The new design by the “Official Ballpark Builder of Major League Baseball” ROK Architects – builders of Camden Yards, PNP Park in Pittsburgh, the Great American Ballpark in Cincinatti, PacBell in San Francisco, Petco Park in San Diego– is another ROK cookie cutter stadium – not uniquely New York in any way.
Lots of brick and somewhat of a look of Ebbets on the exterior, but the resemblance to Ebbets Field stops as soon as you hit the field.
Citi Field, 2006 Rendering. Nothing Ebbetsian About It. Note bullpens in right center. No roofs in left — the symetrical fences. And another thing — in old Ebbets the bullpens were down the left and right field lines so they warmed up within a few feet of the fans. Since the fans in the box seats will be paying astronomical prices for the box seats it would be a nice touch to put in more cheap seats in right instead of wasting space on bullpen areas. Web Capture of Computerized Flyover from New York Mets Website.
If you take the virtual fly through of the ballpark on the New York Mets website at http://newyork.mets.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/nym/ballpark/citifield_overview.jsp, you will note immediately that ROK has continued its trademark rakeback construction of the upper decks, setting the fans awaayyyy back from the field and above it. It’s not as bad as the “perched on the edge of a saucer cup” feel that Roger Kahn coined to describe Shea Stadium when it opened in 1964.
Citi Field Left Field Line. Note the setback of the decks and the steep rake, putting the upper deck aficianado considerably away from the greensward. Virtually a knockoff of Camden Yards, not Ebbets Field Webcaptures from Computerized Flyover on New York Mets website.
However, if you’re in the decks you are set way back starting well back of the field box level. Not good. This is done to accommodate sky boxes on the mezzanine levels. If you compare the new ballparks ROK has built the aim is to create more field level boxes (expensive seats) while stacking the upper decks high, slanted and back away from the foul lines.
Observe how set back the upper decks are in the Citi Field grandstand. When you set the decks back you are putting folks farther away from the action. If you note the original Ebbets upper deck it is almost even with the front row box railings. That is the tyranny of modern construction. Webcaptures from Computerized Flyover on New York Mets website.
I am sick of these architects designing stadiums that are lousy to watch baseball in.
Let’s go around Citi Field There is no intimacy about the interior of the park. The interior has three decks in left field just like Camden Yards — the same look as Camden Yards. The right field section has two upper decks – does not look at all like Ebbets Field. ROK has borrowed the Briggs Stadium overhang effect in right, thinking it’s cute. The Polo Grounds had an overhang, but old Ebbets Field did not.
The Citi Field Right Field Corner. Where does that come from? Extend the stands to the foulpoul and give us a single bleacher for more Ebbets Look.
An overhanging deck in right has nothing to do with Ebbets Field. Ebbetts Field had a humpback boomerang outfield wall that Carl Furillo played the carom on and threw out many a runner at second and third trying to stretch. Why could they not duplicate that?
Then there is the rightfield screen. Ebbetts Field had double deck bleachers from the leftfield line past centerfield. Does ROK do that? No. They stop the stands at just before leftcenter and have various entertainment and eateries and plazas and two garish dominating scoreboards rising monolithically like something out of 2001: A Space Odyssey. Nothing nostalgic there. There is no homage to the famous “Schaefer Scoreboard” in right centerfield which they could have easily incorporated instead of placing the unimaginative bullpen chutes in right center which is more Fenway Park than Ebbets Field. Do the architects have any knowledge of baseball anyway? No. They do not.
The interior stands wrap around majestically in a circle effect – just like Shea Stadium – with stands that are borrowed from the Turner Field, Dodger Stadium look – again with upper decks set back placing you far away from the action on the field.
Gil waits on deck to greet Campy Campanella after a three-run shot. Note the gallery in the upper deck how close the fans are. Photo (c) by John C. Wagner, Jr., www.pportals.com/jcw. Used with permission.
You lose the right angle, overhanging effects that marked good ol’ Ebbets. Why is this important?
Intimacy is not to be found.
Too much foul territory in this new design. The concept of all the ROK ballparks is to pay lipservice to nostalgia visually, but the upper decks are still stack cantilevered stadiums that cater more to entertaining you with your backs to the ballgame. You’re going to need binoculars to go this ball game if you sit in the Upper Decks in Citi Field – from the visuals in the flyover tour. Maybe the decks will be closer and steeper when built – but the flyover does not show that.
The rake and voluptuousness of the spacious decks in the new Citi Field conjour up visions of a football stadium like Municipal Stadium in Cleveland – and yes, Shea Stadium the uninspired rockpile next door. You may even be closer in Shea to the action than you are in the new Citi Field.
ROK essentially is doing on the major league level what Kaiser, Garment and Davidson do with synthetic turf stadiums around Westchester County: one size fits all and little tweaks to the basic design are made – with the same gee whiz electronic scoreboards, jumbotrons and visual chock-a-block that substitutes sensory stimulation for good baseball. Every time they get a new ballpark, ROK flips the decks from side to side and rearranges the “deck chairs,” on their stadium Titanics and creates nothing unique.
