper seats in the top deck are some of the farthest away in all of baseball. So don’t skimp. Wait until you get to Colorado or San Francisco—where a top-shelf seat at least comes with a primo outfield view—to start pinching pennies. The park offers a reasonable average ticket price, but don’t let that fool you into thinking the average seat is well priced. The average ticket price is lowered by the fact that there are a great number of bad seats in the upper tank.

So pricey they don’t even have section numbers, the first two rows behind and beside the two dugouts are reserved for
the likes of the Bush sisters and those rascally Ryan grandkids. Unless you’re Texas royalty or baseball royalty, don’t get your hopes up. The same goes for the first two rows between the dugouts—the 88 Home Plate Seats, which were added down on the field in 2009.

Josh:
I’ve got to be honest, I kind of thought you and I would be baseball royalty by now.

Kevin:
Because the first edition of our book did so well?

Josh:
No, because I collected souvenir ice cream helmets from all thirty parks.

Kevin:
And you didn’t even clean them out before stashing them in the trunk of the road trip mobile.

The incline of the seats on the first level is steeper than at most parks, and all of these seats between the bases feel like they’re right on top of the action. Section 18 is at third base, Section 25 is directly behind the plate, and Section 34 is at first base.

Appearing in the middle of the lower bowl, behind the Premium Infield seats and in front of the raised lower boxes, the Lower Infield seats are nicely angled toward the action. This is probably where you’ll wind up sitting if you’re a bit too thrifty to shell out big bucks for a primo seat but fan-enough to want a very good seat at Rangers Ballpark. If you’re a moderate spender, you really can’t beat Sections 26 or 27 behind the plate.

This hodgepodge of pricing represents two kinds of seats, those infield seats just beyond the bases, and the seats just behind all the infield seats on what appears to be the first level. We say this because the seats in Sections 115–136 are actually on the first level, but can only be accessed by an upper concourse. They are located immediately behind the section in front of them, and thus the illusion is created that they are part of the same section, yet there is no access to them from the first-level concourse. There are only nine rows of seats in these upper Lower Box sections. And they are covered by the overhang of the Club Level. They’re not a bad option, but we like the Lower Box seats along the baselines a bit better because they are closer to the field.

We should mention, though, that the seats in right field (Sections 35–38) begin to angle away from the plate, forcing fans to look over their left shoulder a bit. The effect is not as dramatic on the left side.

Here is another hodgepodge of sections thrown together more by pricing level than by the fact that they’re in a similar location. These are probably the best value for the money on the first level. Getting seats in the lower rows of Sections 13 or 39 will not disappoint you. The other important factor with these seats is that (except for Sections 41 and 42) they are all clear of any foul-pole obstructions, while the lower-reserved sections nearby have obstruction issues. If this is important to you, spend the extra ten bucks to stay in the clear.

These are the home run territory seats, where you’ll want to bring your glove. Compared to other parks, they’re a bit on the pricey side at more than $30 a pop. A distinctive and kitschy section to sit in is the lower deck of the grandstand in right field. If you want a unique experience, remember not to sit in Section 44, which is not under the roof. The aisles are built around the pillars, and the pillars themselves
are narrow, so the inevitable blockage of view is not terrible in this delightfully “old-timey” part of the park. Sit in the center of the sections and down low if you want to avoid the “experience” of sitting behind a pole, regardless of the kitsch factor. Sections 3 to 7 in left are elevated above the high-tech scoreboard. These sections obscure just a tad of the warning track, but all in all they’re not bad. A small gully separates the first row of seats from the outfield wall. Sections 8 and 9 down the left-field line are the poorest in this range. The back rows are under a significant overhang, and the field view is cut in half by the foul pole. The lower seats in Section 8 are not as bad, but most of the seats in Section 9 have some type of obstruction.