They nuked the team... for this?

[NewMarketSean]

That stadium is being built on hallowed ground.

May they never win a game there.

LOL. That made me laugh.

[Migrant Redbird]

I never understood why you couldn't make one like a steamer basket. Maybe there's a reason I'm an engineer and not an architecht.

I imagine that would be even uglier, but I'd need to see an architectural drawing before I'd rule it out.

Essentially, I agree with TGO. Putting a removable cover over a baseball stadium is always going to tend to make it ugly. You need some way to fold it up out of sight, or you need to make the cover an attractive element of the design, both while it's in place and when it's withdrawn. Something like a fifties era Ford Sunliner, but those kinds of solutions just don't scale very well.

Personally, I kind of like the architectural drawings of Tampa's proposed new stadium. Reality may be a little different, as with the Denver airport.

Alternatively, you could use a fleet of Zeppelins to carry off a roof to an ajoining field. Then the stadium could be any shape you want. That has the shape advantage, and the advantage that Zeppelins are really cool.

Or you follow the Arizona Cardinals model, and put the field on rollers so that you can bring the grass out into the sunlight and keep it healthy. That's probably not feasible for a baseball park.

The retractable roofs tend to be very expensive too, and the cost constraints tend to force aesthetic compromises.

[Mad Mark]

I think "Roster turnover" is a nice way of saying they destroyed the team in a petty bit of revenge for not getting a free stadium. And telling a tax paying fanbase that their favorite team is going to be destroyed unless you give them $500M is a sure way to kill said fanbase.

You speaking to '97, '03 or both here?

[weams]

It is 35 years of non relocation.

[Goop]

I never understood why you couldn't make one like a steamer basket. Maybe there's a reason I'm an engineer and not an architecht.

Alternatively, you could use a fleet of Zeppelins to carry off a roof to an ajoining field. Then the stadium could be any shape you want. That has the shape advantage, and the advantage that Zeppelins are really cool.

I don't think either Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, or JPJ have the energy for that anymore.

[byrdz]

This stadium is consistent with that cheesy-80's-dayglow-Miami Vice look that everything has in Miami. Place some plastic Pelicans out front and voila!

<img src = "http://www.alligatorpapiere.de/images/Miami-Vice-Staffel-1.jpg">

[DrungoHazewood]

Or you follow the Arizona Cardinals model, and put the field on rollers so that you can bring the grass out into the sunlight and keep it healthy. That's probably not feasible for a baseball park.

Maybe you could also put the stands on rollers, too, so the fans would also get the advantage of being outside, too.

That's it! You can make the stadium any shape or size you want as long as you fix the roof supports to the ground, but make the stadium move!

You speaking to '97, '03 or both here?

Yes, both.

[Moose Milligan]

I think it looks alright. Certainly not a gorgeous stadium or anything, but I don't think its an eyesore, either.

Marlins...bleh.

[ChrisAF79]

The real question is...will people from Miami/South Florida actually go there to see a baseball game? It's going to look even more stupid when it's 3/4 empty.

[GnatsFan]

The real question is...will people from Miami/South Florida actually go there to see a baseball game? It's going to look even more stupid when it's 3/4 empty.

They could go Minor League on us and drop the stadium capacity down to 10,000 that way it would only be 1/2 empty. :scratchchinhmm:

[Balmer Bomber]

Drungo. You tell me. The Dolphins barely sell out playoff games and there are empty seats to be found at Fins games each week during the regular season.

The Marlins situation is well known.

The Panthers are always at the bottom of attendance figures. Maybe playing in downtown Miami might help but who knows. It's hockey for crying out loud in a city where most people wear bikinis.

The Heat seem to draw in the middle of the pack. They were #3 overall the year they won the championship.

The Fins haven't been competitive for a couple years. So what you are telling me is that if the Ravens went 7 years without making the playoffs, with a 1-15 season sprinkled in there somewhere, that the season they are turning it around it would still be easy to get tix, even to playoff games. I would like to see the Ravens' attendance numbers for 1997 (last year at Memorial Stadium) and 1999 (last year of playoff drought).

As for barely selling out the game, it was the highest attended home game in Fins history.

The Panthers haven't played in downtown Miami since 1999. They now play in Sunrise which is in a completely different county than Miami.

