Earlier this week, a gentleman named Gary Rector made the following "This Date In History"-type post on Jim Haller's "Corsair Tales" Facebook group:
Nov. 14, 1956 The Pirates threaten to move the franchise from Pittsburgh unless a new municipal stadium is built to replace Forbes Field. The second division club drew 949,878 fans, the fifth best total of the eight National League teams.
This led to a number of comments along the lines of "well this is how far back corporate and municipal blackmail by sports teams went". I also made the following comment to Mr. Rector's post:
PNC Park just completed its 16th season. Three Rivers Stadium lasted for 31 seasons, and the discontent with the place began well before then. The Braves and the Rangers have already shown us that the shelf life of "state of the art" ball parks is about twenty years. Nothing coming from 115 Federal Street in the next five years or so about this issue will surprise me. Nothing.
I could add to that that I would be even less surprised if such rumblings emanated from the Steelers' corporate offices expressing discontent with Heinz Field. In fact, such rumblings appeared three or four years ago, and that led to the construction of those 3,000 new "club level" seats at Heinz Field.
It will be interesting to see how the ownership groups of both the Pirates and Steelers act about their respective stadiums in three or four more years when this facilities begin their third decade of operations. As I said, nothing will surprise me.
Showing posts with label PNC Park. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PNC Park. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 16, 2016
Wednesday, August 5, 2015
New Experience at PNC Park
I have been attending Pirates games at PNC Park for the entire fifteen years of the Park's existence, and I thought that I had pretty much experienced everything that the place had to offer. Last night, though, I found out that I was wrong, because last night was our first experience here:
Yep, we sat in the "All You Can Eat" seats, a first for us. I will explain about how that came about in a bit, but first, a word or two on the experience. The All You Can Eat seats are in sections 201-205 down the right field line. Very good seats, and, as the picture shows and the name implies, you get a wrist band and access to a concession area that pretty much allows one to go hog wild when it comes to stuffing yourself. Between the two of us last night, Marilyn and I consumed (and I am not necessarily proud of this) 3 cheeseburgers, 1 hot dog, 1 order of nachos, 2 orders of peanuts, 2 boxes of popcorn, 2 ice cream sandwiches, and 6 soft drinks (beer is NOT available as an All You Can Eat item, although you don't need to go far to buy some). We figured that if we were to make equivalent purchases and regular concession stands at PNC Park, which we would not do, we would have spent over a hundred bucks on food and drink alone.
The tickets cost $45, and I am guessing that an equivalent ticket for those sections would cost in the $20-$25 range. So you pay a premium for all the "free" food, and I am sure that the Pirates are not losing money on this promotion, but, C'Mon Man, you should have seen what some of the OTHER people in our section were packing away.
No wonder we have an obesity problem in this country.
As to how we came about those tickets, our nephew George, his wife Claire, and their children, Lizzie and Andrew, were on a trip from their home in Socorro, New Mexico that covered State College, PA, London, England, and Pittsburgh before returning to Socorro. They wanted to see a Pirates game and wanted seats in the first row of the upper level, so George ordered the tickets, including the two for Marilyn and I, not knowing that he was getting in on the All You Can Eat bonanza.
So the real bonus was not all the grub, but being able to spend some time with these two and their parents at a major league baseball game.
Of course, unless you are a Cubs fan, that game last night (a 5-0 Cubs win) was an absolute bomb of a game. Long, drawn out, boring, and an awful showing by the Buccos. Andrew and Lizzie learned an important lesson early in life about sports: When you buy a ticket to a professional sporting event, you are probably going to be entertained, but there is no guarantee of it.
Yep, we sat in the "All You Can Eat" seats, a first for us. I will explain about how that came about in a bit, but first, a word or two on the experience. The All You Can Eat seats are in sections 201-205 down the right field line. Very good seats, and, as the picture shows and the name implies, you get a wrist band and access to a concession area that pretty much allows one to go hog wild when it comes to stuffing yourself. Between the two of us last night, Marilyn and I consumed (and I am not necessarily proud of this) 3 cheeseburgers, 1 hot dog, 1 order of nachos, 2 orders of peanuts, 2 boxes of popcorn, 2 ice cream sandwiches, and 6 soft drinks (beer is NOT available as an All You Can Eat item, although you don't need to go far to buy some). We figured that if we were to make equivalent purchases and regular concession stands at PNC Park, which we would not do, we would have spent over a hundred bucks on food and drink alone.
The tickets cost $45, and I am guessing that an equivalent ticket for those sections would cost in the $20-$25 range. So you pay a premium for all the "free" food, and I am sure that the Pirates are not losing money on this promotion, but, C'Mon Man, you should have seen what some of the OTHER people in our section were packing away.
No wonder we have an obesity problem in this country.
As to how we came about those tickets, our nephew George, his wife Claire, and their children, Lizzie and Andrew, were on a trip from their home in Socorro, New Mexico that covered State College, PA, London, England, and Pittsburgh before returning to Socorro. They wanted to see a Pirates game and wanted seats in the first row of the upper level, so George ordered the tickets, including the two for Marilyn and I, not knowing that he was getting in on the All You Can Eat bonanza.
So the real bonus was not all the grub, but being able to spend some time with these two and their parents at a major league baseball game.
Of course, unless you are a Cubs fan, that game last night (a 5-0 Cubs win) was an absolute bomb of a game. Long, drawn out, boring, and an awful showing by the Buccos. Andrew and Lizzie learned an important lesson early in life about sports: When you buy a ticket to a professional sporting event, you are probably going to be entertained, but there is no guarantee of it.
Thursday, August 28, 2014
To Absent Friends - Sophie Masloff
Sophie Masloff, Mayor of Pittsburgh from 1988-94, died earlier this month at the age of 94.
With her beehive hairdo, extreme Pittsburgh accent, penchant for malapropisms, and perhaps shrewdly calculated "Jewish Grandmother" image, it was easy to make fun of Sophie, but it is now easy to look back from the vantage point of a twenty year old rear view mirror, and see that Pittsburgh got pretty lucky when Sophie, then President of City Council, ascended to the mayor's office upon the death of Mayor Richard Caliguiri back in 1988.
In his column in the Post-Gazette today, Brian O'Neill states the case that Mayor Masloff's decision to cut the city wage tax at a time when unemployment in the City was in the stratosphere, and young people were leaving the City in droves, a decision that was advised against by many, including her own close advisors, at the time, has contributed mightily to reshaping the City of Pittsburgh into what it is today, one with a tech-oriented economy that is now bringing younger people INTO the City. I suggest that you look up O'Neill's column from today, and one from last week as well, that states far better than I can the impact and the legacy of Sophie Masloff.
And being a baseball and a Pirates fan, it has to be noted that Mayor Masloff was among the first, and certainly the first political honcho, who stated back in the early 1990's that the City needed to provide a new baseball only ballpark for the Pirates in order for them to remain in Pittsburgh. She even envisioned it on the North Shore. People made fun of the notion and criticized Sophie for such an outlandish thought, but that thought eventually became PNC Park. Pittsburghers have a penchant for going overboard in their desire for statues and monuments, but I don't think it would be asking too much of the Pirates to dedicate some sort of plaque or marker to Sophie Masloff somewhere in PNC Park to honor that crazy vision of hers way back when.
RIP Sophie Masloff.
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