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Charlotte Knights AAA Ballpark in Third Ward


dubone

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Yeah, I sat in 122 on Sat night and I immediately noticed that.  We ended up walking around behind the foul pole and standing facing home plate.  It's a beautiful stadium, but there simply are not enough seats behind the bases.  With season ticket holders taking these seats, the rest of us are mostly left with deep foul line or outfield seats, 300+ feet away from the "action".  I do like how you can see the field from anywhere under the overhang and I like all the SRO areas, but they really lacked vision in making this only 10,000 seats (minimum AAA seating I think) with so few close to the action.  Where can they possibly add more seating?  

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I do think it feels a little small and although I didn't notice the seat angle thing (being around 3rd base in 118, and not as invested in the game as socializing), I think that if they had to make a decision between having more seats or uninterrupted sight lines around the entire perimeter, they made the right call.

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yea, the seating angle thing really isn't the end of the world. But, for me, I think it may make the difference between a blah night at the ballpark (no matter the quality of the game) and a great time (which I had sitting in the outfield in the HR section in rightfield). I am sure that the Knights will have more sustained success (and the city will get more benefit) if they can increase the number of people at games who enjoy themselves.

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Interesting about the seat angle, thanks for that info.  I hadn't realized that at the old park, the seats didn't extend much further down the lines than the infield.

 

I'm disappointed at the lack of $8 seats -- the price of progress, I guess -- it sure was nice to take a family of 4 to the old Ft Mill place and sit in the upper deck for $32 total.  The only $8 seats in the new place are in left-center, and they are not individual fold-down seats.  Instead, they are semi-uncomfortable plastic molded seats and backrests on metal benches.  I fear they may also look into the sun in the early evening, but I don't know for sure yet.  Standing for $10 on the Home Run Portch upstairs isn't an option with 2 kids.  Next cheapest jumps to $14 for the home run seats in right field, which at least has fold-down seats and not looking into the sun.  Oh well, pay twice as much and go to half as many games -- life goes on.

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The only $8 seats in the new place are in left-center.....  I fear they may also look into the sun in the early evening, but I don't know for sure yet. 

 

The do face the sun for 7:05 start games, but they look very pleasant after the sun sets (just my judgement from walking by them, have not sat there yet)

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Got this semi-interesting e-mail from the PTA at my girls' elementary school.  I don't know exactly what happened (I'm not active in PTA and didn't even know anything about the game night), but it sorta sounds like: Knights say go ahead and sell X tickets; PTA sells X tickets; Knights say oh wait we didn't mean X.  At least from the PTA's point of view (which could obviously be wrong), sounds like an "oops" for the Knights.

 

"

We regret to inform you that at this time we have had to make the decision to cancel our baseball night with the Charlotte Knights scheduled for Friday, June 6. Due to miscommunication by the Knights and the popularity of the new stadium, the Knights are no longer able to accommodate our ticket sales for the seating that we had requested.  We are extremely disappointed and have reviewed several options before having to make this decision.  It was not one that was taken lightly.  The PTA will be reviewing whether or not we want to work with the Knights in future years. We thank everyone who purchased tickets and for your continued support of the PTA.   Where possible, the original, voided checks submitted for tickets will be sent home with students. If that is not possible, a refund will be issued and sent home with students.

"

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Yeah, who knows.  It could be as simple as a single Knights employee took the call from the school, and said they would block out X number of seats, and then failed to do so.  I don't know.  (Not so much a promo maybe, more of a block of seats for a group sale. If there's a difference??)

 

But yeah, based on the initial sales/reaction, I wouldn't expect a vast number of seats to be available on a Fri night anyway.

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As of 1:54pm, there are exactly 3 seats available for tonight's Knights game.  Interestingly, those are in sections 119 and 121.  An hour ago, the only seats available were in 101 and HR1.  So obviously some come and go.  But the point is, it's essentially a sellout, on a random Tuesday night (with great weather).  Or is there something going on that I'm not aware of?  Hmmm, the race maybe?  I don't know.

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I haven't been to a game at the new stadium yet, but will soon enough, however from what I've seen I'm ok with them not putting a building (hotel?) behind it. Leave the grassy hill as is. Maybe leave it there if they want to tack on more seats or something (if that's doable). Plenty of other holes in uptown to be filled... though that seems to be gaining more steam lately. 

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I haven't been to a game at the new stadium yet, but will soon enough, however from what I've seen I'm ok with them not putting a building (hotel?) behind it. Leave the grassy hill as is. Maybe leave it there if they want to tack on more seats or something (if that's doable). Plenty of other holes in uptown to be filled... though that seems to be gaining more steam lately. 

Most of that grassy field isn't usable though for watching the game, as most of it is obstructed by the scoreboard or the barrier for the kid's play area. You'll see the people who hang out on the lawn tend to all end up in 2 fairly narrow areas where the views are. Personally I can't wait to see the lot developed as I think it will make for an even cooler denser feel to walking around the stadium, and its a perfect place for some interesting but smaller scale development whether its a hotel or not. 

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Most of that grassy field isn't usable though for watching the game, as most of it is obstructed by the scoreboard or the barrier for the kid's play area. You'll see the people who hang out on the lawn tend to all end up in 2 fairly narrow areas where the views are. Personally I can't wait to see the lot developed as I think it will make for an even cooler denser feel to walking around the stadium, and its a perfect place for some interesting but smaller scale development whether its a hotel or not. 

 

Ok, then if it's a mostly obstructed view I rescind my statement. Based on the webcam views it wasn't apparent...

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Random question: was there ever a reason given for why the building in LF was never built?

I was told that when the land deal was made for the stadium they didn't want to give away the land for the hotel until the Knight's Stadium could demonstrate that it was profitable after 1 year of use.

 

I'd say they've met that metric.

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  • 3 weeks later...

So I've been watching all the tweets that the Knights send out. It's early June and they have already surpassed their attendance from last year. Just had their 15th sellout of the year this evening. It probably took their Fort Mill location 5 Years to have that many sellouts. And probably needed 4th of July fireworks nights to make that happen. I realize the newness will wear off in a few years but my god you're blind if you don't see the positives in this move.

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While the newness may wear off, the size of the stadium will keep the number of sellouts high, I think.  With all of the events that they can combine with the community, work events, etc, they will remain very successful in this location. 

 

It is better to sell out a small stadium than have as many people in a large stadium wondering where everyone else is.

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