• Home
  • Escapes and Pleasures
  • Family and Friends
  • Go Sox
  • The Outer Loop
  • Articles of Interest

MillersTime

MillersTime

Tag Archives: Pesky Pole

Nats’ New Park, Sox’s Fenway South, & When to Get Your Kid Hooked on Baseball

16 Thursday Mar 2017

Posted by Richard in Go Sox

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

2017 MillersTime Baseball Contests, Astros, Baseball Contests, Boston Red Sox, Fenway South, Green Monster, Houston Astros, Jet Blue Park, Joe Posnanski, Nats, Orioles, Pesky Pole, Rays, Sox, Spring Training, The BallPark of the Palm Beaches, Thomas Boswell, USA, Washington Nationals, World Baseball Classic

We had heard a good deal about the new Nationals/Astros spring training facility — The Ballpark of the Palm Beaches. Thus, when I saw that the Sox would be playing the Nats there, I of course got tickets and met my cousin and some other friends there Mar. 7th.

We had tickets behind the Sox dugout, and, for some reason, the Sox brought most of their starting players. The weather was perfect, and we got to see both first string Sox & Nats players as well as those trying to make the teams. The Sox won, of course, and even if it doesn’t matter who wins Spring Training games, if you’re a Sox fan, you never want them to lose.

Indeed it’s a good park. I don’t think there’s a bad seat in the place. It has 6,500 seats and another 1500 spectators can sit on a grass berm beyond left and right field. The stadium seats are largely in the shade, thanks to good planning and to some over hanging shade structures. There’s an open air concourse that goes from the left field fence all around to the one in right, and you can walk along it without missing a pitch. The only fault I could find with the park was the small scoreboard in the outfield which made it hard to see the names of the players, etc. (But that could also be a factor of my aging eyesight.)

The facility is on 160 acres of what use to be a landfill, trash dump. There are 12 practice fields, six for each team. The Astros have one which is the exact dimensions of their home field, and the Nats have two that are similar to their park in DC. The facility was built quickly, in 15 months, and cost about $150 million, $50 from the state and $100 million from a new county hotel tax. We had heard horror stories about the traffic getting into the Ballpark of the Palm Beaches, but thanks to advance word and advice from my cousin, we approached it from the north (?) and had no trouble parking.

There are now four teams that have their Spring Training facilities in the area – Nats, Astros, Cards, and Marlins – so if you have the time and interest, spending a week or so in the Palm Beach area in the month of March will allow you to see those teams as well as ones that come across the state from the West Coast.

 

Then it was on to the West Coast to see other friends and three Sox games, one against the USA World Baseball Classic team, one against the Os, and one against the Rays. Of course, the Sox won all three, and even if the games don’t count for much, if you’re a Sox fan, you always want to see them win.

But the real reason to go was to see Fenway South, i.e.,Jet Blue Park, where the stadium is said to be a replica of Fenway Park in Boston. Built five years ago, after much negotiation with the ‘powers’ in Ft. Myers, the Sox got a new $77.9 million stadium outside of the city on 126 acres, including six practice fields (one with the same dimensions as Fenway) and a rehabilitation center. The funding came, in part, I think, because Lee County was afraid the Sox would move away, and involved some kind of public-private partnership, where much of the public outlay came from a “bed tax” on hotel rooms in the area.

While the main ball park itself has the same dimensions as the one in the north, it didn’t feel so much like Fenway in Boston. Yes. It has a Green Monster, with seats and a net in the middle of the wall, a former Fenway scoreboard that has to be manually updated with the use of a ladder (there’s no room behind the scoreboard to change the score between innings, etc.), a Pesky Pole, a triangle in center field, and a lone red seat (longest HR in Fenway).

The 11,000 seat stadium is quite open and shady, but it didn’t feel anything like Boston’s Fenway to me. I couldn’t tell exactly, but the right field configuration didn’t feel like the Fenway I know and sitting on/in the Green Monster (game vs. the Rays) only faintly resembled the one in Boston. In the game vs the USA team, we sat just to the left of home plate and had an enormous amount of room in which to stretch out. Against the Os, we sat beyond first base and by the end of the game our necks were sore from looking to the left.

Still, it’s the spring home of my heroes, and, like most spring training facilities these days (15 in Florida and 15 in Arizona), you feel close to the players, the weather is delightful (away from the cold and snow of the north), and you get the opportunity to see both starting players and those who are trying to be starters, or will be in several years.

I’ll definitely return. Anyone want to plan next year’s trip with me?

**          **          **          **          **          **          **          **

Readers of this site probably already know of my interest in different generations enjoying baseball together. That’s how I got hooked on baseball, and I’ve carried that on with my own kids and now grand kids.

You may also know of my two favorite current sports’ writers, Joe Posnanski and Thomas Boswell, from whom I learn something every time I read one of their columns.

And so, check out Posnanski’s latest column, wherein he writes about the best age to get your kids/grandkid involved. While the article does focus on Theo Epstein, I post a link to it primarily for the discussion about getting the next generation involved.

And finally, I have not heard from most of you with your predictions for the 2017 MillersTime Baseball Contests. And in case you missed the post, Connecting Generations, there are special prizes this year for submissions that involve cooperation between two generations.

Deadline for submissions is just about two weeks away. Remember, in case of a tie, the predictions submitted earlier wins.

Share

♣ Search



♣ Featured Posts

  • Cappadocia: Thru Ellen’s Lens
  • Thru Ellen’s Lens: Petra & Wadi Rum
  • I Changed My Mind
  • By the Sea, By the Beautiful Sea…
  • So Many Books…So Little Time? Here Are 34 Recent Favorite Reads
  • One Favorite Read
  • Yes, It’s True…I Biked from Bruges to Amsterdam!
  • Carrie Trauth Made the World a Better Place
  • “I Used to Be a Human Being” – Andrew Sullivan
  • MillersTime Contributors Favorite Reads from 2021
  • Thru Ellen’s Lens: Alaskan Landscapes & Skyscapes
  • Thru Ellen’s Lens: The Brown Bears of Katmai, Alaska
  • When I Was 22…
  • The Country ‘Spoke’ Again
  • Thru Ellen’s Lens: The Slot Canyons of Arizona

♣ Recent Comments

  • Ed Scholl on 2023 MillersTime Baseball Contests
  • Land Wayland on 2023 MillersTime Baseball Contests
  • Land Wayland on 2023 MillersTime Baseball Contests
  • Elizabeth W. Frost on Oaxaca, Mexico: Thru Ellen’s Lens
  • Janet Rock on Oaxaca, Mexico: Thru Ellen’s Lens

♣ Archives

  • February 2023
  • December 2022
  • November 2022
  • October 2022
  • September 2022
  • August 2022
  • July 2022
  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011

♣ Sections

  • Articles & Books of Interest
  • Escapes and Pleasures
  • Family and Friends
  • Go Sox
  • The Outer Loop

Proudly powered by WordPress Theme: Chateau by Ignacio Ricci.