Tigers Weekly 2008 Season

WEEK 14: 7/21/08 - 7/27/08

Greetings, Tigers Fans!

Well, it was another confusing week for Tigers 
fans.  After sweeping the Royals in devastating 
fashion by a combined score of 33-6, the Tigers 
came within an out of beating the Sox (not the 
Sawx) on Friday before Tiger-killer Jermaine 
Dye led two straight one-run victories over our 
boys.  The Tigers salvaged a win Sunday to win 
2/3 of their games for the week, but Tigers fans 
can’t help but feel like there were opportunities 
lost.  Two total runs were the difference between 
a 4-2 week and a 6.5 game deficit in the division, 
and a 6-0 week and a 4.5 game deficit in the 
division.  The Tigers gained ground on the Twins 
last week, but only held serve against the White 
Sox, who continue to lead the division.  The 
Tigers continue to trail the Wild Card by 7 
games, and with four teams ahead of them in that 
race (not counting the three division leaders), it 
appears more and more obvious that the Tigers 
will need to win the AL Central in order to make 
the playoffs.

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Week of July 20-27
Record: 4-2     W W W - L L W

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Undy-Five-Hundy: negative two

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Up Next for the Tigers...

(10-game road trip vs. teams that are a combined 
20 games over .500)

July 28-31       @ Cleveland Indians
August 1-3       @ Tampa Bay Rays
August 5-7       @ Chicago White Sox

(followed by 10-game homestand vs. teams that 
are a combined 3 games under .500)

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AL Central Standings...

CWS   59-44   ---
MIN   57-47   2.5
DET   53-51   6.5
KC    47-59   13.5
CLE   45-58   14.0

Tigers Division

LAA   64-40   ---

FLA   55-50   9.5
TEX   54-51   10.5
ARI   53-51   11.0
DET   49-49   11.0
OAK   53-51   11.0
TOR   53-52   11.5
LAD   52-52   12.0

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Tiger of the Week...
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In last week’s issue, we discussed how the starting rotation was in dire need of a consistent #5 starter, and we mentioned how Zach Miner was the latest candidate anointed to fill the role. In his first two starts of the season, Miner was everything the Tigers could have hoped for, turning in two quality starts and getting two wins. His line for the week:2 starts / 12 INN / 8 H / 1 BB / 6 K / 2 ER / left games with leads of 7-0 and 6-2 / 2-0 record Thank you Zach!

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Poll Question...
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Last week I proposed three questions, including 
a contest with fun (but valueless) prizes, and I 
only had a total of one entry.  (Thanks to Bob 
Maguire, who answered all three questions – I’m 
keeping his responses for the contest secret, in 
the hopes that others will take the time to 
participate this week).  I’m calling out everyone 
to actually take part in the contest, particularly 
those of you who are teachers with summers off 
(Rykse/Stevens/Daggett), college students with 
summers off (Reynolds), spend hours every day 
on sports-related blogs every day anyway 
(Claus/Hanna), or those of you who are leeches 
on society and could actually contribute to the 
human race for once (Senters). 

Here is the contest:

With the season more than halfway gone, and 
with 90+ games of evidence on which to base a 
judgment, its time for you the Reader to predict 
the rest of the season.  Who will win each 
division, who will win the wild card, who will win 
the AL and NL, and who will win the World 
Series?  Current standing can be found here: 
Click HERE for standings from MLB

If you choose to participate in the contest, feel 
free to add any commentary or insight as you go. 

Again, the prize is 20 unopened wax packs of 
overprinted, valueless, mid-1990s baseball cards, 
in mint condition (except for the card that was 
packaged next to the piece of gum) to the winner 
of this contest.  Crudely-drawn Donruss 
Diamond Kings... chunks of a puzzle that might 
be Willie Stargell... checklists galore... they're
all right here for you to enjoy!   

For the contest, 2 points will be awarded for 
each of the division winners & wild card, 3 points 
for the league winners and 4 points for the World 
Series Champion.  1 point will be awarded if you 
switch a division winner & wild card prediction.  
The tiebreaker will be predicting the Tigers' final 
regular-season record.

Publish your answers in the following format...

AL East = Orioles
AL Central = Indians
AL West = Mariners
AL Wild Card = Royals
NL East = National
NL Central = Pirates
NL West = Padres
NL Wild Card = Giants

AL Champ = Mariners
NL Champ = Padres
World Series = Padres

Tigers' final regular season record: 49-113

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Readers Write In...
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~~~Bob Maguire~~~

Hey, Chas, good job, thanks! 

