Nelson W. Wolff Municipal Stadium

San Antonio Missions, Texas League

8/10

The front door is actually the pass gate. The peons can enter on either base side.

The finishing touches on the field, post batting practice.

The crowd enjoys things from the upper aisle.

I rolled into San Antonio late one June evening,on the last night of my June 2015 trip after driving down most of Texas from Oklahoma City. I accepted a 3 hour drive after the game to catch one more park prior to flying home and I'm glad I did. Nelson W. Wolff Municipal Stadium(or "The Wolff") for short, has been San Antonio's home for baseball since 1994. I would have pegged it as a late 80's park based on it's design, but was a little off. It's a little bit of a quirky design, but I liked it. There's your box seat sections, then loges behind an aisle, but there's an upper aisle behind that, which I really liked. There are also your run of the mill luxury boxes and some metal seats further back and further out. The park is on the edge of town, with an off ramp from a freeway almost directly into the lot. It was a cloudy night, but a few large planes could be heard taking off from the nearby Air Force base.

Concessions here were about average, there were lots of specialty kind of options, but they were made to order, which would have meant a wait of 10-15 minutes, which is a little much. I ended up with an average hot dog and drink.

The big thing that saves this from from being just another ballpark is the atmosphere. People want to come out and watch. The game featured the hometown San Antonio Missions, longtime AA affiliate of the San Diego Padres, against the Arkansas Travellers, who are tied up with the Angels at the moment. A Travs batter grounded out to Shortstop and decided against even moving towards first base, at which point, some random voice seated in the loge behind me yelled "There's little kids here! Run it out!" There were some promos and stuff, but on the whole, it's an enjoyable place to take in a game. I'll head back for sure and with a Texas trip towards the top of my list, it could be soon.

Update 2021: This place had a few interesting years since the last post. In 2019, the Colorado Springs franchise in the PCL moved here and the AA team moved to Amarillo. But, San Antonio's time in Triple A was limited to just the 2019 season, as 2020 saw the MiLB season cancelled outright and 2021 saw minor league contraction. The end result was San Diego selecting this park for it's AA team. I didn't write this at the time, but it did feel like there could have been Triple A here when I saw it. I'm sure the locals enjoyed their one year.

Linescore

                                                 123   456   789   R H E

Arkansas Travelers (LAA)        010  022   000   5  10 1

San Antonio Missons(SD)         012 300   30x   9  10  1

Temp: 88F Time: 2:58 Att: 4,749

Pensacola Bayfront Stadium

Pensacola Blue Wahoos, Southern League

7/10

        The exterior of the park is still pretty bare, omitting even a sign with the name of the building(I had to look it up when I got back). I'd suspect its being left blank for a corporate sponsor.
         This staff member is covering her mouth, already over-apologetic for standing in my picture.

 

          I was here SUPER early, which gave me a chance to really walk around.

                                    

The Jackson Generals take batting practice.

I was excited to include the new stadium in Pensacola on my loop through three southern states in 2012. The team had just relocated from the Carolinas, and was enjoying its inaugural season in this brand new ballpark built right on the shore of Pensacola Bay. I had travelled from just outside of Atlanta after catching the Braves and swung through Alabama, making a pit stop in Mobile to see the USS Alabama in all its restored glory, prior to arriving in P-cola.

The evening's contest featured the hometown Pensacola Blue Wahoos, the Cincinnati Reds AA club, matched against the Jackson Generals, the equivalent for the Seattle Mariners. The park itself is located right in downtown Pensacola, one of the bigger cities on the Florida panhandle, as part of a new waterfront complex. One of the first drawbacks is that there isn't very much parking in the immediate area of the stadium and it's pretty much all snapped up by disabled parking, VIP parking, or season ticket holders. There are numerous pay lots in the area, as well as a ton of FREE on street parking, which I opted for.

The façade of the park is so basic that I didn't get a photo of it. As mentioned above, I doubt this place will be so generically named for too long. Entrance is on the first base side and up a few flights of stairs. Once you're up, you are confronted by a sparkling new ballpark, with just under 5,000 seats. It is well laid out and the outfield views are of the bay to right and an inlet to left. It isn't just Barry Bonds that can hit one into the water here. The team shop/ offices are in the main building behind home plate.

I'm a bit of a hypocrite with the issue of Minor League teams in particular taking on goofy names to sell shirts. "Blue Wahoos" is a goofy name. I also now own a Pensacola Blue Wahoos running shirt(featuring a Blue Wahoo wrapped around a baseball bat to form a "P") AND kept the bag it came in. I'm deeply conflicted.

