FromThisSeat Blog

 

Welcome to the FromThisSeat Blog.

Here our editors will bring you plenty of news coverage on tickets, ballparks, stadiums and arenas as they pertain to the NFL, NHL, MLB and NBA.  If you have any questions or suggestions pertaining to the articles, feel free to 'Contact Us' via the navigation bar.

Photo of actor Jack Nicholson sitting courtside at the Staples Center during a Los Angeles Lakers game. 

Image Credit: Kathy - Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Jack Nicholson has been a Los Angeles Lakers season ticket holder since the 1970’s. The talented actor always sits courtside at the Staples Center and is one of the most recognizable celebrities at Lakers games in addition to David Beckham, James Goldstein and Rihanna. However, on Sunday night when the Lakers were hosting the Cleveland Cavaliers, Nicholson was asked to show his ticket to the courtside usher.

Photo of the outfield wall at Angel Stadium of Anaheim. Home of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

Image Credit: Ken Lund (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Angel Stadium of Anaheim is one of the oldest stadiums in Major League Baseball. However, age doesn’t make the venue immune to updates and changes. The Los Angeles Angels have announced that they will be lowering the height of the home run boundary in right field from 18 feet to 8 feet.

Photo of the outfield seating area at Oakland Coliseum. Home of the Oakland Athletics.

Image Credit: JonDoeForty1-Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The Oakland Athletics have been playing at Oakland Coliseum since 1968 and have spent the last several years lobbying for the construction of a new stadium. Out of left field (no pun intended), the team will be adding a 10,000 square foot party area where the left field bleachers used to be. The area will be called “The Treehouse” and will consist of an indoor bar, a bar and lounge on an outdoor terrace as well as a patio deck.

Photo of the Calgary, Alberta downtown skyline from Prince's Island. 

Image Credit: Abdallahh - Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

Talks between the Calgary Flames organization and the city of Calgary about the construction of a new arena in downtown Calgary have officially stalled. The talks have actually been stalled for several months now, at least according to NHL commissioner Gary Bettman. The proposed arena would be built in the Victoria Park section of downtown Calgary which sits just north of the Scotiabank Saddledome. Neither the team nor the city was able to agree on how the project would be funded which is common for most new stadium talks. Over the last two years, many cities across North America have begun to put up resistance when sports teams ask for public dollars to build new stadiums.

Photo of the Seattle, Washington skyline.

Image Credit: Angela N (CC BY 2.0)

The Oak View Group, the investment group desperately trying to secure an NHL franchise for the city of Seattle, received an enormous response for their season ticket drive earlier this week. Seattle area residents were asked to put down a $500 or $1000 deposit for season tickets to gauge the city’s interest in an NHL expansion team. Not only did the Oak View Group secure more than 25,000 season ticket deposits in an hour, the deposit drive also caused Ticketmaster’s computer systems to crash.

Photo of the large tiger statues outside of Comerica Park. Home of the Detroit Tigers. 

Image Credit: Grangernite - Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

The Detroit Tigers and Comerica Bank have agreed to extend the current naming rights agreement for Comerica Park for another five years. The original naming rights agreement was signed in 1998 while Comerica Park was being constructed and the Tigers were still playing their home games at Tiger Stadium.

Photo of the ice at Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum. Home of the New York Islanders.

Image Credit: Doug Kerr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The New York Islanders will begin playing their home games at a brand-new arena in Belmont Park, New York beginning in 2021. Until then, the team will split their regular season home games between the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, the team’s current home, and the old Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, New York. Nassau Coliseum recently completed a major renovation and reopened in 2017. The move marks the first time in NHL history that a team has split it’s home games between two arenas over multiple seasons.

Photo of a New York Jets game taken from the upper level of Metlife Stadium.

Image Credit: Phil Dolby (CC BY 2.0)

The New York Jets have announced that they will be freezing all ticket prices for the 2018 and 2019 NFL seasons for fans enrolled in the 10 and 12-month installment plans. Following the franchise’s second straight 5-11 season and seven-year playoff drought, season ticket prices will decline by an average of 11% next season. The 11% decrease in season ticket prices is the largest drop since the Jets first moved into Metlife Stadium nearly 10 years ago.

Photo of a Pittsburgh Steelers fan waving a yellow terrible towel at Heinz Field.

Image Credit: Daveynin (CC BY 2.0)

The Terrible Towel is a rally towel and an iconic piece of NFL and Pittsburgh Steelers history. The idea of the Terrible Towel was dreamed up by Myron Cope who served as the voice of the Pittsburgh Steelers for more than 30 years. The Terrible Towel made it’s debut on December 27, 1975 when the Steelers hosted the Baltimore Colts during the 1975 NFL Playoffs.

Photo of a Chicago Bulls home game taken from the upper level of the United Center. 

Image Credit: Mack Male (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The Chicago Bulls will host their third NBA All-Star Game when they host the event on February 16th, 2020 at the United Center. The game will be the 69th NBA All-Star Game and will be the first held at the United Center which originally opened in 1994. The Bulls haven’t hosted an NBA All-Star Game since 1988 and before that, 1973.

Photo of a poorly attended Baltimore Ravens game at M&T Bank Stadium.

Image Credit: TruffShuff - Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The Baltimore Ravens have sold out every home game at M&T Bank Stadium since the team relocated from Cleveland in 1996. However, in light of the ongoing national anthem protests and declining attendance league-wide, the Ravens were forced to advertise tickets for Sunday’s matchup vs. the Detroit Lions. To say the Baltimore Ravens organization and the rest of the league are panicking about the decline in television ratings and game attendance would be an understatement.

