I started recording the many sporting events I have been to back on May 30, 2007. It took nearly six years, but I have made it 2,000 sporting events. And I have been to 334 stadiums! That is the purpose of this website: to show off the many, many stadiums I have been to. This site will cover all types of stadiums: minor league baseball stadiums, college basketball arenas, and high school football stadiums are just a sample of the many different types of stadiums I have been to and will share on this site. The emphasis will be mostly on smaller sports venues, although there will be a professional stadium on here every now and then. The solid majority of these stadiums will be from the Carolinas where I have lived since I was two. I live in South Carolina, but spent four years at High Point University so you can count on a solid representation of North Carolina stadiums as well. And I have traveled elsewhere in the country so you will also occasionally see stadiums from elsewhere in the country pop up.
Each stadium will have several photos of it shown on here as well. The photos are the main purpose of the site, meant to show you the whole stadium and what it is like. I will also do this through my eight category review process. Each stadium will be reviewed based on these eight categories on a grade scale from A to F:
1. Seating capacity of the stadium: Do you seat enough people to accommodate your fans? This will obviously be different at each level. A 5,000 seat high school basketball gym is usually way more than adequate for most places. But a 5,000 seat college football stadium would be woefully inadequate even for a NCAA Division 1-AA (FCS) team. I will also make some adjustments from the official capacity listed. Some stadiums give official capacities way higher than what it actually is. The fire code limit is not adequate in evaluating a stadium’s real size. If you rely largely on standing room or berm seating to pack your fans in, you probably do not have a good stadium
2. Quality of seats: How good are the sight lines of your seats? Are they all at the right angle at the right distance from the field or court? Does the stadium rely on chairback seats, or bleachers with no back support? Or worse, the dreaded berm/grassy hill?
3. Attractiveness/Unique qualities: How nice looking is your stadium (and the immediate surrounding landscape if you are an outdoor stadium)? Ultimately, I want something to remember by what your stadium looks like. If your stadium is featured in a video game or some media type where I only get a slight glimpse of it, I want to be able to say, “Yes, I know exactly which stadium that is”. If your stadium looks like it could be anywhere and looks like a generic stand-in for “stadium” or “arena”, that will get a low grade.
4. Concessions: Can you get a real meal at the stadium, or did you just unload a vending machine and brought what you could grab to a table? And just as importantly, can you get that meal at a reasonable price?
5. Parking: Can you park near the stadium, or a mile away? Is the lot cleanly paved and neatly marked, or is it a free for all in grabbing spaces near the stadium? Is it easy to pull into a space before a game, and then get back on main roads after the game? And very importantly, can you park for free or practically have to purchase another ticket to stop your car?
6. Lighting: a personal thing for me, mainly because I am a photography enthusiast. But this also impacts how your stadium is seen on television as well. And lighting is especially important for basketball arenas. Do pictures taken inside come out looking dark and blurry, or as clear as they would be if taken outside? While most fans will never notice or care about this category, this is very important for the media.
7. Fans: Judged by quality, not quantity. A half full stadium where everybody is passionate about the game at hand and actively participates in rhythm to the game will always be judged better than a packed house where fans are there just to socialize and can’t stay in there seats very long.
8. Other stuff: Mostly reserved to judge the modern qualities of the stadium in how well designed it is to suit fans and players alike. This is often a big factor in the perception of stadiums when discussed elsewhere. But to me, that is only a small part of the overall picture of a stadium. And often times these stadiums have an unfortunate tendency to tightly manage their fans. I like to be able to roam around and take pictures before the game, and not worry about upsetting a stadium staff member. This is not always easy wen the game played is at one of the “entertainment venues”.
So that is my ratings system. The grades will be averaged for a final score via a “GPA average”. Sometimes the score will be fair, sometimes it will not be. There will be times where my perception of a stadium will be enhanced or dragged down based on one or two key categories, but the stadium will receive a better or worse score than it deserves. But I would like to limit the subjectivity to be as fair to each stadium as possible. My rating system is a little bit different than what you will see at websites. One category some reviewers often use is “History”, also known as “Let’s pad a stadium’s grade because the home team often wins or is a superpower”. This is a big reason why stadiums like the old Yankee Stadium got favorable reviews even when the actual stadium was not very good. I also do not like categories such as “Neighborhood” as used on Stadium Journey. I am not here to visit your city, I am here to see your stadium. But one Stadium Journey category I like not used here is “Return on Investment”. It is the quality of the stadium and game experience you get for the price of the visit. This is a key factor in how much I like a stadium. It may not be used for the official grade on here, but I will consider it for each category and will bring it up in my written description of each stadium.
So there you have it for this website’s purpose. As this is “Stadium of the Day”, I will pick a new stadium to review every day. Check back here every day for a new stadium. I will start tomorrow night with my first stadium review, which will be of South Carolina’s Colonial Life Arena. I will also include occasional features that affect the stadiums I visit. This will start later tonight, where I introduce the 2013-14 Red Line Math on athletic budget data for NCAA Division I conferences. So enjoy the stadiums!
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