Everything about The Richmond County Bank Ballpark totally explained
The
Richmond County Bank Ballpark at St. George (RCB Ballpark) is a baseball stadium located on the north-eastern tip of Staten Island. The ballpark is the home of the
Staten Island Yankees, the
NY-Penn League affiliate of the
New York Yankees, and of
Wagner College Seahawks Baseball. The ballpark was also home of the city’s
Pro Cricket team the
New York Storm. In addition, local High Schools have the chance to play at least one game at the Richmond County Bank Ballpark.
RCB Ballpark opened in 2001 and was designed by
HOK Sport Venue Event. The design of the ballpark features sails at the entrances due to its location next to the world-famous
Staten Island Ferry. All major local buses and the
Staten Island Railway end at the
St. George Ferry Terminal, which is less then a five-minute walk from the ballpark. The Ballpark at St. George is more commonly referred to as Staten Island Yankees Stadium instead of its much longer name.
The site on which the ballpark was built was once the site of the
B&O Railroad rail yards for the City of New York, and the current stadium parking lot was the site of
Major League Baseball in the
1880s. The New York Metropolitians of the American Association played at the St. George Baseball Grounds in 1886-1887 and the New York Giants played there while awaiting the construction of the second Polo Grounds.
Richmond County Bank Ballpark was part of a deal with both the
Yankees and
New York Mets, brokered by then-Mayor
Rudy Giuliani. Due to Major League Baseball territory rules, the Yankees and Mets have veto power over each other (and any other Major League Baseball franchise), if they want to bring an affiliated minor-league team in to the
New York City metropolitan area. The Yankees and Mets had attempted to move minor-league teams to the area in the past, only to be turned down with their rival. With help (and public money) from the mayor, both teams agreed to allow each other to have a minor-league team in the city in return for new stadiums. The Mets moved a franchise to a new stadium, called
KeySpan Park, in the
Coney Island section of
Brooklyn.
In 2005,
RCB Ballpark hosted two of the four concerts of the
Across the Narrows Festival. The other two concerts took place simultaneously at KeySpan Park.
Design
The Richmond County Bank Ballpark was designed to take advantage of the stadium’s location overlooking
New York Harbor. The main entrance to the stadium is located on street level with the seating bowl and field built below street level. Sails at each entrance are a reference to boats which are always passing beyond the outfield wall. The batter’s eye in centerfield is able to retract so that spectators can view the skyline of New York City.
A replica of the
Verrazano-Narrows Bridge is located on top of the main scoreboard.
The outfield walls have changed several times over the course of the stadium’s history. Originally the stadium had four
LED video boards spaced out on the outfield wall that would display rotating advertisements throughout the game. After these boards malfunctioned the team replaced them with traditional signage along the wall. These signs were replaced with a new 200 foot long video board in right field in 2007. The new video board is one of the longest in the minors. Also in 2007 the Ballpark received a brand new
high-definition main video board on top of the scoreboard.
Miscellaneous
RCB Ballpark has 18 regular-sized
luxury suites along with a 60-person Skyline Suite with one of the best views of the harbor.
Currently
RCB Ballpark is home of the very first
Professional Baseball Scouts Wall of Fame along the right field concourse. Members of the Scout Wall of Fame include
Cesar Presbott,
John Hagemann,
Billy Blitzer,
Gil Bassetti,
Ralph Dilullo,
Roland Hemond, and
Herb Stein.
A small kids’ area is located down the left-field line with games.
Photo Gallery
Image:StadiumView.jpg|View over the outfield fence
Further Information
Get more info on 'Richmond County Bank Ballpark'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://richmond_county_bank_ballpark.totallyexplained.com">Richmond County Bank Ballpark Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |