Parkview Field

Home-plate entrance to Parkview Field, Jul-2009.

The seating bowl, as seen from the first-base line picnic area. The park is relatively empty because it’s raining.

The view from behind the plate as the first pitch is being thrown.

Chronological Tour: Stop 345

• Location: Ewing and Brackenridge streets, Fort Wayne, Ind. (map it using Google Maps)
• Opened: 2009
• Home team: Fort Wayne TinCaps, Midwest League (2009-present)
• Capacity: 6,800 (approx.)

Rating: 5 baseballs

The trouble was that Fort Wayne Memorial Stadium wasn’t that old. It was still in pretty good shape, although it didn’t have all the amenities that a modern ballpark has, like updated luxury boxes.

The webmaster, at his 1000th professional game.

That said, this is a huge improvement over the old park. The newly rechristened TinCaps (the name comes from John Chapman, aka Johnny Appleseed, and his tenure in Fort Wayne in the first half of the 19th century) have built a stadium about which I had to nitpick in order to find something wrong. My biggest complaint is that the speaker towers in right field obscure parts of the scoreboard. There was also no lineup board, but the owners have decided on a marquee-style model that should be in place for 2010.

Other than that, there is practically nothing wrong with this park, which offers an abundance of seating and entertainment options, from two berm seating areas to club seating behind the plate to, yes, those upper-deck suites. And don’t forget the Treetops Seating off the parking garage in right field.

By happenstance, I saw my 1000th professional game at Parkview Field, and I couldn’t think of too many better places for that event to occur.