Here are my poll answers— 

(Lions team slogan) – “Slogans are the Answer!”

(Tigers team slogan) – “We don’t play favorites, 
or do we?”

A fan favorite like Brandon (“Clete Boyer”) Inge 
(whom we afford to have as the regular Super 
Thirdbaseman since we have power in other 
places) doesn’t play, but a management favorite 
like Gary (“The Drugs Wore Off”) Sheffield 
keeps getting sent out there, 0-4 day after 1-5 
day.

Possible Tigers trade deadline moves:

It’s nuts to suggest Ichiro. He’s making $20M 
and there isn’t any Japanese audience in Detroit. 
But what a dream team—Ordoñez in left, Grandy 
in center, Ichiro in right; Inge 3B, Tulowitzki SS, 
Polanco 2B, Casey 1B, Cabrera DH, Hoodahell 
Catching.  Actually, just sending Sheffield to a 
retirement home would improve the team a lot 
and wouldn’t cost more than the salary for a 
Clete Thomas. 

EDITOR’S NOTE: As requested, fellow 7-star 
general Mike Kopec weighed in with his ballpark 
rankings for all 30 MLB stadiums.  Check out his 
rankings here, and then see mine below.  They 
were created independently of each other and 
therefore have a few major differences…  

~~~Mike “The Colonel” Kopec~~~

Here are my BRT ballpark rankings.  I tried to 
rank the ballparks based as much as possible on 
the ballpark itself.  The experience obviously 
comes into play, and I will admit the rankings are 
imperfect (should lead to some good debate), but 
here goes: 

1. Boston
There is only one Fenway Park - loved it.

2. New York Yankees
Fellow roadtrippers will strongly disagree with 
me having Yankee Stadium this high, but I 
thought the Yankee Stadium experience was very 
cool.

3. Chicago Cubs
Will move up to #2 next year when the Yankees 
move to a new stadium.

4. San Francisco
I agree with Chas - upper deck seats behind 
home plate may be the best view in baseball.

5. San Diego
San Francisco and San Diego were easily my 
two favorites of all the "newer" ballparks. Love 
the mini-warehouse in left and the high rise condo 
view.

6. Los Angeles Dodgers
Should probably be #4 based on the overall cool 
factor of Dodger Stadium, but I had to knock 
them down a couple of spots because their fans 
are jags (to borrow a Kevin Kopec phrase) and 
the area around the stadium feels like "Escape 
from L.A." with Kurt Russell.

7. Pittsburgh
Great ballpark - have to get back to experience it 
again (last visit was in 2002).

8. Baltimore
Fellow road trippers will have this park higher 
than do.  I liked it - and love the warehouse - but 
didn't love everything about it.

9. St. Louis

Very nice new park.  "Solid."

10. Atlanta
Underrated park.  It surprised me; I was a big 
fan of it.

11. Texas
(See comments above regarding Atlanta.  
Enjoyed the trolley, too.)

12. Colorado
(See comments above regarding Atlanta.  Very 
respectable park.)

13. Detroit
I could probably move Comerica up a notch or 
two, but anything more than that and I would be 
acting like a homer.  Comerica is nice, and our 
fans are great, but having been to all the other 
parks, I can definitely think of ways Comerica 
could improve in relation to other ballparks.

14. Seattle
I gave Comerica the nod over Seattle only 
because Seattle is a retractable roof.

15. Milwaukee
(See above comments regarding Seattle.  
Underrated ballpark.)

16. Phildelphia
Solid, but not spectacular.  Good place to see a 
game, though.

17. Houston
Liked it more than I thought I would.  Some 
crazy features like the train and the hill, but a nice 
park overall.

18. Arizona
Very spacious, and everything is green.  I liked 
the hot tub, but was not super impressed with the 
BOB.
19. Cleveland
We caught the Jake on a bad day for the 
roadtrippers.  I think it would move up if we went 
again.

20. Cincinnati
(See above comments regarding Cleveland, 
although I would add that Cincy was easily my 
least favorite of the "newer" parks.  Everything is 
white.)

21. Chicago White Sox
It may not be Wrigley, but I kind of like the Cell 
Block.  It's not as bad as you may think.

22. New York Mets
Shea Stadium is a dump.  Good fans, old 
ballpark.  They need a new one and are getting it.

23. Kansas City
Loved the city and its fans, but the park itself is 
outdated.

24. Anaheim
Even with recent improvements, the park is still a 
dive.  Was not impressed.

25. Toronto
Not terrible, but indoors and kind of drab.

26. Florida
Had a great experience there, but they play in a 
spacious football stadium with few fans.  Enough 
said.

27. Oakland
(See above comments regarding Florida - only 
