Our review of Great American Ballpark - Cincinnati Reds (6/8)

As the baseball marathon road trip continues, the whole family had to deal with the toughest day of all on the trip.  Michael and I drove back to Chicago from Miller Park Tuesday night and got back at just after midnight.  Then, four hours later, we had to hit the road and leave my beloved Chicago behind so we could make a 12:30 pm game in Cincinnati between the Reds and the Cubs – and do it all on Michael’s Birthday!!!  Yes, my main man turned 11 today.  And I have to say, he has been a great kid on the trip.  So far, he’s had only one moment of “I want to go home” and that was after we pulled into Denver after three long days of driving from Seattle.  He got over it after getting a good night rest and he hasn’t had another moment since.

Anyway, Helen provided driving support for me this morning as we crossed the great state of Indiana and into Ohio.  I drove a little over half way, but Helen was a huge help as I got my first nap of the trip in the car.  So far, we have logged over 5,000 miles and we aren’t even half way done.  Anyway, we pulled into Cincinnati and met up with my old law partner in my firm, Eric Wittenberg and his wife Susan who drove down from Columbus where they live.  Helen wasn’t feeling well enough to go to the game so her and Andie stayed home.  It was probably best since it was really HOT AND HUMID!!  Nothing like a day game in 97 degree 80% humidity weather! 

Great American Park is a really nice park.  It sits right on the north bank of the Ohio River along the back of the right field stands.  The entire stadium has a riverboat theme to it.  It’s a smaller park, but it has a really nice feel to it.  There is a giant scoreboard/video board in the upper deck in left field and the center field has a riverboat restaurant, which was a cooler place to watch a game then where we were – right along the left field line in the middle of the sweltering sun.   The place was well-attended for the weather and it being a Wednesday afternoon.  The views from the park are very nice.  In the distance, you can see buildings on the other side of the Ohio River, which incidentally is in Kentucky.  Unfortunately, the Cubs managed to pull the game out on back-to-back home runs in the 4^th inning and they went on to win 4-1.  There’s really not a bad seat in the house.  Michael had his toughest time at the game because of the heat.  If it wasn’t so bad, we would have walked around a little more, but we still managed to see a good part of the park.  I’d say it’s definitely in the upper half of parks.  And thanks again to Eric and Susan for spending Michael's birthday with our family.

Great American Park from the outside

The view from our seats.  We just can't seem to shake the Cub fans.

Cincinnati has a very nice scoreboard.  Although, I'm partial to having them in center field.

The view from behind left field.
That's the Ohio River in the background and the buildings across the river are in Kentucky.

This is a great mosaic of the Reds players from the Big Red Machine of the early 1970s.

Check out the riverboat in center field - nice!

Here’s Michael’s take:

Hey everyone, it’s me Michael.  First of all, I had a great birthday.  I got treated to a nice dinner with my family and dad’s friends.  Then we went to this ice cream place called Graters’ in Cincinnati.  That was some good ice cream.  I just wished it was a little cooler, but I guess that’s what I get for being born in June.  Anyway, I really liked the Reds’ park.  It’s pretty simple, but I liked the views of the River.  And the food was really good.  I had a Skyline hot dog, which was a chili dog that had cinnamon flavor in it.  It was really good.  Anyway, I give the stadium an 8 out of 10.

Well there you have it.  We wake up bright and early as we head up to the Motor City – Detroit, Michigan.  We’ll be there a couple of days and I will be staying at my brother’s house, who I haven’t seen in about 20 years.  Andie and Helen will take off back to Phoenix on Friday and it will just be Michael and I for the next week until they rejoin us in New York for a little over a week.  We hope to hit the Motown Museum and maybe even the Henry Ford museum.  We are scheduled to see the Tigers take on the Mariners (that’s the fourth and final time for these guys) on Friday night.  We’ll have our updated rankings through Great American Ballpark tomorrow and we also hope to have the St. Louis, Milwaukee, Chicago, and Cincinnati videos up throughout the next couple of days.  More tomorrow!