For a 42,000 seat stadium which Citi Field is – those seats look a long way from the field and in no way hang over the field the way they used to do at Ebbets, “Where the howling mobs” seemed on the backs of the visiting New York Giants.
Even the Polo Grounds was more intimate than this faux-Ebbets Field.
Hanging out at the Batting Cage. Ebbets Field, 1955. Note the blue-gray seats (not green) and the jaunty red box seat railings! Photo (c) by John C. Wagner, Jr., www.pportals.com/jcw. Used with permission.
And another thing: the ball park measurements are another Shea Stadium with the exception of the power alleys. in view of our readers who noted our inadvertent switching of the dimensions, the Mets pitchers will have 8 more feet to work with in left center and 20 more feet to work with in right center. But this means the Mets will have to have a good outfield to cut off the doubles.
In Ebbets Field, the bandbox effect and the cantilevered fences and contours and short fences made the ballpark a factor. Brooks pitchers had to be good pitching in that park.
Absolutely a mistake to design Citi Field with deeper power alleys.
How many games did Mr. Wilpon ever attend at Ebbetts Field? One wonders! The beauty and the beast of Ebbets was its bandbox size. It was 393 to centerfield. A ridiculously short distance. It was a 348 foot poke down the Left Field Foul Line. The colorful advertising on the left field wall then ran out at a right angle only 3 feet to 351 feet in left center (the new Citi Field is correctly this time supposed to be 379 in left center (a full 28 feet DEEPER).
Then good ole Ebbets went at a right angle out to 393 in dead center (Citi Field is to be 408 in dead center).
In centerfield, Ebbets took an abrupt right turn straight across center and angled slightly out to 403 feet in right center in a V. Then the center field wall with the colorful advertising took over all the way at a right angle to the right field foul line, tracking in to 352 feet in straightaway right right center (Citi Field is to be 391 in right center).
The cantilevered Ebbets Field wall then nipped in 52 feet nightmarishly to 297 feet at the right field foul line. The Citi Field right field foul pole is 330 feet from home plate.
No Quirks, No Nips. No Tucks in the outfield. Just plain wall.
It would be interesting if Mr. Wilpon and the HOK guys duplicated those dimensions, but maybe they were too afraid the fans eating sushi in centerfield restaurants would be killed by the screaming line drives bombarding the concourses beyond centerfield like mortars thanks to the hand grenades that serve as baseballs today. (Talking about the lively juiced up, souped up, tightly wound baseballs of today.)
However – you could duplicate the configuration of the Ebbets Field walls with the new dimensions of CitiField.
They have simply recreated the Shea Stadium dimensions a little deeper in the alleys (8 feet deeper in left center, 20 feet deeper in right)with the power alleys moving slightly out. How creative.
One of the most boring aspects of Shea Stadium is that the outfield is easy to play. It is symmetrical and the outfielders really have no challenging catches to make, except at the fence. That same antiseptic outfield though deeper is being recreated for another 40 years.
Skoonj’s Territory. The intriguing rightfield wall. How could HOK leave it out? Carl Furillo (Skoonj) used to play the caroms and gun down runners at second with his “Springfield Rifle” Arm. Photo (c) by John C. Wagner, Jr., www.pportals.com/jcw. Used with permission.
A closer look at Skoonj’s Territory. Note the cantilevered wall Photo (c) by John C. Wagner, Jr., www.pportals.com/jcw. Used with permission.
Perhaps, just perhaps the architects could have duplicated the boomerang-cantilever wall in centerfield over to right field….to provide the feel of the unexpected when you got a line shot caroming off the wall in the 1950s.
Why could they not replicate the old Ebbets Field scoreboard at field level, with drop down scores as they have in Fenway Park and Wrigley Field?
That would be a touch. But, there are no touches in this ballpark. The monster pyramids of two scoreboards with the jumbotrons is a visual eyesore – typical of the phoney superficial cuteness that has always characterized the Mets as a franchise.
The doubledeck in right has no similarity to Ebbets Field at all…you might have extended the left field decks around into right center and curled the right field upper deck over and around the foul pole.
Ahhh, the grandeur. Only the dead know Brooklyn. The Ebbets Roof and lighttowers. Russ Meyer is on the mound in 1955. Pee Wee at short. Gilliam at third. Photo (c) by John C. Wagner, Jr., www.pportals.com/jcw. Used with permission.
Now another feature of Ebbets was it had a roof on it, as did Shibe Park, Old Comiskey Park, Forbes Field, Crosley Field – those “Baths of Caracala” ballparks of baseball’s golden age.
Why could you not put a roof on the upper deck in left field and square cut it over the other decks for the fans on rainy days. Too expensive? But that was the Ebbets Field look you “suits” out there.
In fact you could have put posts in the upper deck for nostalgia sake and sell them as old time Ebbets Field seats with see-through panels you’d have a real intimate experience. Preposterous? I say it is a touch that would have given soul to this HOK back-of-the-hand design. They may be big and do a lot of jobs, but that does not mean they know baseball and how it is watched – or that they know what is good in a ballpark.
But, I guess I’m different: at $100 a person, for parking, hot dogs and two beers – I go to watch the ballgame. In this park I see more antiseptic baseball, honky tonk and special effects that are typical of every HOK-built ballpark in the majors. There is nothing unique about Citi Field.
