"I couldn't possibly fail to disagree with you less."
12 November 2006We built this CitiThe Baseball Crank is okay with "CitiField" as the name for the Mets' new digs:
You get a new stadium, you get a new name. Let's have none of this "New Shea"/"Old Shea" nonsense. Shea Stadium is a place with its own identity and its own place in the history of the game and the hearts of Mets fans. You tear it down to build a new stadium, you get a new name.
Which the Chicago White Sox should have done with the "new" Comiskey, now the stirringly unresonant "U. S. Cellular Field." Not that there's anything particularly wrong with corporate names:
I don't, in principle, have a problem with corporate stadium names (ballparks have been named after companies, egomaniacal owners, or some combination of the two — see "Wrigley Field" and "Turner Field" for examples — as long as there have been ballparks). $20 million a year can make the Mets more competitive, and that is a good thing.
So long as the name stays put, anyway:
[W]ere I negotiating a stadium deal, I would add in a substantial premium and an escape clause for renaming rights. That's my big issue with naming stadiums after banks and phone companies, as well as new and unstable companies (see: "Enron Field"). But the First National City Bank of New York has been known as "City Bank" or Citibank for decades, and given its size and brand equity, should be for the forseeable future.
Interestingly enough, at least one radio station (KYW) in Philadelphia refuses to call Citizens' Bank Park anything other than "The Ballpark." I'm hoping to ger corporate sponsorship for my blog-"Mystic Chords, brought to you In Living Color by Clairol" (my demographics skew pretty old.) Posted by: John Salmon at 8:29 PM on 12 November 2006There are people around Oklahoma City who refer to the stadium as "The Brick," and that's that. Let's have none of this "New Shea"/"Old Shea" nonsense. Old Shea, can you see...? Posted by: McGehee at 10:03 PM on 12 November 2006If the Atlanta radio station that broadcasts Braves games would just call it "Turner Field" I'd be better able to tolerate it. But they insist on calling it "The Ted." I'm sorry, but that's just too "The Donald" for me. At least if they called it "Turner Field" I could pretend they were talking about Tina Turner. When they call it "The Ted" the first alternative that comes to my mind is Bundy, with Kaczynski in close second. Posted by: McGehee at 10:07 PM on 12 November 2006When the new stadium was built for the Tennessee Titans (transplanted Houston Oilers), Adelphia Communications was a big player in the telecom market around Nashville and the eastern part of the country. They bought the naming rights for beaucoup bucks and it was named Adelphia Coliseum, or The Delph for short. Then they went the bankruptcy route and for a few years it sat there on the banks of the Cumberland river without a name and was simply called The Coliseum.. A few months ago they signed up a new naming rights patron, Louisiana-Pacific, and it is called LP Field. To the average consumer or the average ball fan, LP has no identity in the area - we don't even know what they do. While we are all grateful for their big bucks contribution to our fair city, I'm not sure what they were thinking. To all us old codgers, LP is a vinyl disc about 10" or so in diameter, that has music recorded in minute grooves at 33-1/3 RPM. That LP stood for Long Play. I've got several hundred that really need to be spun... Posted by: Winston at 6:29 AM on 13 November 20063com Park in Frisco, PSInet Stadium in Baltimore, WorldCom Park in DC, and the list goes on. Posted by: Dan B at 11:30 AM on 13 November 2006Wow. I haven't thought about PSInet in a decade or so. Here in Tulsa in 1981, they named the new ballpark Sutton Stadium after Robert Sutton, the "angel" whose money got the stadium built and kept the team in town. When he was tarnished by some corporate scandal, the name was changed to Tulsa County Stadium and eventually to Drillers Stadium. I think it's fine to name a ballpark after the company or the individual that owns the team and built the stadium or after some player, manager, or owner who played an important role in the team's history. It's strange to sell naming rights to a company that otherwise has no connection with the facility. Posted by: Michael Bates at 12:55 PM on 13 November 2006 |