[NewMarketSean]

The Fins haven't been competitive for a couple years. So what you are telling me is that if the Ravens went 7 years without making the playoffs, with a 1-15 season sprinkled in there somewhere, that the season they are turning it around it would still be easy to get tix, even to playoff games. I would like to see the Ravens' attendance numbers for 1997 (last year at Memorial Stadium) and 1999 (last year of playoff drought).

I can't believe you are even asking this question. The game would be sold out in like 10 seconds.

Since the Ravens have been in Baltimore, they have missed selling out a game only twice. Since they moved into M&T Bank Stadium they have sold out every game.

The same would go for the Orioles in the playoffs. Baltimore and Miami are two totally different cities when it comes to sports fans.

As for barely selling out the game, it was the highest attended home game in Fins history.

Good for them. I think it took them almost a week to sell out the game.

The Panthers haven't played in downtown Miami since 1999. They now play in Sunrise which is in a completely different county than Miami.

Baltimore would still support their team if they played in Harford or Carroll County. At least more than Miami.

[Balmer Bomber]

Oops, my bad. How dare I call into question the loyalty of a fan base that only sells out baseball games when its opening day or the Yanks/Sox are in town.

As for the hockey, why is Washington still in the middle of the pack when it comes to attendance? Baltimore and DC are close enough to each other if you want to discount the south Florida market.

[NewMarketSean]

Oops, my bad. How dare I call into question the loyalty of a fan base that only sells out baseball games when its opening day or the Yanks/Sox are in town.

Not selling out games when the team is in the middle of an extended losing stretch is expected... whether it is Miami or New York or Boston. But your point was doubting that the Ravens would sell out a playoff game if they went through an extended down period and I know for certain they absolutely would.

And about the O's, the attendance has only started to really take a dive these last few years. The fans took the 7-9 year losing stretch in stride and still supported their team better than other cities would have. Now that we're getting into year 10, 11, 12... it's to be expected.

As for the hockey, why is Washington still in the middle of the pack when it comes to attendance? Baltimore and DC are close enough to each other if you want to discount the south Florida market.

Simple. Washington is not Baltimore and never has been. Outside of the Redskins (and only because a lot of Marylanders turned to the Skins when the Colts left), no DC team has a pull in Baltimore.

Also, the Panthers may not be in Miami, but it is the main market that the team relies on for attendance.

And the Caps being in the middle of the pack just speaks about how mediocre DC is as a sports town too. IMO, DC and Miami have a lot of similarities.

[Migrant Redbird]

Maybe you could also put the stands on rollers, too, so the fans would also get the advantage of being outside, too.

That's it! You can make the stadium any shape or size you want as long as you fix the roof supports to the ground, but make the stadium move!

I suspect you realized I wasn't being particularly serious about putting the field on rollers. Having a natural grass playing surface is only part of the attractiveness of having an open air stadium; the greater advantage is enhancing the experience of the fans by exposing them to the elements -- just not too much exposure.

On a serious note, the more weight you're moving, the more robust the engineering solution needs to be.

The lightest weight solution would be something akin to the Tampa sail, but it still has to be robust enough to withstand gale force winds. Having the sail or its supporting tower collapse onto the stands wouldn't be very amusing to anyone who happened to still be in the stands at the time.

Decide to make the roof move and the weight increases somewhat exponentially, especially if the seal between roof and stadium needs to be relatively air tight to facilitate economical air conditioning.

Move the whole stadium (playing surface, stands, rest rooms, and concession areas) and the total weight would undoubtedly be impractically high.

One of my gripes with the new stadium in St. Louis is that they made no allowance for the possible addition of a roof at some later date. I've attended a couple of games there; at the second one, my wife insisted on departing before the seventh inning because the heat was getting to her. One of the other women in our party did suffer a heat injury. In St. Louis, during the dog days of August, shade from the sun becomes even more important than protecting the field from the rain.

Yet I recognize that it could have been cost prohibitive to design the stadium in such a way that a roof could have been added later, and it definitely would have had significant architectural impacts.

Bottom line is that, until we can afford one of the air conditioned luxury suites, we probably won't plan to attend any more home games in St. Louis during the month of August.