Best/Worst Stadiums you've visited (stories appreciated)

Personally, I like Turner Field in Atlanta. Michigan Stadium and seeing the Va.Tech vs Michigan Sugar Bowl in the dome was cool as well.

Worst so far: Vanderbilt Stadium is a bit of an embarrassment for a SEC stadium. Purdue isn't great either, but at least 25,000 Michigan fans make the trip.

I'm not going to give into my bias and say the Big House, even though I should. Outside of Michigan, best stadium experience is either been Wrigley or AT&T Park in San Fran (watching a game on the Bay is awesome). Both are just amazing ballparks. Only pro football stadiums I've been to are Raymond James (shitty acoustics and even shittier video boards) and MetLife (cool but nothing special to me). Busch Stadium in St. Louis is pretty great, too, with downtown and the Arch in the backdrop.

Worst experiences? As far as football goes, Ryan Field at Northwestern. Not that Northwestern fans are assholes, but its just a terrible place to watch a college football game. Its a glorified high school field at best, and I don't really feel like I'm getting the full college football experience. Basketball without question is Value City Arena (OSU). Sat in the student section this year during the Michigan game with all my gear on. I won't do that again. I think the only time I wasn't getting heckled was during the national anthem.

I went to see Dontrelle Willis pitch while I was stationed in Florida. He pitched 8 and 1/3 innings of shutout ball with an 8 run lead. Then the bullpen came in and lost the game 9 to 8. The venue sucked, it was empty, and the fans were terrible.

Baseball Best: AT&T Park is an awesome modern park. It also helped that Matt Cain threw a perfect no hitter last time I was there.

Baseball Worst: Metrodome, what were they thinking with right field. I was a teenager and could tell the place sucked.

 Yost for hockey.  and i hate to say it, but munn always had good ice too, even if the fans weren't very receptive to our team....

Second favorite hockey stadium to play or see a game: the olympia.    after that maybe NMU's berry events center.  we lived there when it was brand new and i loved playing on it and it was a very decent college arena for a school like NMU.   played at Lakeland up there too, in front of a sold out house.  dump of an arena but the atmosphere was excellent.

 

for football my favorite place to play was in san diego at 'the murph' (jack murphy stadium which turned into qualcomm).  nice facilities/locker rooms, field access, grass in decent to excellent shape when we played.   when we played  new york i hated giants stadium but i do have to say that they had the nicest piece of turf i ever played on - this predates the ground tire turf they use nowadays.  worst place to play is the LA coliseum.  the field is okay, but south central LA is a giant, dangerous, feces hole.   heavily armed we were, and with good reason.  

Best:

• PNC Park- the most ideal setting for a baseball game to be played,  gorgeous sightlines, beautiful backdrop of the Alleghaeny, plus it has Primanti Bros as a vendor.
   
• Kauffman Stadium- The renovation of Kauffman has done wonders for the park, I was there last year to watch the Tigers get swept all 3 games by the likes of Guthrie, Chen, and Mendoza, but it's certainly a great place to spend a few hours with friends. Who doesn't like fountains anyhow?
   
• Camden Yards- The first of the new breed of stadiums in baseball and it stands out (or stands in if you prefer launching pads.) The walk to the ballpark is certainly something to behold as it sits right next to the B&O Warehouse.
   

Worst: 

• Fenway Park- Now before people jump all over me on this I want to say this is more against the way the field is set up rather than the stadium and the location. I dislike the Green Monster and the Pesky Pole with a monumental passion. These dimensions scream more of a chapter in "Alice in Wonderland" rather than actual dimensions of a baseball stadium, seriously 302 down the right field line and then rounding out like a carousel as you get farther from the pole? And of course the monster turns doubles into singles and if you hit the scoreboard in one of the nooks and crannies you can even leg out a triple of off an easy fly ball in any other park. It's kitschy and stupid.
   
• Beaver Stadium - Happy Valley sucks, prepare to get verbally assaulted like you've never been before. 

 

 

 

at Illinois is the worst experience for me and their fans had much to do with it.  Just aweful fans, slack jawed, not very knowledgeable about football.

Pre-renovation but the whole trip sucked and I will probably never return to that place.

