Apr 26 2011 09:51 AM
After watching a lot of Citifield baseball, I'd like to say that I'm not a fan of the lower level seating (see below sections 104-107 and 128-131) jutting toward the foul line behind the infield, and running parallel to the line a few feet in foul territory all the way to the outfield fence.
[list=1][*]It causes shots down the line to carom back toward the corner outfielders, depriving them of their natural destiny as doubles.[/*:m]
[*]It allows outfielders to escape their awesome responsiblity to pursue balls in the corner, corral them, and hit the relay man.[/*:m]
[*]It almost completely takes the foul-fly-out play out of the game.[/*:m]
[*]That gives contemporary batters an historical edge over their predecessors, as if they need more of a boost.[/*:m]
[*]It smacks of Yankee Stadium, and that can't be good.[/*:m]
[*]It causes more collisions with walls than are necessary.[/*:m]
[*]It gives the Derek Jeters of the world a place to showboat.[/*:m]
[*]I like plays with a lot of moving parts, and bloops down the line, arcing into foul terriotry, pursued simultaneously by the corner outfielder, middle infielder, and corner infielder are among those. That play is now that much rarer.[/*:m]
[*]More folks are exposed to line drives.[/*:m]
[*]Folks in the front row of the outfield now have the opportunity to not only interfere with balls in play, but interfere with fair bals in play.[/*:m][/list:o]
Hey, wow, that adds up to ten. I was actually just streaming off the top of my head and didn't mean that. I realize the seats closer to the field are representative of the more intimate baseball stadium of our day, but I can't afford them anyway.