more of a dive.)

28. Washington
This is based on RFK; like Chas, I have not been 
to the new park.  Looking forward to catching a 
game there on BRT09.

29. Minnesota
Not as bad as some roadtrippers may slam it, but 
it is the Metrodome, and yes, it still sucks.

30. Tampa Bay
Easily the worst ballpark in the majors.  It's not 
even close.  The gap between #29 and #30 is 
huge, in my opinion. 

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Toolie's Trashtalk...
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...is being directed only as his lovely new bride 
for another week.  Replacing it is…

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Grey Fox: on the Prowl...

Having visited 33 MLB Stadiums, here are my 
rankings of the ones in current use (except for 
Washington ).  Like The Colonel, I tried to be 
objective, and base my opinions only on the 
stadium and not on other factors, such as the 
fans, surrounding area, quality of team, etc.  
However, I’m a pretty judgmental guy, and I 
know that I sometimes failed. 

1. AT&T Park (San Francisco Giants)
Some may call it sacrilege to place a new stadium 
ahead of the Holy Trinity of Classic Stadiums: 
Fenway, Wrigley & Yankee.  However, I 
recently made my second trip The City by the 
Bay and the experience only served to confirm 
what I suspected after my first visit: that the upper 
deck seats behind the plate in San Francisco are 
the best seats in baseball.  Not only that, but 
every feature and every view are real treats, from 
walking the concourse between the right field 
bleachers and the nearby marina where “Splash 
Hits” land, to joining the kiddies in enjoying the 
Coke bottle slide.  San Francisco has the 
advantage of a setting that most other cities 
cannot boast, but they should be proud for having 
taken full advantage of it.

2. Fenway Park (Boston Red Sox)
One of the great ballparks of all time, it requires 
very little justification for any top-3 placement.  
The Green Monster is great, and the surrounding 
area is a lot of fun.  Not only that, but the 
ambiance is probably the best I’ve ever been 
around.  The fans are knowledgeable – 
even/especially the women – and are into the 
game from start to finish… to bad I hate them!!!
 
3. Wrigley Field (Chicago Cubs)
Another one of the classics, there are few better 
ways to spend a Sunday afternoon than on the 
North Side at a Cubs game.  The bars & 
restaurants surrounding Wrigley are perhaps the 
best in baseball, and the fans are die-hard (which 
makes them both respectable in terms of 
consistent support for a generally-losing 
franchise, but also really annoying in terms of their 
shaky grasp on reality, such as their insistence on 
blaming Steve Bartman for losing a playoff series 
where, even after the incident, they were up 3 
runs and 5 outs away from the World Series 
(after which Alex Gonzalez booted a double-play 
ball, Mark Prior gave up a walk, a wild pitch, a 
single and a double, Kyle Farnsworth gave up 2 
walks, a sac fly, and two hits, and the next night 
the Cubs went on to blow a 5-3 lead at home in 
game 7 of the 2003 NLCS.
 
4. Oriole Park at Camden Yards (Baltimore Orioles)
I’ve been there three times now, and every 
experience has been absolutely great.  The 
surrounding area is awesome (BRT veterans will 
fondly remember Pickle’s Pub), the fans are 
great, the warehouse in right is a cool defining 
feature.  This was the second of the “modern” 
stadiums, and is the one that all modern stadiums 
are judged against (unlike the first “modern” 
stadium, New Comiskey / U.S. Cellular Field, 
which is a pile.
 
5. Yankee Stadium (New York Yankees)
It didn’t impress me as much as I 
wanted/expected it to, but it is still “The House 
that Ruth Built.”  Anyone who has the 
opportunity should check it out in its last year of 
existence, and be sure to do the Monument Park 
tour before the game to see the plaques of 
Yankees greats of the past.  I will be making my 
third & final visit to the stadium later this summer 
when the lovely & talented Emily Sawyer & I 
visit her brother Joel & his wife Carina in August.
 
6. PETCO Park (San Diego Padres)
A new stadium that I knew very little about prior 
to my visit, PETCO impressed me as one of the 
best of the new stadiums.  For TW readers who 
have visited Ford Field, it has the same sort of 
warehouse-built-into-the-stadium thing going in 
left field.  It also has a giant picnic hill in 
centerfield, where spectators can bring blankets 
and enjoy the game while their kids run around 
