September 24, 2022, Denver, CO - Denver loves baseball. Whether it is a winning or losing season, attendance is always high at Coors Field. Purple is the the color, and there was a sea of it for this Friday night game. The introduction of the Rockies players riffed on the visual style and music from "Yellowstone" which I thought was clever and appropriate.
We took a stadium tour the morning before the game which we really enjoyed. We got to walk onto the field but were cautioned not to touch the grass or fact the wrath of the groundskeepers. The tour guides were very enthusiastic. One of them pointed out that the umpire lounge door sign not only had the words "Umpire Lounge" on the sign but also had this translated in Braille. You get it.
It was cool, breezy night. The weather could not have been any better and even in the lower seats we were treated to a partial sunset behind the jumbotron in the shape of a mountain.
At the game we visited the higher section of the stadium "Roof Top" which offers spectacular views of the distant mountains. This section is a standing room only party area which any ticket holder can access. It puts you level with the row of purple seats which ring the stadium at 5280 feet above sea level. We are in the club now.
Coors Field offers cheap standing room only tickets, as well as a bleacher seat section between center and left field that can be purchased on the cheap. The accessibility of cheaper tickets is likely the key to their high attendance (duh!).
Other observations:
Coors field was built in the warehouse district and they retained part of a structure which was a brewery. This brewery structure remains part of the stadium. Blue Moon beer was invented there, but it was originally called the "belly slider". This brewery location in the stadium still calls it that. We grabbed one of those as we headed to the rooftop.
There was very little on field entertainment between innings. Most of it centered on trivia on the scoreboard.
No racers.
The closer - Jake Bird, intro music "Stranglehold" (Ted Nugent).
Fireworks were spectacular, but we had to wait about 30 minutes for the staff to lead several sections onto the field so they would not be hit by the debris. The people in these sections were on the outfield grass. Touching the grass. Touching the grass.
Stadium Ratings are exciting, good, meh, bad, disastrous.
Stadium - There are sparse lower level views but the sky that can be seen over the jumbotron still offered the spectacular western sunset. The Roof Top section is a nice touch and the views of the mountains are fantastic. The staff were all very friendly. I doubt there is a bad seat in the facility. Fireworks show over the mountain jumobtron was spectacular. Rating: Excellent
Food - We tried a Rockies Dog which was a foot long with grilled peppers. I can't recommend it. The fries that came with it were fine. It was hard to find any beer that was not a Coors product. This is a Coors shop so that is what you are going to drink. The stadium unique food item is rocky mountain oysters which did not seem to be available - not that I would have gotten them. Update: Our second night Christine enjoyed the baked potato that we found on the club level. This elevated our rating from bad to meh. Rating: Meh
Mascot - Dinger is a purple dinosaur. (Wait, that rings a bell! Maybe they are cousins.) There was some crowd interaction before the game, and some dugout cheering in the last innings, but not anything in-between. Rating: Meh