All about Stadium Names

This week the Cleveland Indians removed the letters that spelled "Jacobs Field" from the Stadium. The new name is Progressive field named after the insurance company that is located in Mayfield Ohio, a suburb east of the city. The original name was named after the Jacobs brothers, who owned the team when the stadium was built in 1994. The trend of naming rights to stadiums caught on long ago, but I started wondering just how many teams have a regular name like Yankee Stadium, or the former Jays stadium Sky Dome. What happened to great names like that?

It looks as though the days of what I call "cool creative names" are long gone. Jacobs field may have not been that creative, but it sounds better than Progressive field!

Sky Dome was one of those creative names. Sky Dome was completed in 1989 and was the first retractable dome stadium. The stadium was open on sunny days and closed for rainy days making Sky Dome a cool name. The stadium is now called Rogers Centre after the Canadian cable company. Rogers just doesn't have that cool name not just because it is a corporate name but Sky Dome fits the old feeling of the mechanical function of a retractable dome. It's not just a dome but an open stadium too.

There are more examples such as the old home of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Three Rivers Stadium. Simple, but sweet and much better than PNC ballpark! The name fit since there are three rivers that start in the heart of Pittsburgh; the Ohio, Monongahela and Allegheny. How about the Astrodome in Houston? The stadium was named after NASA, which is a big part of Houston, the new stadium is Minuet Maid park. How about old Mile High Stadium home of the Rockies, before they moved to Coors field? The stadium is in the Rocky Mountains and a mile high. Perfect name right?

Three stadiums are still named after it's owner; Turner field in Atlanta, Kauffman stadium in Kansas City and Wrigley Field in Chicago. Comisky park in Chicago now named US Cellular field was named after it's owner like Jacobs Field was.

What's wrong with naming the Stadium after the team that plays in it? Tigers stadium in Detroit was the old stadium, the new stadium is Comerica Park. I personally like naming the stadium after a team better than a bank! The famous Yankees Stadium won't change when the new Yankees stadium opens in 2009. The Yankees ownership seems to be smart enough to keep the tradition in place! Another AL East team that has named the stadium after the team is Baltimore; Orioles park at Camden Yards. There's also Dodger Stadium, Angels stadium of Anaheim, Rangers Ballpark in Arlington and Nationals Park. Nationals Park opens it's inaugural season this year in 2008.

The new Twins Ballpark is under construction and Rays Ballpark is under proposal. Not everybody is following Minnesota, Washington and New York Yankee's lead however, The New York Mets, whose stadium will also open in the 2009 season will be named Citi Field after Citi Bank. The proposed new field for the Oakland A's is Cisco field replacing McAfee Coliseum. Neither one has a good ring to it like the old Candlestick Park across the bay in San Francisco. The new stadium is AT&T Park.

It's debatable when the first commercial name started, since Wrigley field in Chicago was named after the gum giant William Wrigley, though it could be argued it was just named after his name. One thing is certain is that for the most part naming rights started back in the 90s and have become common among all major sports arena throughout North America.

I may be old fashioned and some of the companies that paid for the naming rights will disagree with me, but give me the old creative names back any day! I'm sure Rogers Centre is great advertisement but I like Skydome much better!

Coming soon to The Blue Jays Beat

It's been a busy offseason after all. The Jays signed free agent David Eckstein, traded Troy Glaus for Scott Rolen and signed all restricted free agents except for Alex Rios. Rios is negotiating terms at the moment. The six other players include: Scott Downs (P), Marco Scutaro (infielder) , Jason Frasor (P), Gustavo Chacin (P) Reed Johnson (LF) and Brian Tallet (P). I will take a look at how each one of these players are key to the Blue Jays success in 2008.