Photo of the Pontiac Silverdome. Former home of the Detroit Lions.

Image Credit: Ken Lund (CC BY_SA 2.0)

The Pontiac Silverdome, located in Pontiac, Michigan, was home to the Detroit Lions from 1975 until 2001. Since 2001, the Pontiac Silverdome has been sitting idly and decaying. There are have been several efforts to revive the venue, however, nothing meaningful has ever come to fruition. Various events were held at the Silverdome as late as 2013. Triple Investment Group of Toronto, Ontario purchased the Pontiac Silverdome in 2009 for $583,000 at a public auction. After a snowstorm destroyed the stadium’s roof in 2013, the Silverdome began to decay at an even quicker pace.

Photo of Laney College in California.

Image Credit: George Kelly (CC BY 2.0)

One look at the exterior of Oakland Coliseum, home of the Oakland Athletics, and it becomes blatantly obvious that the team needs an upgrade in it's home stadium. Well friends, that day seems to be drawing near. The Oakland Athletics have chosen the future site of their new stadium and it sits near Laney College. The plot of land the team is interested in sits between Lake Merritt and I-880. Currently, there are warehouses, parking lots and offices that belong to the Peralta Community College District occupying the area. The Athletics organization will need to purchase and raze the entire area before construction can begin. The ballpark is not expected to be constructed for several more years.

Photo of shade being cast on Levi's Stadium. Home of the San Francisco 49ers.

Image Credit: Chris Martin (CC BY 2.0)

In case you haven’t noticed, Levi’s Stadium, home of the San Francisco 49ers, has been virtually empty on more than one occasion this season. One of those reasons appears to be because the east side of the stadium offers virtually no shade for fans on hot and sunny game days. This was especially the case for the first home game of the season when the team hosted the Carolina Panthers. As a result, the San Francisco 49ers organization have hired Populous, an architectural firm in Kansas City, to see if awnings can be added to Levi’s Stadium.

 Photo of downtown Kansas City, Missouri.

Image Credit: Dean Hochman (CC BY 2.0)

For many years, Kansas City sports fans have expressed disgust in the fact that their two sports stadiums at the Truman Sports Complex (Kauffman Stadium and Arrowhead Stadium) sit several miles from downtown. Not only that, but there are virtually no bars, restaurants or hotels within the immediate vicinity of the two stadiums. The Kansas City Royals are currently funding a study that would explore possible locales for a new baseball stadium in downtown Kansas City, Missouri. A little over a decade ago, the Royals explored building a downtown stadium but that was before Kauffman Stadium was renovated.

Photo of Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Home of the Los Angeles Rams.

Image Credit: Oscar Borboa - Facebook 

There were high expectations when the Los Angeles Rams returned to Los Angeles, California in 2016. Not since 1994 had the city of Los Angeles had a professional football team after the Rams originally fled for St. Louis and the Raiders fled for Oakland. Seven games into the 2017 NFL season and it’s beginning to look like the National Football League could flop in Los Angeles once again. The Los Angeles Rams are currently drawing 26,000 fewer fans to their home games than they did in 2016; the largest attendance decline in the NFL since 1993.

Exterior photo of AT&T Stadium. Home of the Dallas Cowboys.

Image Credit: Shawn Collins (CC BY 2.0)

The city of Arlington, Texas recently took the steps to refinance the debt owed toward AT&T Stadium, home of the Dallas Cowboys. The strategy will help pay for both AT&T Stadium and the construction of Globe Life Field, future home of the Texas Rangers. Arlington is expected to contribute $500 million towards the construction of Globe Life Field and still owes $171 million in principal and interest towards AT&T Stadium.

Aerial photo of Bell MTS Place in downtown Winnipeg, Manitoba. Home of the Winnipeg Jets.

Image Credit: Travel Manitoba (CC BY 2.0)

True North Sports and Entertainment recently completed a series of renovations to the concourses of the Bell MTS Place, home of the NHL’s Winnipeg Jets. Improvements were made to the flooring, lighting and signage of the arena. The Jets also added 150 new HD televisions, new drink rails and 40 new points of sale including new concessions and retail spaces. The new points of sale were built with the goal of limiting wait times at the concession stands throughout the lower and upper concourses.

Photo of field level seating at Fenway Park. Home of the Boston Red Sox.

Image Credit: ElCapitanBSC/Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The Boston Red Sox are considering adding a brand new row of 25 seats to the third baseline area of Fenway Park. The new row would put fans even closer to the action on the left field side. Down the first base side, the Red Sox are also considering adding a dugout suite below ground. This will require the team to move an entire row forward. 

Aerial photo of Rogers Place construction. Future home of the Edmonton Oilers.

Image Credit: Mack Male (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The recent national anthem protests in the National Football League have brought the topic of federal subsidies being used to fund the construction of NFL stadiums to the surface. Since 1997, the National Football League has received $6.7 billion in taxpayer dollars to build ten new stadiums and renovate three others. Those number will exceed $7 billion with the completion of the Oakland Raiders new stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada in 2020. The $750 million tax subsidy needed to build the new Raiders stadium will be the largest taxpayer contribution in NFL history.

Photo of Qualcomm Stadium, former home of the San Diego Chargers.

Image Credit: SD Dirk (CC BY 2.0)

Los Angeles, California lost both of it’s NFL teams back in 1994 when the Los Angeles Raiders relocated to Oakland, California and the Los Angeles Rams relocated to St. Louis, Missouri. Both organizations struggled with attendance while playing their home games in Los Angeles. And as it appears, things haven’t changed much in Los Angeles with the return of the Rams and the relocation of the San Diego Chargers.