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Coors Field

Coors Field, located in Denver, Colorado, is the home field of the National League's Colorado Rockies. It is named for the Coors Brewing Company of Golden, Colorado, which purchased the naming rights to the park prior to its completion in 1995. The Rockies played their first two seasons, 1993 and 1994, in Mile High Stadium before moving to Coors Field, two blocks from Union Station in Denver's Lower Downtown (or LoDo) neighborhood. The park includes 63 luxury suites and 4,500 club seats.

Reputation as a home run-friendly park

Coors Field once had a reputation as a home run-friendly park that at one point, arguably, equaled Chicago's venerable Wrigley Field, and earned it the nickname "Coors Canaveral" among critics (a reference to Cape Canaveral, from where NASA launches spacecraft). Before the introduction in 2002 of a large humidor used for baseball storage, Denver's dry air tended to dry out baseballs, which made the balls harder and caused them to travel farther. In addition, the curveball tends to curve less with the thin air than at sea level leading to fewer strikeouts and fewer effective pitches for pitchers to work with.

Stadium designers knew beforehand that Coors Field would give up a disproportionate number of home runs because of its high elevation and dry air, and acted accordingly by placing the outfield fences at an unsually far distance from home plate; thus creating one of the largest outfields in baseball today. The result was a ballpark that, for many years, not only gave up the most home runs in baseball, but also gave up the most doubles and triples as well. With the introduction of the humidor, Coors Field has fallen into the middle of the pack in terms of home run prevalence.

Development and construction

Coors Field was the first new stadium added in a six year period in which Denver's sports venues were upgraded, along with Pepsi Center and INVESCO Field at Mile High. It was also the first baseball-only National League Park since Dodger Stadium was built in 1962.

As with the other new venues, Coors Field was constructed with accessibility in mind. It sits near Interstate 25 and has direct access to the 20th Street and Park Avenue exits. Nearby Union Station also provides light rail access.

Coors Field was originally planned to be somewhat smaller, seating only 43,800. However, after the Rockies drew almost 4.5 million people in their first season—the most in baseball history—plans were altered during construction, and new seats in the right field upper deck were added. The center field bleacher section has its own informal name: "the Rockpile."

During construction, workers discovered a number of dinosaur fossils throughout the grounds. Because of this, "Jurassic Park" was one of the first names to be considered for the stadium. This later led to the selection of a dinosaur as the Rockies' mascot, "Dinger."

Features

While most of the seats in Coors Field are dark green, the seats in the 20th row of the upper deck are purple. This marks the city's one mile elevation point.

Unlike most baseball stadiums, where home plate faces east or northeast (so as to prevent sunsets from disturbing the batter), Coors Field faces due north, resulting in the sun shining in the first-baseman's eyes during sunset.

The Blue Moon Brewery at The Sandlot is a microbrewery/restaurant that is behind the Right Field Stands, with an entrance from Coors Field, and from Blake Street. The brewery is operated by the Coors Brewing Company, and experiments with craft beers on a small scale. Every year, they receive awards at the Great American Beer Festival in many different categories. The popular Blue Moon, a Belgian-Style Wheat beer was invented here, and is now mass produced by Coors. The restaurant is housed in a building that is attached to the stadium.

Behind the center field wall is a landscape decoration that reflects the typical environment of the Rocky Mountains. This landscape area consists of a waterfall, fountains, and pine trees.

Notable events

The only no-hitter at Coors Field was thrown by Hideo Nomo of the Los Angeles Dodgers on September 17, 1996.

The 1998 Major League Baseball All-Star Game took place in Coors Field.

There have been seven 1-0 games in Coors Field history, as of 9/17/2008, all since the humidor was in use:

July 9, 2005, when the Rockies beat the San Diego Padres
April 16, 2006, when the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Rockies
July 25, 2006, when the St Louis Cardinals beat the Rockies
August 1, 2006, when the Milwaukee Brewers beat the Rockies
June 11, 2008, when the Rockies beat the San Francisco Giants
September 14, 2008, when the Rockies beat the Los Angeles Dodgers
September 17, 2008, when the Rockies beat the San Diego Padres

The September 14, 2008 game was the only in Coors Field history to have both teams scoreless through nine innings.

Games 3 and 4 of the 2007 World Series were held at Coors Field.

In Popular Culture

Coors Field appeared in an episode of South Park named The Losing Edge.

The "Voice" of Coors Field

Alan Roach was the main PA announcer since Coors Field opened in 1995. In the spring preceding the 2007 Rockies season, Roach announced his retirement from his post at Coors Field to spend more time over the summer with his family. Although he did come back to substitute for Reed Saunders for 2 games in 2008. Roach is also the PA announcer for the nearby Colorado Avalanche hockey team of the NHL and provides voice-overs for local sports introductions in the region, in addition to hosting a local sports talk radio show. He is also one of the voices of the train system at Denver International Airport, and has also been heard as the PA announcer at recent Super Bowls. Reed Saunders, 23, was chosen to be the new voice of Coors Field on March 16, 2007.