Wrigley is awesome for watching games, but the rest of it is a dump. My sister in law works for the cubbies so I got a private tour. The club house is small, the weight room is a joke, and the concourse is a disaster waiting to happen. Major renovations are needed.

Worst Experience ever ! Believe it or not the IU fans were bad, really bad. Old lady's cursing at me, old men talking all sorts of smack, it was like I was in the twilight zone. After we won the game in the final moments it was even worse, me and the group of 5 I was with were just walking back to our car minding our own, discussing how bad our defense was and a group of about 8 or so IU fans pretty much jumped us, spit in my buddy's wife's face and pretty much attacked her while cursing us!! Lets just say it ended ugly for them, but this is the last thing I would ever want at a game, I had never felt more disrespected and shocked at another teams fan-base , it was unreal ! I am the most non-violent dude you could meet and the last thing you want while at an opponents stadium is to be jumped. They got what was coming to them, that day changed my view on IU fans forever and I don't think it will ever change.

Spartan stadium was pretty turrible. People were threatening to kick my ass after the choke job/Brady Quinn show in 06 while walking out with recruits. Bunch of drunken morans. I regret getting a picture with Jason Richardson too.

Never had a bad seat.  I once sat two rows from the top for a '92 game against the Blue Jays and I could see everything without ever losing sight of the play.

Worst: Houston Astrodome.  Great for little leaguers to run around on the field and upstage the major leaguers.  Terrible for actually watching a game, unless you like the stale environment of baseball played inside a storage facility.

When I was living in NYC in 2007, I attended Army-Tulane at Michie Stadium in West Point.  It was a Michigan bye week, and having nothing better to do my buddy (Notre Dame Naval ROTC grad) and I wandered up the Hudson River for the game.

Visiting the USMA campus on gameday is one of the few times you can walk the campus unescorted, as long as you stay out of the posted off-limits areas. The "post" - don't call it a campus to a Cadet - is fantastically beautiful on an autumn afternoon:

We sadly missed the game day Cadet Review (hungover) , but apparently its fantastic: 

Great tailgating, we were invited to more tents than I can remember. Great people, nearly all USMA alumni, their families, and proud parents.  20 minutes before kickoff the Cadet Regiment marches on the field - 1000 Cadets, it takes more than 5 minutes. Then the Army Band play the National Anthem. Spine tingling. 

Michie Stadium itself is one of the most dramatic places to watch a game, especially during the autumn colors:

It's intimate and fun. The level of play is (obviously) lower than you find at Michgan Stadium, but the fact that every player on the field was (is) headed to war on graduation, and the passion that the Cadets had made it one of the greatest sporting events I have attended. Oh, and it was an amazing game - Army scored on a last second, deflected, desperation touchdown throw to tie the game then won on a field goal in OT.

Highly recommended, a close second game-day experience to Ann Arbor.

When I was 14 in 1994, my good friend Mark, who is a Buckeye fan from a Buckeye family, invited me to see the Buckeyes mutilate Houston.  My first trip to the Horseshoe.  I wore a white shirt and khakis.  Black socks and Michigan boxers.  My view was partially blocked by a pillar.  There were advertisements everywhere.  The people were rude and vulgar.  They were still taunting the Houston team during the 4th quarter, when the third string was in.  We had Donato's pizza for dinner after the game.  Not interested in going back to Columbus for a football game.  Would not take my wife and four kids.  Would even pick Camp Randall over the Horseshoe if forced.

...that I really dislike because I find them all to be interesting in some way or another.

As for favorites, yeah, the obvious ones like Tiger Stadium but I'll also add the Pontiac Silverdome as perhaps my favorite underrated stadium.  During the heyday of the Barry Sanders era, it was pretty fun and I've never heard any place louder than when that old dome was rocking.

I am just an overall fan of the stadium experience, but my favorites include:

1.  The Big House (No other stadium can just match up to the overall experience)

2.  Dean Smith Center (Easily one of the best arenas/domes in the nation)

3.  Great American Ballpark (Saw the Tigers play there last year, and the experience was phenomenal... Fans were very nice as well)

 

Best can range from the Big House and Comerica (obviously) and my alma mater (Falcon Stadium, AFA) but I really do love Wrigley for the history of it.  Even the old Tiger Stadium was classic in that respect.

