King Sized Showdown

My preceptor (boss/grader for 5 weeks) was talking about how good the Mariners game was going to be Monday night when he got to work yesterday. He said that the best pitchers (Felix Hernandez and Yu Darvish) will be pitching for both teams, and convinced me to go to the game as there would not be a chance like this anytime soon. So I decided to leave my house around 5:30 and head to the stadium to find a ticket. I found out that every home game Felix Hernandez starts, there is a section dedicated to him, called King's Court (his nickname is King Felix. For $30 you get a ticket, a t-shirt, and a sign that has a "K" on it. Unfortunately it was sold out by the time I arrived at the stadium.

Felix's section. It filled in closer to game time.

I decided to get a ticket in the upper deck right by first base, which wasn't a bad seat. It was raining all day, so the roof was closed before the game. Right as the line-ups were being announced, they decided to open the roof. It was nice for the first half of the game, but it did get cold later in the night with the wind up top.

Roof closed.

Roof opened.

Since I was at a baseball game, I had to take in some good food. I heard that Safeco Field sold sushi (yes, sushi at a baseball game), so I had to at least try it. It was reasonably priced for stadium food standards, and quite good as well. One of the pharmacists I work with also said a fan favorite is the garlic fries. Almost every stand in the stadium sells these, it seemed to be like the nachos of the Northwest. They were also very good.

I got the "Ichiroll." Very clever naming.

Fans around me made comments on how Ichiro stood in the batter's box. He should be called out every time he is at the plate, as the only part of his foot that touches the box is his big toe. Very interesting to see from this angle.

Out of the box.

The King

Late in the game I decided to walk around and see the different viewing angles. The attendance was fairly low, slightly over 20,000 and the park holds 47,000, so there were plenty of open areas. I forgot to mention in the last post, but Safeco has the smallest netting behind home plate allowable by baseball. They do this in order for more fans to get foul balls and return to future games. There was one foul ball that reached the upper deck just down my row actually.

View from home plate

 Right field opening. The seats down the RF line angle quite a bit more than most stadiums from what it looked like.

Center field

Safeco is designed in a unique way in that the bullpens are right next to the concourse. There is literally 4 feet of separation between the pitcher warming up and the fans up against the railing. You can almost reach out and touch the players.

Since Texas was in town, I had to appease Dad and get a picture of Joe Nathan. The Rangers were losing, so he was not going to pitch tonight.

Fans were harassing him to come back to Minnesota during the time he was standing there.