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Game 24 | Cleveland, 5 — Tampa Bay, 1 | August 1
Ballpark Summary
The domed Tropicana Field was built to counteract the merciless
and fickle Florida weather. One minute it’s 95 degrees with 95 percent
humidity, the next minute it’s thunder, lightning and pouring rain.
Either way, its 70 degrees and time to play ball on the field. Tropicana
Field induced a change in attitude on
Indoor Baseball for Mike Rose.
Ballpark Perks
The Trop has a new variety of artificial turf called FieldTurf.
Unlike the gristly Astroturf, this grass is soft, like the leaves
of a fake houseplant. The blades are ‘planted’ in 2.5 inches of
ground up rubber called ‘infill’. A sample of the FieldTurf was
on display, and turf and infill felt just like the real deal – as
Dave will attest. The stadium has quite a few gimmicky picnic/meeting/jacuzzi/dinner/party
seating areas, which is good (I guess) for a city with no Major
League baseball history. The concessions were Floridian — Tim and
Dave wasted away again in Margaritaville, no lost shaker of salt
found.
Ballpark Downers
In an attempt to improve fan sight lines, most of the seats down the
baselines are angled in towards the infield. (That is, the rows are
parallel with the baselines, but each seat is angled 15 degrees off
the parallel.) While this sounds like a good idea, it actually makes
seating cramped and awkward. Better to opt for the good old-fashioned
neck straining seats.
This is not the regular type of shot we use to show our vantage point.
But this picture does two things:
It shows the view we had of the game.
It also shows that the roof at Tropicana Field is on a slant. One
end of the roof is lower than the other side of the roof.
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