Worst places all deal with the fans, such as Fenway, even though it's considered a classic.  But THE WORST was also in Boston...went to see UM play Boston College in the early 90s.  I had full beer cans thrown at me from behind in the stands.  Worst fans anywhere.  

Best: Michigan Stadium (let me count the ways). My homerism notwithstanding, seeing so many people in one place is a shock to the senses. I love the simplicity of the design.

Worst: Superdome. My only visit was the 2012 Sugar Bowl. While we all loved the outcome, I was not impressed with the venue. Many of the seats far from the field, poor lighting. Artificial atmosphere for college football.

The Best ... Obviously.

The Worst ... I have to go with Wrigley Field

/ducks

I think the game experience at Wrigley as well as the surrounding neighborhood are some of the best anywhere, but the physical building is pretty thread bare. Even Yankee Stadium, Camden Yards, Tiger Stadium and Comiskey Park were replaced. Time for a new ballpark. 

We road tripped to the game last year and I was the odd man out for our groups sweetheart ticket hook up. Having no fear I purchased a single endzone seat about 50 rows up and sat in a sea of red. But unlike our classless neighbors to the southeast, I was surrounded by enthusiastic, knowledgeable football junkies. It was a great experience where I must have shaken hands with 200 complete strangers. Even as the game got ugly post Denard, the Husker fans stayed classy and friendly. I think I got asked 25 times..."did you really drive this far to come to a football game?"

 

I would recommend the trip to all road warriors, extra caffiene drinks required for driving through Iowa...yawn. The Nebraska Masonic Grand Lodge is near the stadium as well for my fellow Mason Wolverines.

I think I am a bit against the grain, here.

First, I really like going to games at MSU.  Their stadium is just okay, and yes, their fans can be real jerks (in 1993, I went to see UM-MSU there and as we were leaving the student section at the end of the game several full-on punches were thrown at us, to which I was like, "dude, you won?  Why you mad?").  But most are okay, and overall I think they have the best tailgating scene of anwyere I've been.

Second, Northwestern is probably my favorite place to see Michigan play (not counting A2).  It's a virtual home game, you can take the El to-and-from, and after the game you can party in Chicago.  Yeah, the stadium is rinky-dink, but I don't mind that so long as I have a good view of the game--which I always have.

I also like Bloomington.  The last time I went to a game there, we paid $5 for tickets in the parking lot and wound up sitting basically around row 20 on the 35 yard-line.  And Bloomington is an attractive college town with lots of fun stuff to do.

...the old King Dome in Seattle. Saw the Mariners in front of several thousand or so. The place had a cement roof. As dreary as you can imagine. Like watching a game inside a crypt.

Best: Michigan Stadium, Cowboys Stadium Worst: Purdue, Lucas Oil Stadium( only because the one game I went to, with company tickets, was in nose bleeds and I watched the game on a TV)

Best: Nationals Park in DC is dynamite. Good sight lines and very well done.

Worst: Can't really say. I've never been to a truly awful venue, but I'm sure that will change when I finally make the trip to Columbus.

It was built for boxing, so no matter where you were you had a great view of mid court.  We were in a loge-type section with the deck above us hanging over so close that every shot at the other end of the arena disappeared from view.  To check out a score board you bend down below your knees to see, which made verything upside down.

I went to the 2011 game at msu. This is the year before they got new scoreboards, so they only had one actual replay screen which was ridiculously small. The outside of the stadium reminds you of a parking garage with all the concrete, and the visitor's side actually has a gas station attached to it. The inside is just generic. Everything is gray. The wall around the field, the rim around the top of the stadium, the seats, all gray. At least the new press box looks pretty good. 

I will admit it got pretty loud as it should for their biggest game of the year, but the atmosphere was like minor league baseball. They even had the which helmet is the ball under game on the scoreboard. Lame. 

Spartan stadium, whatever miami's stadium is called proplayer or land shark or whatever, the silverdome for a pistons game!, jou Louis from the outside

Best: not sure if best, but most unique was seeing the expos at estade olympique in like 2002 or something on Tim Raines night. Such a weird fun night in a wierd fun city. And I will admit that ND stadium delivered.