on the field, or play in the sandbox area just 
beyond the right field wall.  I generally don’t like 
turning a baseball stadium into family 
entertainment (ferris wheel/carousel at 
Comerica), but I don’t mind nearly as much when 
the kids can play without forcing the parents to 
abandon watching the game.  This stadium gets it 
right.
 
7. PNC Park (Pittsburgh Pirates)
This stadium, more than any other, reminds me of 
Comerica.  It has the cut-out centerfield that has 
become centerfield, and the yellow bridges make 
a beautiful backdrop, as well as a fine way to visit 
the historical forts or the confluence of the three 
rivers before/after the game.  A Pirates game 
would be a fine choice for Tigers fans who are 
looking for a worthy day-or-weekend trip.
 
8. Dodgers Stadium (Los Angeles Dodgers)
Let’s get this straight before I continue: unlike 
Randy Newman, I do NOT love L.A.  I hate 
L.A.  Every negative stereotype that I had about 
this city/area is TRUER than the negative 
rumors.  This particularly applies to Dodgers 
fans, who show up late, leave early, and are the 
loudest, profanest, and dumbest fans that I’ve 
ever encountered.  That said, Dodgers Stadium is 
really cool.  I recommend the $30 all-you-can-
eat section in the right field bleachers, to enjoy an 
unlimited supply of Dodger Dogs.
 
9. Citizens Bank Park (Philadelphia Phillies)
It lacks anything near the stadium, but it more 
than makes up for it with the best food in 
baseball.  Affordable and delicious Philly Cheese 
Steaks are complimented by a series of 
restaurants in left field designed to imitate the row 
of bars across the street from Camden Yards.  
Plus, the Phillie Phanatic is hilarious – just ask 
Mike Claus.
 
10. Rangers Ballpark in Arlington (Texas Rangers)
This stadium was always my favorite in video 
games of the mid-1990s, and it did not 
disappoint.  The outfield façade is really cool, and 
it has one of my favorite features in baseball – a 
whiffleball field beyond the centerfield wall where 
kids can play throughout the game.  It does have 
a few bizarre features, such the fact that fans on 
the first base line in right field can’t possibly see 
any ball that goes to the right field corner, but 
ultimately it’s a park that’s far above average.
 
11. Comerica Park (Detroit Tigers)
You’ve all been there, so I won’t assess its 
features.  I’ll just put it in perspective by ranking 
it.
 
12. Safeco Field (Seattle Mariners)
Despite having just been there on the 4th of July, 
I don’t feel like I have a very good judgment of 
this park.  On my only visit there, we came 15 
minutes prior to first pitch, were subjected to the 
slowest and most incompetent concession service 
I’ve ever witnessed, and were not in our seats 
until the 2nd inning.  We stayed in our seats the 
whole game and didn’t really get to wander 
around.  My first impression was that it had good 
sightlines and was a pretty cool place to watch a 
game, but this stadium could definitely move + or 
– 5 spots upon a revisit.
 
13. Progressive Field / Jacobs Field 
(Cleveland Indians)
Despite it being the closest MLB stadium to 
Detroit , and despite the fact that I’m marrying an 
Indians fan – the lovely & talented Emily Sawyer 
– in three months, I don’t have a good feel for 
this stadium either.  The first/only time I was at a 
game there, I pretty much fell asleep at the end of 
BRT1, watching Curt Shilling (then with the 
Diamondbacks, who then wore purple) dominate 
the Indians.  This is another park that could move 
+ or – 5 spots upon a revisit… luckily, I’ll get my 
chance Tuesday, when I will be treating the 
Lovely & Talent One’s family to a Tigers/Tribe 
game at the Field Formerly Known as The Jake.
 
14. Miller Park (Milwaukee Brewers)
This is another stadium that might be better or 
worse than my first impression, as the game we 
attended was with the roof closed.  However, I 
love the roof design, which is unique to anything 
else I’ve seen before, as well as the Bernie the 
Brewer Beer Slide and the original hot dog race.
 
15. Minute Maid Park / Enron Field
(Houston Astros)
Despite the stadium being financed by Enron and 
the park out front being financed by Haliburton 
(seriously!), this was a stadium that I liked more 
than I though it would or wanted to.  The roof 
was also closed here, but the day was about 105 
degrees in the shade and I was very appreciative.
The little overhangs are cool, the home run train
is cool, and the hill in centerfield is dumb but 
largely irrelevant.  This stadium is a lot like 
