How Is Camden Yards Holding Up?

[Dr. Unk]

2 hours ago, MurphDogg said:

The club level definitely needs to be refreshed, it is pretty depressing.

The upper deck, lower deck and Eutaw Street area are quite nice.

Could use new tvs throughout and an updated sound system.

I agree with the club level.  Looks ok on the outside, but when I went to the restroom in one of the suites, it was very outdated, and actually embarrassing. 

[SteveA]

5 minutes ago, Moose Milligan said:

It still looks good.  

I wonder if Orioles fans would be dumping on Nats park like they do, simply because it's the Nats and the whole "rivalry."

The open concourse at Nats stadium is fantastic.  It's great to be able to walk around and get food and still have access to watching the game.

A friend and I have bought cheap seats way upstairs and never gone to the upper deck.   Watched most of the game from the standup bars behind the lower deck seats down the 1B or 3B lines, and then at some point scouted out some seats that had been empty the whole game by one foul pole or the other and watched the last 3 or 4 from there.  

That is the one feature that Oriole Park lacks.   And it exists to some extent at New Comiskey, or whatever it is being called now by some corporation that is giving the White Sox money but since they are not giving me any money I refuse to devote brain cells to learning the name.   So it isn't a new invention, I think New Comiskey predated Oriole park by a year or two.   (Other than that feature though, I found very little to like about New Comiskey when I went there about 28 or 29 years ago).

[Yossarian]

I need to get back out there for a game.  My one and only trip to Camden Yards was 17 years ago.

[MurphDogg]

1 hour ago, Moose Milligan said:

It still looks good.  

I wonder if Orioles fans would be dumping on Nats park like they do, simply because it's the Nats and the whole "rivalry."

The open concourse at Nats stadium is fantastic.  It's great to be able to walk around and get food and still have access to watching the game.

Nah, the Nats Park is cold and corporate and the upper deck is far too high. The open concourse is great though and they have some good food options. 

[GuidoSarducci]

2 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

It still looks good.  

I wonder if Orioles fans would be dumping on Nats park like they do, simply because it's the Nats and the whole "rivalry."

The open concourse at Nats stadium is fantastic.  It's great to be able to walk around and get food and still have access to watching the game.

Not really dumping on it - it just didn't have the feel of Camden Yards with the warehouse and the architecture.   And food at Camden was better IMO - and I had the expensive club level seats. But few parks do.  Whatever they call the SF Giants stadium now (Bank of America? too lazy to look it up) is pretty darn good, though of course is the view and the weather which is hard to beat. 

And I don't hate the Nats at all, and in fact rooted for them in their run in 2019. 

It is alot better than Oakland Coliseum, I can tell you that.   The only good thing I can say about the Coliseum is the A's do an admiral job with what they have to work with which is pretty much a dump of a stadium.

[OsFanSinceThe80s]

1 hour ago, GuidoSarducci said:

Not really dumping on it - it just didn't have the feel of Camden Yards with the warehouse and the architecture.   And food at Camden was better IMO - and I had the expensive club level seats. But few parks do.  Whatever they call the SF Giants stadium now (Bank of America? too lazy to look it up) is pretty darn good, though of course is the view and the weather which is hard to beat. 

And I don't hate the Nats at all, and in fact rooted for them in their run in 2019. 

It is alot better than Oakland Coliseum, I can tell you that.   The only good thing I can say about the Coliseum is the A's do an admiral job with what they have to work with which is pretty much a dump of a stadium.

The Oakland Coliseum used to have a nice view before Mt. Davis was built. 
 

[Frobby]

8 hours ago, Moose Milligan said:

It still looks good.  

I wonder if Orioles fans would be dumping on Nats park like they do, simply because it's the Nats and the whole "rivalry."

The open concourse at Nats stadium is fantastic.  It's great to be able to walk around and get food and still have access to watching the game.

Open concourse is nice, but a bit overrated IMO.    Usually you can see a sliver of the field but don’t really have much of a view.    Better than no view at all, I suppose.   But I’ve been in a beer line plenty of times at Nats Park and couldn’t really tell what was going on even though I could see part of the field.   I once missed seeing Stephen Strasburg hit a homer off the Orioles while standing in a beer line facing the open concourse.

I think one of the trade offs of an open concourse is that the upper deck needs to be set back further.   But I’m not sure of that.   Ask your local architect.   

Frankly, I was glad that Nats Park wasn’t just a near-clone of Camden Yards, as many subsequent parks were.   I like Camden Yards better, but Nats Park has its charms, and it needed to be different than the park 40 miles down the road.  

 

[drdelaware]

I'm 53 years old and still liked Memorial Stadium better.  Sometimes it isn't the amenities as much as the memories.  A winning tradition will do that though.  I like Oriole Park but they haven't won anything in it yet.  To answer the question though it has held up well which is more than I can say for the franchise.  Still love them though.

