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Created by:
Jeff LeCrone
| Dunn
Tire Park Buffalo, NY
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| If
AAA baseball is the closest a player can get before making it to the
majors, then Dunn Tire Park is the closest a minor league fan can get to a
major league experience. This place is huge. It has one of the
largest capacities in the minors. At just over 21,000 seats, the
place is twice as big as most other AAA parks. In fact, when the
place was first built in the late 1980's, the city of Buffalo was hoping
to land a National League expansion team. Thus, the place is built
so that an extra deck of around 20,000 seats could be added to the top of
it. Of course, they never needed that deck, because all four
expansions since then have gone to other places.
Still, the place makes for an impressive ballpark. The vast majority of the seats sit on the lower deck, surrounding the infield and going the whole way down both foul lines. A small upper deck houses luxury boxes and club seats. The red seats make for a change from the traditional green seen in so many parks, even if it is a bit garish. To be fair, though, attendance is usually much higher than it was for the day game I attended, which I presume makes the red much less noticeable. While not exactly an old park, Dunn Tire no longer feels like a new one, either. I'm sure it was downright sparkling in 1988, but it is beginning to show signs of age, especially in design, as it no longer resembles other new parks that are coming out recently. The park is located on the edge of downtown Buffalo, adjacent to the interstate. Unfortunately, the park faces away from the skyline, but the resulting view, while unspectacular, is not entirely uninteresting. This ballpark has suffered from a corporation-inspired identity crisis, taking on three different names over the years. It's initial name was Pilot Field, after Pilot Air Freight. It then became North Americare Park, after a local HMO. Finally, it settled on it's current moniker, Dunn Tire Park. The bottom line: Dunn Tire Park is an above average ballpark that comes the closest of any park I've been to in creating a major league atmosphere.
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