the one in Arizona , but with significant 
improvements in the area of intimacy.
 
16. Coors Field (Colorado Rockies)
I’ve been to this park twice, and had two pretty 
different experiences.  The first time, I really 
didn’t like it, though we did enjoy the cheapest 
seats in the majors - $4 in the centerfield “Rock 
Pile.”  This time, I liked it a lot and enjoyed the 
vistas of the background.  Still, to me it suffers 
from one of my ultimate baseball pet peeves: I 
believe that every home run (or as many as 
possible) should land among the fans.  In 
Colorado (which has the most home runs), far 
too many land among a bunch of ceramic rocks 
and other nonsense.
 
17. Turner Field (Atlanta Braves)
My main recollection of this stadium is that it was 
BIG and it was FILLED.  The Braves can’t even 
sell out the first two rounds of the playoffs 
anymore, but they sure sold out this regular 
season dust-up with the New York Mets.  I 
don’t recall much else about the stadium, other 
than I didn’t particularly like it, but that I was 
impressed.
 
18. Great American Ball Park (Cincinnati Reds)
I feel like I have fewer actual memories of this 
stadium than any other.  The reason for this is that 
is that it was HOT.  My only real recollection 
was retreating to the concourse to stand in the 
shade due to my suspicion that I could smell my 
skin baking and that my eyeballs were 
permanently seared white.
 
19. Busch Stadium (St. Louis Cardinals)
I am less objective about this stadium than any 
other.  I went to the Old Busch Stadium three 
times before it was imploded.  Every single time 
was absolutely great and the fans were the most 
pleasant that I’ve ever been around, even when 
the Cards were beating the Tigers (due to Jose 
Lima giving up three MONSTER home runs, 
including a 3rd-deck job to Mark McGwire).  
The new stadium, while adequate and reminiscent 
of Philadelphia , seems to have attracted a much 
less pleasant element – a richer, angrier, there-to-
be-seen not here-to-watch-baseball element.  
One imagines that my brother Mike’s former 
queen-of-unpleasantness housemate from his 
Colorado Springs SkySox days, Karen, is 
probably a season ticket holder.
 
20. Kauffman Stadium (Kansas City Royals)
This stadium is an outlier.  It feels like a minor 
league stadium.  There is one section of fan 
seating wrapping around the right field foul pole 
and one section wrapping around the left field 
pole.  Other than that, there is no outfield 
seating.  I really enjoyed the two games that I 
attended there – especially 8 of us painting “GO 
TIGERS” on our chests on July 4, 2003 – but it’s 
just too bizarre to rank any higher than this.  
Major renovations are underway during the 
season, which radio listeners to last week’s series 
vs. the Royals may have heard in the background 
(and were discussed by Price & Dickerson).
 
21. Shea Stadium (New York Mets)
I’m sure that the stadium was cutting edge when 
it was built during the 1964 World’s Fair, but it’s 
just not a great place to watch a game.  We sat in 
the lower deck, so far under the overhang that it 
was like watching a widescreen/letterbox 
television.  On ground balls, we all stood to try to 
see the ball.  On pop ups or fly balls, we all stuck 
our heads as close to the ground as possible and 
tried to look up.  Ultimately, the two most 
memorable parts of the day were (1) Dontrelle 
Willis (then of the Marlins) mowing down the 
Mets of the 3rd of July, and (2) the Editor, Matt 
O’Toole, doing the “Ducks on the Pond” dance, 
as featured on the cheap B&W scoreboard at 
Comerica Park. 
 
22. U.S. Cellular Field / New Comiskey Stadium 
(Chicago White Sox)
The White Sox have a lot of misfortune.  For 
being such a solid time and in such a large 
market, they have the misfortune of one of the 
laziest and most apathetic bandwagon-jumping 
fan bases anywhere, ever.  They also had the 
misfortune of being the first “new” stadium 
builders, and while they made mistakes, 
Baltimore , Cleveland , and others learned from 
those mistakes and were hailed has engineering 
marvels, while “The Cell” is generally criticized… 
and rightly so.  The stadium is steep enough to 
give anyone vertigo, and while significant 
improvements have been made in the past 
decade, it’s still among my least favorite (and 
most overpriced) places to watch baseball.
 
23. Chase Field (Arizona Diamondbacks)
This stadium reminded me of stretching a tarp 
over the Grand Canyon and playing baseball 
there.  It’s huge, it’s tall, it’s devoid of any sort of 
