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Blog / Month: October 2016

Tale of the tape

Every year since 2003, we’ve provided a public service: a comparison of the two ballparks in that year’s World Series. This year something interesting is happening. We have two parks that have never appeared in our side-by-side comparison before. In fact, if we’d been doing a chart like this every autumn for the past seven decades, one of these parks would never have appeared.

Hard to imagine. But true.

Check out our comparison by clicking here. Then add a comment at the bottom of that page to tell us what you think.

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Sneak peek at SunTrust Park

While in Atlanta for the final two baseball games at Turner Field (see our photo essay on it here), the Braves graciously agreed to take me on a tour of the construction site for SunTrust Park, which will become their home in 2017. This article and the accompanying photos lets you know what I saw and learned.

Leading the tour was Derek Schiller, President of the Braves’ business operations. Also along was Beth Marshall, Senior Director of Public Relations. The insight provided by the two of them was simply outstanding,  because you need to understand the reasons behind the team’s desire for a new facility to appreciate its location and why it was designed the way it was.

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In case you’re not familiar with the new park’s location, it’s a dandy. It’s quite close to the interchange of two of the area’s major highways, I-75 and I-285, in Cobb County, about ten miles north of Atlanta’s downtown.

Prior to the Braves’ acquisition of the parcels of land to make this project possible, this was an oblong piece of largely undeveloped land bounded by Windy Ridge Parkway on the north and Circle 75 Parkway on the east and south. Even though it’s very much in the center of an enormous amount of traffic, it hadn’t been developed partly because major pipelines ran beneath the property. On the south side of Circle 75, though, were several office buildings.  The Braves set up a “Preview Center” in one of them. The photo above looks across Circle 75 from the front of that office building.  Three years ago, this same scene showed thick trees and a pond.

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Turning the page on Turner Field – Part 4

In the first three installments of this series on Turner Field, we provided insights from a Braves exec, a fan since the team moved to Atlanta and the team’s face of the franchise during its years at the ballpark. To wrap up this series, here is the article I wrote for USA TODAY Sports Weekly (which is why I conducted those three interviews).  The piece appeared in their September 28, 2016 edition under the headline “Braves had Super Run at Stadium.”  Many thanks to the editorial staff for allowing me to reproduce it for you here.

By the way, after the article was published, an astute reader contacted Sports Weekly and suggested that the Top Ten list was missing an important event:  the unveiling of the All Century Team at the 1999 MLB All Star Game at Turner Field. I think he’s right.

 

ATLANTA    When the Braves host the Detroit Tigers on Sunday, October 2, it will mark the end of an era.  Turner Field, the scene of a tremendous amount of history in its short two decades, will see its final baseball game. That’s because in 2017, the Braves will move into SunTrust Park, currently under construction ten miles to the north in Cobb County.

As fans prepare to say goodbye to the ballpark, let’s examine how it came to be, what magical moments have occurred on its playing field, and what will become of it when the Braves are gone.

ANYTHING BUT HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

When Atlanta secured the rights to host the 1996 Summer Olympic Games, organizers realized there was no local venue capable of hosting the marquee track-and-field events plus the Opening and Closing Ceremonies. Read More

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Proper Send-off

The Braves have known for three years that this day would come.  They knew that at the close of the 2016 season, it would be time to say goodbye to Turner Field so they could move about ten miles north to new SunTrust Park, which will open on April 14, 2017.

BaseballParks.com was on hand for the stadium’s final baseball game. We can’t say that it was the last game, because football will be played there when Georgia State University converts it into a gridiron facility. But Sunday, October 2 was the final baseball contest, and the Braves pulled out all the stops in giving their home for the past 20 seasons a proper send-off.

So here are some of the sights from that last game.

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As fans entered Turner Field one last time, they were handed a special memento. It was a small disk containing “2016 Authenticated Game Used Dirt” from the ballpark, along with an oversized commemorative ticket. It was all in a plastic lanyard.  A very nice touch.

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