A Guide to Major League Baseball Stadiums, Part 2: The Worst of the Bunch

As I already discussed in my companion piece (A Guide to Major League Baseball Stadiums: The Best of the Bunch) I fulfilled a lifelong dream of visiting all 30 major league ballparks. In that article I showcased the national past time's most impressive stadiums. Sadly, as I discovered on my journey, not all stadiums are created equal. Now it's time to get down to some dirty work and let you in on the worst ballparks MLB has to offer.

Wrecking Ball Ready

Shea Stadium, New York Mets - If I can be unoriginal for a moment I'd like to quote the great acid tongued Bette Davis: "What. A. Dump." That pretty much sums up Shea Stadium. Sure it was home to the famed 1965 Beatles concert but it also looks like that's the last time anyone cleaned the place. Typical of most 1960's circular concrete designed parks, a stark and overwhelming sadness lingers over the stadium's cold facade. As all baseball fans know by now, LaGuardia Airport is located nearby and the constant slew of jumbo jets flying overhead make it a less than ideal spot to watch a game. The Mets are set to open a new stadium in 2009 and it can't come soon enough.

Dolphin Stadium, Florida Marlins - Dolphin Stadium isn't such a bad stadium really. That's assuming of course that you're there to watch a Dolphins game. However if you're a Marlins fan (and much like Big Foot sightings, I question the authenticity of such a statement) it's a whole other story. This is another prototypical multi-purpose stadium: appropriate for football, poor site lines for baseball games. It doesn't help matters that locals don't come out to support the team in spite of the fact they've won two World Series titles in the past ten years. Empty stadiums plague home games (they averaged just a little above 14,000 per game last season) and simply add to their inability to build any kind of excitement or festive atmosphere.