PK Park

Eugene Emeralds (Northwest League)

8/10

No doubting who the landlord is here. Nice facade though.

A decent crowd takes in a Sunday evening contest versus cross-state rivals Hillsboro.

Overall, this is a decent little place.

My first visit to PK Park was on my 2014 summer loop. The Ems were taking on the 2nd year Hillsboro Hops in a Sunday evening match up. We arrived after a long drive from Sacramento and I was looking for a good game to move on from a disappointing night there. This was the first time I'd seen a team in 2 different parks, after seeing the Emeralds twice in Civic Stadium.

The Emeralds ended up moving in here after their old park started to show it's age. Fortunately for them, the University of Oregon brought it's Baseball program back up to the varsity level and built PK Park, in the parking lot of Autzen Stadium, where the football team plays. "The Autzen Zoo", where the ticket office for the Emeralds is located as well, dwarfs this relatively small ballpark.

PK Park has a relatively steep seating bowl, with some suites on top. The field has not the greatest backdrop, of the practice facility for the school's soccer teams and some tall trees. Concessions are slightly above average, featuring such random items as the Bison(Buffalo) corn dog. The atmosphere here was also slightly notable, as having been here 3 times, I can tell you Eugene is a baseball town.

Overall, this place is a sadly much needed upgrade to Civic Stadium that the Emeralds badly needed and all they had to do was switch landlords. I'm in no hurry to go back, but this place is worth at least 1 visit.

Update 2019: The Emeralds are now the Cubs affiliate in the NWL. They continue to draw decent crowds, averaging just over 3,400 a game. I can't find a reliable number for how the Ducks draw at their park, but for 2019, it was less than this. Eugene is not on the chopping block as part of the reorganization of MiLB and I'd be very surprised if this changed. This is the last park until the bay area, so it always has a decent chance of snagging me for a game on the way through.

Linescore
2014-08-17
                                          123   456   789 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17  R H E
Hillsboro Hops(ARI)              100  330   000  0  0   0   0   0   0   0    2   9 17 1
Eugene Emeralds(SD)          500  200   000  0  0  0    0    0   0   0   0   7 16 3
Time: 5:28 Temp: 79F  Att: 2,543