After a hearty breakfast accompanied by a fun talk about the Rockies, courtesy of the Denver Post “Batter’s Up” event, I took stock and vaguely mapped out my intentions for my own Colorado Rockies Opening Day experience. I hadn’t done much preplanning (or ticket buying) besides taking the day off work. So, my first trek away from the Wynkoop Brewing Company was to the Coors Field ticket window. Suspiciously, nary a scalper was in sight, even at 20th and Blake. Upon arriving at the ticket window, I was informed that the only single seats remaining were Club Level $175 seats. I was already, I believed, $50 in the hole for “special event parking” which, even though I budgeted accordingly, led to a little bit of sticker shock and a musing on how a young adult could afford to go to a game much less bring their family. Nonetheless, not being a particular fan of the club level and believing I had “work” i.e. Zingers blog research to do, I wanted to see if I could do better than $175 for a seat I probably wasn’t going to sit much in.

Of course, it wasn’t my first Opening Day, but my own circumstances, inclinations and responsibilities have changed over time. Ordinarily, I would head down to Writer’s Square, grab a hazelnut mocha, and read or write or code or play a game or whatever struck my mood. Instead, I headed down to Writer’s Square, grabbed a hazelnut mocha, and unusually focused, wrote up the summary of “Batter’s Up”.

Cops out in force vs scalpers at #rockies game. Parking $50!. Box office has $175 club tickets. — RockiesZingers (@RockiesZingers) April 4, 2014

Along the way, I managed to find a scalper which was particularly awkward since I normally don’t have to convince someone I am giving money to that I’m not a cop. He was actually from Chicago so perhaps telling him where I grew up (and telling him I’ll find someone else to give my money to) helped. I got a ticket for an outfield wheelchair accessible “seat” for $100 and put the matter out of mind.

Writer’s Square. Complicated by the fact that downtown wi-fi in a tech city like Denver can be pretty problematic, I had a laptop and enough smartmobilehotspot device-things to get the blog post done-ish with a little time to spare before first pitch. I’ve noticed that I run through battery power more when I turn on Twitter. Who knew, right? I proceeded back to Coors, waited in the mob outside the front gate, then got a funny look from the ticket taker wondering why I had so much junk in my backpack. “Nope, I took the day off work. Just need all this for writing.”

Upon entry, I glanced around a bit at the new looking concourse. Now, I used to look around the concourse all the time since, as a cigarette smoker, it was one of the things to do (besides, you know, smoke cigarettes and watch the game on a television and talk about baseball with other smokers). Of course, since smoking has been banished to the periphery of Coors Field, I no longer stand around looking at the concourse like I used to. The starting lineup thing looked neat, but most of the rest I couldn’t tell if it was new or just things that had always been there but I hadn’t seen before.

My first objective was the new rooftop deck but I got waylayed and took some pictures of the huge Opening Day American flag, dutifully cradled by members of our armed services out on the field. iPad armed, I sniped the below picture. Some day, I’ll do some research on what they do with a flag that huge the other 364 days of the year.

Up to the rooftop. Nope. Not there yet. Up again. Nope, still not there. After meandering around the 300 level towards the right field corner, and admittedly, not as familiar with that section of the ballpark since I (and apparently others) didn’t often sit in those seats, hence their removal, I get to the tavern area, adjacent to a pretty large area of tables with the VIP cabanas tucked behind it. Also found the staircase leading up to “The Rooftop” i.e. the area that faces the field. I could write a few thousand words about my experience up there and, in fact, I will tomorrow. But, not to completely tease you, it’s a wonderful place to hang out but might not be a great idea if you’re at Coors Field to, you know, watch the game. I wandered up there for about an inning, heard from the crowd roar that the Colorado Rockies scored but though I was only a row of people deep from seeing the field and scoreboard, I couldn’t wedge in to figure out what happened. I resolved not to stay up here too long.

Slogged back down to the second level which was a bit of a chore since I was hoping there was a more direct way to get to the Rockpile area. I swung by my “seat” in Section 206 and put my foot inside the yellow painted line on the concrete to mentally mark to myself that I did, in fact, use my seat. Then I went to grab some food from the Kiddie restaurant. I had to wade through a virtual sea of purple lingering in the left field pavilion but my effort was rewarded at the end with virtually no line at the restaurant. Two miniburgers and a cup of fries for $7.50, sold!

Found a table to sit at since, I didn’t have a seat (and there’s no seating in the smoking sections) and munched away while following up on Twitter conversations.

For the record, there are many reliably good people in baseball and its always a pleasure to talk with them. Food scarfed, I trashed and recycled as appropriate and went up to the Rockpile smoking section to watch the game.

For a smoker, that’s the best view of Coors Field since none of the smoking sections have televisions or speakers with the radio broadcast anymore. And that’s the last you’ll see in this post about smoking. Meanwhile, chatted with a few really drunk people. Avoided chatting with some other drunk people. Had a little conversation with a woman in the Navy who was one of the flagbearers who was having a grand old time but admitted to some nervousness while she and her cadre tried to fold that immense flag without letting any of it touch the ground. I was in the area from the 3rd to the 7th inning stretch then decided to head to the Dugout Store. I figured I would mark the new year with a new jersey.

Ah, the inevitable dilemma. I’ll admit that, at first, I was looking for a Charlie Culberson jersey. Nothing against Troy Tulowitzki or Carlos Gonzalez, but I wanted to be a little bit different. I weighed whether I should get a batting practice jersey or not since they were offering two free tickets to a future game. I leaned heavily towards Nolan Arenado at first since I couldn’t find a Culberson (or a Juan Nicasio) jersey. In the end, the custom jersey idea started to take more shape in my mind.

Vain? Self-promotional? A bit flaunting? Oh, perhaps. But, part of having an experience is making it your own, even if you pay the special event premium. Even better when the Rockies win!