intimacy, and it’s only real excuse is that it was at 
the early end of the retractable-roof trend and 
that later entries (like Houston) were able to 
improve upon their earlier mistakes.
 
24. Rogers Centre / Skydome (Toronto Blue Jays)
This stadium was cutting-edge when it first 
opened in the early 1990s, but now it’s just a 
depressing place to watch a game.  It still has 
Astroturf so hard that they routinely drive trucks 
around on the field, including ones to deliver the 
first-pitch thrower and other execs to the mound.  
Another hate-worthy feature is that the outfield 
stands – already unreasonably distant from the 
action, loom ten or twenty feet over the outfield 
wall, so most homeruns actually disappear into 
the dark recesses under the stands instead of 
landing anywhere visable.
 
25. Angel Stadium of Anaheim 
(California Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim )
I really disliked this stadium, and it disgusted me 
even more than the homeless bums sleeping on 
the walk of fame in nearby Hollywood , or the 
prices of the food in restaurants surrounding 
even-more-nearby Disneyland .  Not only is it old 
and awkward, not only does it have the same 
home-runs-landing-among-advertisements-and-
decorations factor of KC or Colorado, but 
shortly after our visit, it was discovered to be 
literally infested with rats:
Click HERE for article from OC Register.
 
26. Dolphin Stadium (Florida Marlins)
We had a great time.  The D-Train pitched a gem 
against the Phillies, the Marlins scored a dozen 
runs and won every fan a dozen donuts.  They 
even have scantily-clad Cuban refugee girls who 
dance that they call the Mermaids, who dance on 
top of the dugout.  Even after all of that, this is  a 
football stadium and its big, empty, and 
cavernous.  A new stadium is slated for 2011.
 
27. McAfee Coliseum (Oakland Athletics)
Basically the same as #26, but without the 
mermaids and with more distance from the field 
and with that unpleasant, thuggish feeling you 
would imagine in Oakland .
 
28. RFK Stadium (Washington Nationals)
Basically the same as #27, including the thuggish-
ness, but with more apathy.  Since they knew the 
stadium would only be in use for a couple of 
years, they made virtually no effort to give it the 
feel of a baseball stadium, and it was filled with 
walkways to nowhere, and tunnels that had been 
chopped off, resulting in 30-foot drops into the 
stands or bullpens.  On top of that, they sold me 
a score card, but did not have pencils or pens – 
not even for sale – not even $5 versions at the 
souvenir stands.  It was weak.  (However, by all 
accounts, the new stadium is great.  I’ll let you 
know after BRT8 next summer… or perhaps you 
can join me for the trip?!?!
 
29. Tropicana Field (Tampa Bay Rays)
This is the worst baseball-only stadium I’ve ever 
been to.  In beautiful, generally-temperate Tampa 
Bay , they built a cave and called it a baseball 
stadium.  For my further remarks, please revisit 
“On the Prowl” in last week’s issue of TW.
 
30. Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome 
(Minnesota Twins)
It’s the worst place I’ve ever watched a sporting 
event, including every rocky, incredibly-dusty, 
first-year-of-kid-pitch baseball field I ever played 
on.
 
NEW STADIUMS PROPOSED / UNDER 
CONSTRUCTION

2009    Citi Field (New York Mets)

2009    New Yankee Stadium (New York Yankees)

2010    Twins Ballpark (Minnesota Twins)

2011    New Marlins Stadium (Miami Marlins – 
name changes when new stadium opens)

2012    Cisco Field (Oakland Athletics 
<proposal not yet approved!> to be built in 
Fremont, halfway between Oakland and San 
Jose )

2012    Rays Ballpark (Tampa Bay Rays 
<proposal not yet approved!> as big a travesty 
as Tropicana Field is, approval seems doubtful since 
(1) the fan base is small & lukewarm at best, 
(2) The Trop was completed rather recently 
(1998) and it seems like you’d want to use a $85 
million field for more than 20 years,  and 
(3) the team wants public financing of 2/3 of the 
$450 million project, after the public financed 
100% of it’s predecessor.

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Have a great week, everybody!  We now return 
you to your regularly-scheduled programming, as 
our guru, the great Matthew O’Toole, returns 
next week (I think).  It’s been a pleasure sitting in 
the throne for the past couple of weeks, but I 
think we’re all looking forward to the Return of 
the King.



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