I went to college at Wichita State University, where we lacked a football program due to several circumstances in the 70’s & 80’s. I feel that I missed out on the experience of tailgating and cheering for a college team on Saturday afternoon’s in the fall. However, I feel a lot of people missed out on watching their college baseball team during the spring. Baseball was a substitute for the football ambiance at WSU, and its the main reason why I’m a college baseball fan today. I don’t watch a lot of regular season games, but I always catch the Super Regionals and College World Series. I thought it would be fun to give my thoughts on the best venues across America. Note: I haven’t traveled to these stadiums, so the “atmosphere” could not be considered in my judging.  I know I’m going to get an email suggesting a stadium that I forgot, and I will probably  have to reconsider my list. Oh who am I joking,  no one comments on my blog posts…

10. Lupton Stadium – Home of the TCU Horned Frogs – Fort Worth, TX.

The right field score board really makes this a cool park
 

9. Miller Park – Home of the BYU Cougars – Provo, UT

This is the smallest of all the parks I have listed with a capacity of 2,200. The stadium itself has a unique canvas like awning, but the true reason I chose to include this location was the view past center field.

8. Clark LeClair Stadium – Home of the East Carolina Pirates – Greenville, NC

The stadium will hold 3000, but the field also hosts an elevated viewing/tailgating area beyond the left and center fences.
 

7. Turchin Stadium – Home of the Tulane Green Wave – New Orleans, LA

This stadium was opened in 2008 as the previous complex was destroyed by hurricane Katrina.
 

6. Russ Chandler – Home of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets – Atlanta, GA

There is nothing like a downtown ballpark.
 

5 USC Stadium – Home of the South Carolina Gamecocks — Columbia, SC

Built in 2009, this is one of the newer stadiums I have noted. It seats nearly 7,000 and the outfield scoreboard towers over 80 ft.
 

4. Eck Stadium – Home of the Wichita State Shockers – Wichita, KS

I’m partial to this stadium as I am an Alumni of WSU, but it really is a great park. It holds close to 8,000, not including the outfield hills, which was developed do to the lack of funding to carry way excess dirt.  

3. Doug Kingsmore  Stadium – Home of the Clemson Tigers – Clemson, SC

With the brick face, this park looks more like a minor league facility than a collegiate. It holds over 5000 spectators and has boasted the best attendance in college baseball numerous years.
 

2. Plainsman Park – Home of the Auburn Tigers – Auburn, AL

This place is actually called Samford Stadium – Hitchcock Field at Plainsman Park and its got loads of character. Probably the most notable is the 37 foot high left field fence that measures 315 feet from home plate. The original facility was first built in 1950 and gone through numerous renovations. Today it seats 4,000 and offers a brick backstop like Wrigley and a Green monster like Fenway.
 

1. New Alex Box Stadium – Home of the LSU Tigers – Baton Rouge, LA

This stadium is ridiculous. It holds 8,500 fans with 17 suites, championship plaza (what ever that is) and two picnic areas.
 

So what have I learned from writing this blog post? The south loves its baseball and if your mascot is a Tiger you have a great chance of having a state-of-the-art facility. Unless your from Missouri… Let me know if you think im wong. I would love to hear about it.

Is anyone else slightly concerned about what’s happening in California? Not the wild fires, but rather the sheer size of the kids that are taking the field in the Little League World Series Tournament. There were several games from the national bracket televised this weekend, and nearly every time I tuned in some 12 year old with a beard was crushing a hanging curveball over the outfield fence. Yeah, you read that right, curve ball. I also saw 80mph fastballs, changeups and even a couple of knuckleballs. The team I watched last night, Chula Vista, CA, have outscored their opponents 72-9 and lofted 28 homeruns to date in the tournament. This has been accomplished with the help of their pitcher/first baseman who is 6 foot, 2 inches tall and weighs in at 206 lbs! This kid looks like he could drive a Chrysler and have a mortgage! I’m not suggesting we test this kid for HGH, beaver tranquilizers or miracle grow, but maybe the fences could be moved back just a bit. Like, maybe to the front door of the local thyroid specialist.

I just got back from my surprise 30th birthday trip . My wonderful wife set the whole weekend up for me. I woke up Thursday and the only thing I knew was that we were going somewhere. That somewhere turned out to be Colorado. We missed our original flight that morning, but luckily Alaska Air got us both on a direct flight to Denver. My brother picked me up  at the airport while my wife drove to Ft. Collins. He had sweet tickets for both of us at the Rockies game that afternoon. I would love to do more sports photography, but i don’t have credentials or a 500mm lens.  However, I didn’t need either of them with the seats we had! We were just off of home plate and only two rows back. I took this in the bottom of the 7th as Right Fielder Brad Hawpe waited on deck. I love this photo; probably some of my best post processing work yet.  A big thanks goes out to my brother for making it possible. I’ll post more photos from the weekend later as this game was only the first of many birthday surprises in store for me over the weekend.

My buddy Craig was at my first pitch game with his daughter. He does a lot of photography work for the Beavers, so naturally he had all of his gear with him. He sent me this series of frames last week. I must say for not playing a lick of baseball,  I think its decent form. He’d be mad if I didn’t post his photo of the Beaver’s mascot roughing me up after the pitch. I would say it’s along the lines of Disney meets Shawshank Redemption… He choose the file name, not me.  A link to Craig’s blog is over to the right.