Updated Stadium Rankings - through Miller Park (Brewers) as of 6/7/11

Through 12 stadiums, here are our updated rankings through Miller Park (Milwaukee Brewers) as of 6/7/11.  We'll update this after each game/tour.

Michael's Rankings:

1. Petco Park - San Diego Padres
2. AT&T Park - San Francisco Giants

3. Coors Field - Colorado Rockies

4. Miller Park - Milwaukee Brewers

5. Anaheim Stadium - Los Angeles Angels

6. U.S. Cellular Field - Chicago White Sox

7. Kauffman Stadium - Kansas City Royals
8. Wrigley Field - Chicago Cubs
9. Chase Field - Arizona Diamondbacks

10. Safeco Field - Seattle Mariners

11. Busch Stadium - St. Louis Cardinals

12. Dodger Stadium - L.A. Dodgers

13. Oakland Coliseum - Oakland A's

Lance's Rankings:

1. AT&T Park
2. Petco Park

3. Safeco Field

4. Coors Field

5. Chase Field

6. U.S. Cellular Field

7. Miller Park

8. Kauffman Stadium

9. Busch Stadium
10. Anaheim Stadium
11. Dodger Stadium
12. Wrigley Field

13. Oakland Coliseum

Miller Park - Milwaukee, Wisconsin - Day 18

What's the best way to say this - Miller Park ain't cheesy?

This is a day late, but yesterday the entire family got up and we made a visit to my favorite place to go in Chicago - the Museum of Science and Industry.  Most people don't know that the Museum is also the most popular tourist attraction in Chicago.  We spent the morning and early afternoon there and it didn't disappoint.  It was nice to be in there on a hot and muggy day in Chicago.  Without a doubt, the most popular attraction was the Chick Hatchery for the kids.

I, however, prefer the cool model train set – something I made my dad spend hours at the museum just so I could watch when I was a kid.  The space exhibits were very cool as well.

That's one giant step for Michael.

Anyway, after we left the museum, Michael and I bolted up I-94 to Milwaukee to catch the Brewers and the Mets at Miller Park.  This was clearly the toughest day of the trip.  We had to be back to our hotel in Chicago after the game for a 4 am drive to Cincinnati to catch the Cubs and Reds play at 12:30 the next day.   To put it shortly, I thought Miller Park was about as close to Chase Field in Phoenix as it gets.  They’re both retractable domed stadiums and with the same enclosed outfields.  Both have huge center field scoreboards/video boards, and both have TGI Friday’s Front Row Grills.  Judging by the look of the attendance, that was about the same too (not very good).   It was nice that the roof was open.  That doesn’t happen too often after mid-June in Phoenix.

Our seats were nice – middle level half-way down first base.  The fans were great.  They definitely know their baseball in Milwaukee.  We even managed to meet another guy (John) who was traveling around the northern part of the country to take in baseball games.  We exchanged stories and he was cool.  We have to give him a shout out since he promised to check out the blog. 

Our new baseball road trip buddy John

 Anyway, the highlight of the night was the sausage races.  You can’t go to a Brewers game without hoping to catch a glimpse of five guys running in huge ethnic sausage outfits and running around the edge of the field in a race.  Just for the record, Hot Dog won.

They just added the Mexican sausage guy in the middle.  His name is Chorizo.
The race was way too European until  he joined the lineup.

We also managed to see Bernie Brewer their mascot slide down from his perch after Prince Fielder launched a mammoth home run to straight away center field.

Overall, I really liked the park.  But because it does remind me so much of Chase Field and because I’m a Diamondbacks fan, I have to give Chase the slight edge, but would highly recommend going to see a game there.  Here’s Michael’s take:

Hey everyone, it’s Michael.  I liked Miller Park too.  I loved the sausage races like my dad did.  The huge video screen in center field was awesome.  It was also really cool seeing Craig Counsel (a former Arizona Diamondback player) get into the game in the seventh inning.  I can’t believe he is still playing, but he was one of my favorite players.  I give the park a 7/10. 

Anyway, there you have it.  Up next – Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati.

It's Michael's 11th birthday today!!

We just arrived in Cincinnati for the Reds game against the Cubs. Happy Birthday to the best son a father can have!!!