We headed to Kauffman Stadium, home of the Kansas City Royals, for our last game of the West coast portion of our trip. After this game, our 11th, we would take a much needed week off. My parents would head home to Springfield to attend a wedding, and I would head to Minnesota for my first triathlon.
This was everyone's first visit to Kauffmann stadium and I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. The Royals had completed a $250 million renovation to the ballpark, and it showed. The park was beautiful, open, and very fan friendly. There were great food choices throughout the stadium including ribs, a taco truck, and some ice cream that looked dangerous.
Behind center field, there is an expansive area with bars, a wiffle ball field, and plenty of room to stand and see the game. The ballpark has a 'minor league' feel to it because it's rather small, but I liked it. The playing surface is also a bit lower than ground level, which creates a unique backdrop as it is surrounded by fountains in the outfield. Admittedly, this was one of my favorite stadiums, but nobody cares what I think, so let's get right to Big Jim's rating.
As you can see, Big Jim liked Kauffman stadium as much as I did. The Royals personnel were great as well. They picked us up in a golf cart at our motor home, and drove us right to player will call. When we were ready to leave, they took us back to the parking lot. It was a great day, but we were all anxious to get back on the road as we had a long drive ahead of us. We would have to drive to Springfield that night, unload and clean the motor home, and my buddy Mike 'Mookie' Harth and I would drive the motor home all the way back to Missouri the next morning. I don't know what we would have done without Mookie, he really saved the day, like usual.
Pros: Fan support, personnel, ballpark layout with one of the best center field attractions we've seen
Cons: Team is young and lacks super stars (I appreciate this, however), attractions surrounding the ballpark..
As I mentioned previously, we will be off for the next week or so and back to baseball and blogging Tuesday, June 12th. Looking forward to some time off, but it's been an incredible experience so far. I can't wait to start the east coast.
As always, thanks for reading.
-JS
Enjoyed the Mookie shoutout. He has a long history of bailing people out of baseball related problems. I will always remember that time you, me, him and Liz went to the Cardinals game and he tried to save Kelly, and then bum a cigarette from a 10 year old.
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