HOK simply flips the positions of the left and right field upper decks and relocates the scoreboards, while adding the usual picnic areas, grills and ways to distract the fans from the boring ball game.
I have sat behind posts in Old Comiskey and they were great “frames” of the action. But then I am old. A ballpark without posts is a football stadium in my opinion.
Please not a lot of candy colored seats. I hate that.
I am not done picking this new stadium to pieces. One wonders if the architects or the Wilpons had ever really really looked at old Ebbets. They say they will have green seats. If they go bright blue that is wrong too. Should be blue-gray with red trim.
Well that is wrong…Ebbets Field had (based on color pictures on baseball cards in the 1950s), blueish gray seats with red railings for the box seats and red box seats – a terrific colorful touch. Very snappy. Please, no green seats – this ain’t Fenway Park. (That leads me to another discussion…the wedding caking of seats on the roof at Fenway have destroyed the look of that place, too.)
Now what will the new dimensions comparison be on the new park compared to Shea Stadium here they are:
New Citi Field DIMENSIONS Old Shea Stadium DIMENSIONS
LF Foul Line 335 LF Foul Line 338
Left Center 379 Left Center 371
Center 408 Center 410
Right Center 391 Right Center 371
Right Field 330 Right Field 338
Take a careful look they have pushed left center some eight feet (more doubles), and pushed out right center 20 feet (more doubles), but remember Ebbets alleys were short — 351 feet and 352 feet – a good 30 to 40 feet closer in than Citi Field. To say that Citi Field is designed like Ebbets Field is simply not true.
Would that be interesting or what? However the dimensions are going out in the power alleys at the new ball park and the right field foul line is 8 feet shorter than Shea Stadium in the new field. The left field line in Citi Field is only 3 feet closer.That does not make sense.
Foul Resemblance Way Foul
The kicker is that the foul pole dimensions at Ebbets are very different from both Shea and the new “Ebbets” Citi Field. At the original Ebbets, Left Field was 348 feet down the line, compared to 335 in new Citi Field, and right was 291 compared to 330. Bring the foul pole in to the Ebbets distance
I have a big problem with the lack of creative symmetry in the new Citi Field.
I dislike the twin monster scoreboards gone amok affect in right center. This looks nothing like Ebbets Field ever did.
Why couldn’t they have put a single bleacher running behind a right field screen to simulate the Ebbets Field look, adding seats where the bullpen areas are now planned? Put the bullpens in play – like old Ebbets down the foul lines?
The rotunda looks pretty majestic on the inside. However, Ebbets Field had an awning on its entrance. They could have duplicated the awning. And another thing: Ebbets had a chandelier hanging down in the rotunda of the old ballpark in the shape of a beautiful huge ivory baseball with white baseballs setting on crossed bats. That’s not here – just some nice ramps and girders. Doesn’t look anything like the Ebbets Field rotunda.
Now, I love Jackie Robinson, who doesn’t? But Brooklyn Dodger fans are dying off. It is high time the Mets stopped glomming on to old New York Giant and Brooklyn Dodger memories. How about pictures of Met greats in the rotunda? Seaver, Jones, Dr. K., Jerry Grote, HoJo, Daryl, Koos, Wayne, Carter — Jackie, Johnny, Carl, Duke and Gil?
Give me some Sexy Lights.
Light towers – I hate the new style of lights today. How about duping the triangular light towers of old Ebbets on the infield side…and if you put roofs on the decks you could use the motion picture show look of lights on those roofs. But the light towers I can live with.
HOK’s idea of oldtime looks is girders. Come on — the old parks were not just girders and ramps. They were odd dimensions. They created a warm old feeling as you went into the park. You were close to the action.
Ebbets exterior was windows and arches and intriguing signage like E X I T –and little Gate signs, as well as colorful ad signs on the walls. Put em on the walls Fred and cantilever the walls and let’s have some fun.
The new Yankee Stadium they are building in the Bronx also suffers from that hideous restaurant in centerfield and the boring symmetry of the present Yankee Stadium makeover.
HOK builds stadiums for corporate types – not baseball fans.
What I love the most about attending minor league and National Pro Fastpitch games is the lack of contrived environments.
When Citi Field opens, joining the other HOK cookie cutter nostalgia parks across the country it will be a shadow of what it could have been.
But it is no Ebbets Field.
You be the judge.
Citi Field, 2009. Webcapture from “Flyover” Computer Simulation on New York Mets website.
Ebbets Field 1955.Photo (c) by John C. Wagner, Jr., www.pportals.com/jcw. Used with permission.
Note: The photographs of Ebbets Field were taken May 30, 1955 at Ebbets Field by John C. Wagner, Jr. when Mr. Wagner was 17 years old. They were shot with an Argus C3 35mm camera, and 8 x 10s and various sizes of these one-of-a-kind-photos may be purchased on Mr. Wagner’s website at www.pportals.com/jcw. Mr. Wagner recalls Bob Purkey pitched for the Pirates and Russ Meyer for the Brooks in this game. Da Bums won both ends of the doubleheader. | 
