Yankee Stadium – page 2

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The Essentials

So new Yankee Stadium is big, almost imposing … but what is it like to attend a game there?

I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that it’s expensive. In fact, the Team Marketing Report gathers info from all 30 big-league franchises and calculates the average cost for a family of four to attend a game — including tickets, parking, programs, food and souvenirs. The best deal in the Majors? The Diamondbacks, at $114.24. The most expensive? Do I even need to tell you?

The Yankees didn’t inch ahead of the perennially most-expensive Red Sox into first place this year. No, they soared past them, coming in at a monumental $410.88. The Sox come in second at a relatively paltry $326.45.

In the garages that surround the new stadium, parking costs $19, which is two dollars more than the final year at the old park. But that’s nothing compared to the increase in ticket prices. National Public Radio reports that Yankee tickets are an astonishing 76% higher on average than in 2008.

You’ve no doubt read and heard a lot about the most expensive seats in the ballpark — the ones that started out costing $2,625 apiece when purchased for an individual game, and $2,500 as a season ticket, and then 12 days into the season many (but not all) were reduced to $1,250 after the seats were unoccupied most nights. Yes, the team was definitely guilty of over-reaching, but the rest of the seats in the place are pretty expensive, too — with the exception of the bleachers.

According to the New York Times, the Yankees label 4,397 seats as being “premium.” These cost from $350 to $2,500 apiece, with an average being $510. Up in the second deck, which the Yanks call the “Main” level, seats are $150 in the infield, $95, $80 and $60 as you move farther toward the outfield. Outfield bleacher seats (in the foreground in the picture above) are a relatively good value at $14 — with the ones with severely obstructed views being sold for $5. The Terrace seats are $85, $75 and $50, depending on how close you are to the infield, while tickets for the uppermost deck, called the Grandstand, are $30 in the infield and $23 beyond.

And the stands aren’t the only places where you can sit down in the new Yankee Stadium. In addition to the two sit-down, full service restaurants (Hard Rock Cafe and NYY Steaks, both in the right-field corner of the stadium), there are scads of lounges, bars and clubs. For instance, to reserve a chair in the Bleachers Cafe directly above the batter’s eye in center field, you can (as an individual, and not part of a group or a season-ticket holder) make a reservation through the Yankees website for (gulp!) $125. This vantage point is shown in the photo on the left side below. To sit in the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar directly below the Bleachers Cafe costs $95. The Audi Yankees Club near the left-field corner is $150, and the Jim Beam Suites vary from $110 to $145, depending on the game. The latter also gives you access to a very crowded bar (below right).

There’s also Tommy Bahama’s Bar, which doesn’t charge for admission since you can’t see the field from inside.

With the move to the new stadium, the Yankees decided to form their own concession company, calling it Legends Hospitality. This firm really did do a nice job of lining up quite a variety of food items — far beyond what was offered in the old park across the street. And the food is, well, fresher than at the old place. That’s because only a couple of dozen of the concession stands in old Yankee Stadium actually had cooking facilities. That means the other 85% of the stands simply sold food prepared elsewhere. In the new park, an impressive 70% of the concession areas have the capability to cook food, meaning hotter, fresher food for the fans.

Another example of this “freshness” initiative can be found in the Lobel’s workspace down the third-base line (below center). Here fans can watch butchers cutting and preparing cuts of meat to be served in the restaurants and stands around the stadium — including at Lobel’s own kiosk nearby. And you can’t get any fresher than a traditional farmers market, which is what Melissa’s offers near the home plate entrance (below right).

There’s an extensive food court behind third base (below left) with a great mixture of deli foods, traditional ballpark fare and sweets. In fact, as you look around the park, there is an astonishing number of concession stands. In all, there are 172 portable kiosks and 272 permanent stands. The team likes to brag that this total of 444 points of sale provides a ratio of one for every 117 fans if a capacity crowd is present. At the old park, the ratio was one for every 191 fans — and, indeed, the lines were always long!

And while you are waiting in line for your hot dog, you can enjoy one of the 1,100 flat-panel, high-definition TV screens (no, that number is not a typo) scattered around the ballpark.

While there’s a very long list of noteworthy food stands in the park with novel offerings, a couple stood out to me. One is the adorably named Big Apple (below left), which in addition to selling candy and Cracker Jack offers apples dipped in chocolate or caramel for $5. Another is Ouri’s Kosher Caterers (below right). I mean, where else inside Yankee Stadium can you find Shawarma ($12) or Falafel ($8), and where the sign reminds you that “all breads are hamotzi”?

And you’ve probably already figured out that if it’s that expensive to get into Yankee Stadium, it’s probably pretty expensive to eat inside Yankee Stadium. Truer words were never spoken. Here is a sampling from around the park: all deli sandwiches (corned beef on rye, pastrami, etc.) are $12; various BBQ sandwiches are $10; steak sandwiches are $15; eggplant or chicken parmesan are $12; regular-size popcorn is $6; a bag of M&Ms, $4.75; small beers are $6 and in a souvenir cup, $10 (imports are $11); regular size sodas are $5; and ice cream in a miniature batting helmet is $6.50.