One of the aspects of the Bayfront Stadium that I really liked were the concessions. The food itself was above average, but the layout is actually pretty innovative. Firstly, they were referred to as "Port" and "Starboard" which pays homage to the nautical theme of the park. Secondly, they were removed from the concourse, meaning that the lines for the concessions aren't going to spill over. There were extra tills not being used, which for big home dates, could get the lines moving. Also, ordering and paying are two separate people, kind of like a drive-thru. It was a little clunky, as most people didn't know quite where to go(me too), but with time, the locals should get the hang of it.

Overall, I enjoyed my game here. The Wahoo starter took a perfect game(or maybe a no hitter) into the final three frames before losing it. The ambience was alright, but like with other debut parks I've been too, there aren't many local traditions yet. Ownership seems pretty approachable, soliciting fan concerns pretty hard(I got a survey in my e-mail the next week) and actually trying to act on them(Don't climb over the seats for instance. I'm a seat climber. I'll try and stop.) But, as of right now, there isn't anything that makes this place particularly special, although that's not to say that won't ever change. 7/10.

Update 2016: This place still doesn't have a corporate sponsor, which going into season 5, is borderline miraculous. On the team website, it's referred to as "Blue Wahoos Stadium", I've also seen "Community Martitime Park", but I'll just stick with this name for now I suppose. As for the ratings, I was going to keep the 7, but I did say the food was above average, so it can have an 8.

Linescore
2012-06-27
                                                 123   456   789  RHE
Jackson Generals(SEA)               000  000   000  040
Pensacola Blue Wahoos(CIN)       200  000  21x  580
Temp:83F   Time: 2:24  Att: 4,625

Baseball Grounds of Jacksonville

Jacksonville Suns, Southern League

8/10

The design of the exterior of the park, as well as the name "Baseball Grounds"give this particular ballpark a retro feel.

A sparse crowd enjoys the break between rain-shortened games.

               EverBank Field and the Commodore Point Expressway dominate the right field skyline.

I stopped in Jacksonville on a weekday afternoon, to catch a getaway game featuring the Jacksonville Suns , the AA affiliate of the Miami Marlins and the Tennessee Smokies. The park is part of a plan to revitalize Jacksonville with brand new everything. It has a brick façade and backstop and even the name “Baseball Grounds” is a tribute to old time baseball. The park is a good example of a smaller retro style. The park holds 11,000 and features both infield and outfield seating. My ticket was 25 dollars and in the front row(I’m not a fan of the front and moved to the back). The park has a small video scoreboard in left field, which displays the usual animations and player photos during the game.

The baseball grounds are located near the shores of the St. Johns River, across a parking lot from Everbank Field, home of the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars and up the street from Jacksonville’s Arena in a Sports district. There’s not much else in the immediate area otherwise, downtown is a short drive away and has a little more in the way of activities. Parking was across the street in the arena parkade for 5 dollars. The game I went to was lightly attended, so in and out was easy.

The game was sparsely attended, due to impending heavy rain throughout Florida, the hometown Suns and Tennessee Smokies made up the previous nights game before playing a 7 inning game at the scheduled start time. I was unaware of the situation coming in. Only about 500 people were in the stands for game 2, despite an announced(they didn’t announce it at the park, because of how off it was) of around 2,700 people for game 2. A good number of kids day camps were there and did most of the cheering, as besides them, there were roughly 100 in the stands.

The concessions were mostly closed with the front office staff manning the one that was open. Lines got long and selection was somewhat limited to burgers, sausages, dogs and snacks. Price for a regular/medium pop and a sausage was 8.50.  There were some specialty stands open, but a lot weren’t.

Jacksonville is a city of over 1 million Metro at the crossroads of I-95 and the eastern end of I-10. The city is also home to the NFL’s Jaguars and sees a great deal of other events. It looked in the quick glance I got to be a nice place and I would definitely go back, given the chance. The mascot is a dog named Southpaw, who, because of low attendance, gave himself the day off.

Assuming the low attendance and lack of atmosphere, plus the poor selection at the concessions are all unique to the game I went to(which is being nice), the park itself is very good, with a bit of a retro feel. Parking is close and cheap and the level of competition for AA is a cut above the low-minors for sure. I wouldn’t mind going back for a better attended game, as I’ll likely get a better impression. 

Update 2016: Rescoring this one, initially, I thought it would drop to a 7, but in actual fact, the park itself is well designed and worthy of an extra point. I'll still hopefully get back here soon, possibly even this summer.Also, sorry about the tiny font, the editor is fighting me hard for some reason. I make it bigger, it saves as smaller. Next revision....

Linescore 
2012-06-25 
                                            123     456     7    R  H  E
Tennessee Smokies(CHC)   000     300     0    3  5 0
Jacksonville Suns(MIA)        000     127     X    10 9 0 
Temp: 87F   Time: 2:00  Att: 2,247
Note: The teams played two 7 inning games to make up the previous night's. This was game 2.