Playing the Fields

In an era when live major-league baseball has retreated to pleasure palaces packed with flashing videos, blaring music, and gut-busting food courts, has the old-fashioned game lost something? Across seven ballparks in seven days, one fan goes looking for an answer

By Jeff Ruby

(page 8 of 8)

U.S. CELLULAR FIELD
333 West 35th Street, Chicago

Opened 1991

Capacity 40,615

Great tradition Exploding scoreboard shoots fireworks you can see from the Dan Ryan.

Lame corporate sellout Connie's Pizza races on the scoreboard

Say it ain't so Scoreboard resorts to a fake noise meter to pump up the crowd.

Worst-named kids' area Pontiac FUNdamentals, an otherwise fine multilevel interactive space beyond left field

Nod to history The seats where Paul Konerko's and Scott Podsednik's home runs landed in the 2005 World Series are blue. Other seats are green.

Odd detail The shower near section 161, a carryover from old Comiskey

What to order Overwhelming food selection, but go with a kosher dog, Miller Lite, and elote (roasted corn with mayo, Parmesan, and Mexican spices).

What to avoid Driving. We paid $20 for parking and still had a long walk.

Nice detail You can get a certificate commemorating a child's first Sox game from Guest Relations. We got two.

GAME 7
Detroit Tigers vs. Chicago White Sox
U.S. Cellular Field, Chicago
July 26, 2007

ODOMETER:
297
miles from St. Louis to Chicago

I've got to haul ass to make it back to Chicago in time for a 1:05 game, which means I get pulled over again, this time near Normal. The guy clocks me doing 83 in a 65 and before I can win the guy over—You a baseball fan, Officer?—he slaps me with a $75 ticket.

My wife and kids meet me at U.S. Cellular Field for one last chance to see the home team leave happy. The wife's a Cubs fan, and quick to begin the Cell-bashing, recounting all the usual grievances: The ballpark was the result of the owner's threat to relocate to Tampa; it had the misfortune of preceding the retro-classic revolution that began with Baltimore's Camden Yards; that steep upper deck gives people vertigo; the surrounding neighborhoods have zero attractions. Besides, she continues, the stadium is cold and impersonal. If you arrive by el, you're forced to circumnavigate the park just to find the damn entrance, prompting a friend of mine to remark that the whole place seems to have turned its back on you.

My wife has old information. The Cell, the first major-league park built by HOK Sport (the company seemed to have gotten all of the mistakes out of its system with this design), has addressed several of the problems. The Sox removed nearly 7,000 seats from the upper deck and shifted the bullpens to make room for more bleachers. A nifty "Fan Deck" atop the center field concession stands now lends a breathtaking view of the field, the handiwork of the team's legendary groundskeeper Roger Bossard. And, oh, yeah, the team won the World Series, which has a way of smoothing out even the roughest edges, because the park finally has some good memories attached to it. The Cell now has its own Champions Plaza outside Gate 4 with personalized bricks to honor the 2005 champions—a site so cheerful, even Juan Uribe gets his own statue.

I've been to dozens of games here, and it's my team, so it's hard to see it with an outsider's eye. The first thing I notice from our seats (section 147, third-base side) is that the LaSalle Bank sign in right field may be the largest ad in any ballpark. (Either that or the ComEd sign in left.) Distracting LED "ribbon boards" flash numbers and ads all around the park. Hard-core fans of the old Comiskey may blanch at the pervasive corporate presence, not to mention sterile bathrooms and garden burgers at food stands with cutesy names like "Lollar's Guard the Plate Grill." But it's tough to find fault with the obligatory statues of Sox greats beyond center field, nor the vastly improved sightlines. I'm happier now than I ever was at Comiskey.

More troubling is the laid-back vibe of Sox fans. Maybe it's because this is a day game, or a low-scoring battle, or Nancy Faust's organ has hypnotized them. Or maybe the Sox nation is fat and happy because of that World Series trophy. But people are yawning. They're quiet. They're . . . bored? With baseball, on the South Side?

I'm just glad Dad's not here to see it.

Still, after a single, a bunt, and a throwing error, the Sox pull out an exciting 4-3 win in the bottom of the ninth, and the good old South Siders have ended my six-game losing streak. The celebration, however, feels perfunctory. People leave the park quickly, and I'm among them, dragging two babies and a wife who still says The Cell stinks. She thinks the old ballparks like Wrigley, the creaky dinosaurs whose days are most likely numbered, will always be superior. Someday, when they're old enough, maybe the tykes will share their opinions.