And every single food and drink item on every menu is accompanied by its caloric content. I’m not kidding. It’s the law of New York, so you are told that the ice cream has 550 calories.

On the slim chance that you have any cash left in your wallet after parking, buying tickets and eating, there are the four souvenir shops (the “Home Plate Store” is shown below left) — plus several areas where you can purchase seats and mementos from the old park (below right).

Again, it’s a little like piling on to start listing the shocking prices, but here are some: a program is $10 (and I thought $5 programs at other parks were ridiculous); a Yankees Yearbook is $25 (no, it’s not bound in leather); adjustable caps are $30, and fitted caps are $36 and $42; lapel pins are $10 … you get the idea.

Very, very unlike Citi Field, this is not a place where you’ll find lots of ways to entertain youngsters — unless, of course, your youngsters love staring at World Series trophies and photos of pennant-winning teams and Hall of Famers. In fact, the lack of a kids’ play area of any kind is almost unimaginable in a ballpark this large. Oh, and don’t take your child to go find the Yankees mascot. This high-and-mighty franchise has no such thing.

And the ushers are absolutely nothing like those in Kansas City. They are the same brusque types as populated the old park. When I innocently dared to sit down on the corner of a metal riser that wasn’t being used by anybody for any purpose, an usher rushed over to bark at me to get off it right now! Again, this doesn’t exactly contribute to an enjoyable, fun atmosphere.

So I have lots of problems with the cost of attending a game here, and the lack of “fun” elements. But what is it like when you’re sitting in your comfy seat, with its extra leg-room, and you sit back with your $11 beer to watch the game? It’s nice. Aside from the annoyance of the constant stream of corporate sponsorships (more on that in a minute), the experience of watching the game at new Yankee Stadium is just fine.

The scoreboards in the outfield and the ribbon boards are quite Yankee-esque — and add nicely to the enjoyment of the game. The main screen in center field is 59 feet tall and 101 feet wide, and has stunning, high-resolution color. But that’s just the start. On each side of the main board are two more color screens that offer up extra information on the batter, list the entire batting order and display out-of-town scores. The LED ribbon board on the facing of the Terrace deck runs continuously from one end of the level to the other. In case you’re wondering, that makes the three-foot-tall screen 1,279 feet long.

Oh, and all of that high resolution video power is used quite often to show candid shots of celebrities in the crowd.

The game data provided on the screens, the audio and music piped through the excellent PA system, and the game-day presentation by the Yanks are all wonderful. A word to the wise: if you hate hearing about the franchise’s storied past, stay away from the stadium. The Yankees’ history permeates every aspect of your time at the park.

Except one. At the old stadium, a bronze bat sat atop the tallest flagpole in the ballpark — a pole that rose out of the center of Monument Park. Legend has it that it was Lou Gehrig’s bat, bronzed to preserve it for the ages. Was it anywhere to be found in the new park? No. In fact, I noticed it was still on the top of the same flagpole inside the old stadium, a facility that was about to demolished. One assumes that the prized bat will be salvaged before the wrecking ball arrives and sold by the Yanks for a lot of money.

But don’t you think they could’ve found a place for it somewhere in the new ballpark?

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Summary

If you’re a baseball fan, you’ve certainly spent time at ballparks waiting out rain delays. One of the days I spent at new Yankee Stadium was particularly rainy. In fact, the delay that afternoon topped five and a half hours. Like so many stunning things in this review, I couldn’t make that up.

I wanted to believe that the evil Yankees were scheming to squeeze the captive audience for every cent in overpriced concessions and souvenirs that they could, rather than sending us all home and calling the game. The reality, though, was that it was an inter-league game, and the two teams wouldn’t be facing each other again this season.

So I had a lot of free time to take pictures and make notes. After a while, I started playing a game: let’s see just how many corporate sponsorships I could find within the ballpark. Between my roaming around, and taking notes while play was going on, it was staggering. I’ve already mentioned some of them in this review: Audi’s Yankee Club; Mohegan Sun’s Sports Bar; Jim Beam’s Suite Lounge; Tommy Bahama’s Bar … but there are more: Delta’s Sky360 Suite section; the Budweiser Hall Of Fame Lounge; the H&R Block Suite Level; the Peter Max Art Gallery; the New Era Yankee Stadium Flagship Store; when Robinson Cano hit a ball over the fence, the home run was said to be sponsored by Geico (yes, those are geckos on the video screens below); the animated subway-car race is sponsored by, of course, Subway … and perhaps worst of all, Take Me Out To The Ballgame is sponsored by Budweiser.

Now, it’s true that the team did the admirable thing and resisted the temptation to sell the naming rights to the entire stadium — something the Mets couldn’t resist. In announcing that the new ballpark would have exactly the same name as the old one — Yankee Stadium — the team alluded to the fact that other elements within the park would have corporate sponsors. Indeed.

Despite the tedious, never-ending parade of ads and corporate names, the park really is something to behold. Serious and massive to the point of being overdone? Yes. A fitting home for the team that’s won more titles than any other pro franchise? Definitely.