[baloriole4]

Orioles have the SMALLEST video scoreboard in MLB... and this article and graphic is from 2016 (!!!!) and it was the smallest then, six seasons ago      https://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/ct-baseball-video-boards-htmlstory.html

(so be sure to toggle to the "View boards in order of SIZE" button and ignore the 'installed by year button' info it provides, as alot of the boards added after the Orioles one from 2009 have been replaced since this 2016 article/graphic (i.e. the Angels now have a newer one that is massive). 

[Frobby]

4 hours ago, baloriole4 said:

Orioles have the SMALLEST video scoreboard in MLB... and this article and graphic is from 2016 (!!!!) and it was the smallest then, six seasons ago      https://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/ct-baseball-video-boards-htmlstory.html

(so be sure to toggle to the "View boards in order of SIZE" button and ignore the 'installed by year button' info it provides, as alot of the boards added after the Orioles one from 2009 have been replaced since this 2016 article/graphic (i.e. the Angels now have a newer one that is massive). 

Now I am probably going to found like an old fart, but just how big does a stadium video screen have to be to satisfy people?   I was looking at the Phillies’ screen last night while watching the game and thought it looked TOO big in the context of the stadium.   I feel like the OPACY screen provides the information I need or want, is easily visible and readable, and I don’t need or want a screen that dominates the stadium.   

Now, if they were designing the whole stadium from scratch, might a bigger screen have been fit in?   Maybe, but I think it would be hard to do now and not necessarily worthwhile.  

This from a guy who doesn’t have a TV screen larger than 50” in his house.  

 

[Moose Milligan]

13 hours ago, GuidoSarducci said:

Not really dumping on it - it just didn't have the feel of Camden Yards with the warehouse and the architecture.   And food at Camden was better IMO - and I had the expensive club level seats. But few parks do.  Whatever they call the SF Giants stadium now (Bank of America? too lazy to look it up) is pretty darn good, though of course is the view and the weather which is hard to beat. 

And I don't hate the Nats at all, and in fact rooted for them in their run in 2019. 

It is alot better than Oakland Coliseum, I can tell you that.   The only good thing I can say about the Coliseum is the A's do an admiral job with what they have to work with which is pretty much a dump of a stadium.

No kidding they don't have a warehouse.  There's no other building like it on the east coast.  As @Frobbysaid I'm glad they didn't do a knock-off like every other stadium that came directly after Camden Yards.

[Can_of_corn]

There is an agreement between the team and the State that covers upkeep correct?

So it should be holding up fine.

[BohKnowsBmore]

1 hour ago, Frobby said:

Now I am probably going to found like an old fart, but just how big does a stadium video screen have to be to satisfy people?   I was looking at the Phillies’ screen last night while watching the game and thought it looked TOO big in the context of the stadium.   I feel like the OPACY screen provides the information I need or want, is easily visible and readable, and I don’t need or want a screen that dominates the stadium.   

Now, if they were designing the whole stadium from scratch, might a bigger screen have been fit in?   Maybe, but I think it would be hard to do now and not necessarily worthwhile.  

This from a guy who doesn’t have a TV screen larger than 50” in his house.  

 

Yea, I actually think the video board was sufficiently modernized without being too much / impeding on the physical charms of OPACY. Doesn't feel like a distraction to the eye from the grass on the field, warehouse, etc. but gets the job done (again, sufficiently updated from the old black / yellow bulb board).

[Ruzious]

17 hours ago, MurphDogg said:

From a financial standpoint it would make very little sense to sell before Peter Angelos dies. If they sell before he dies, his investment in the Orioles would realize a capital gain and he would owe taxes on that capital gain. If the team is sold after he dies, the heirs would get a stepped up basis on the investment in the Orioles and would not owe taxes on capital gains upon selling the team.

The heirs will owe inheritance taxes, whether those inheritance taxes can be paid without selling the team is the big question. The amount of the inheritance tax depends on their estate planning strategy. Likely, Peter Angelos' interest in the team was moved into a trust which froze the value owed for inheritance tax purposes to the value of his interest at the time the team was moved into the trust.

I agree about your observations, except for the comments about an inheritance tax.  The estate would pay the tax based on the value of the assets, and there is no inheritance tax that I'm aware of.  

[rm5678]

14 hours ago, Frobby said:

Open concourse is nice, but a bit overrated IMO.    Usually you can see a sliver of the field but don’t really have much of a view.    Better than no view at all, I suppose.   But I’ve been in a beer line plenty of times at Nats Park and couldn’t really tell what was going on even though I could see part of the field.   I once missed seeing Stephen Strasburg hit a homer off the Orioles while standing in a beer line facing the open concourse.

I think one of the trade offs of an open concourse is that the upper deck needs to be set back further.   But I’m not sure of that.   Ask your local architect.   

Frankly, I was glad that Nats Park wasn’t just a near-clone of Camden Yards, as many subsequent parks were.   I like Camden Yards better, but Nats Park has its charms, and it needed to be different than the park 40 miles down the road.  

 

One thing that Nats Park has that Camden Yards needs is a live organist.