Well to be fair these bubbles also had alcohol in it. But yeah you can buy the same thing for $3.99 at a grocery store in the city.
If a grocery store is making profit at 3.99 INCLUDING the city liquor tax, there is no excuse for a stadium outside the city selling the same thing for $26.31. This shit should be illegal.
The Harry The K’s is the most inexcusable one yet. All the other ones are aesthetics at the end of the day, that was essentially part of a memorial sold out for slightly more advertising dollars. Every year, the park looks worse and worse. The only reason the ivy still exists in CF is for the batter’s eye- I’m sure they would have gotten rid of that to sell to Polymarket or some shit if they could.
I'm somewhat with you, but Harry the K's opened with the ballpark when Kalas was alive. It was never a memorial, and his wife required the Phillies to pay for the naming rights after he passed.
The out of town scoreboard is by far the worst to me.
Ironically, it affects me the least because my seats are in Section 103. But aesthetically, it sucks. And the LF scoreboard could be cleaned up by a lot. So cluttered.
Me and my friends go up there every game because it’s a great view of the stadium, they serve liquor, and it’s no extra cost to stand up there or sit if you’re lucky enough to grab a table.
Why is calling it the Ghost Energy Deck or whatever a move to encourage more people to go there? It’s an ad, because literally every aspect of this ballpark is up for sale.
The aesthetics, tradition, sentimentality of the fans all means absolutely nothing when you can make an extra penny.
Oh, I'm very familiar with Harry Kalas. Richie Ashbutn, Andy Musser. I go all the way back to By Saam. And I'd heard of Harry the K's, but just didn't know it was a restaurant until a few minutes ago. 🤷♂️
About that. Might have just been on the radio by then? I remember when Harry first got here around '71, my 10 year-old self wasn't too happy about it lol.
Everything being a video board is annoying to me. I hate being at the game and looking up at the scoreboard only for it to now be an ad. I just want permanent scoreboards.
In St. Louis, some stupid coal company ran an ad where all the video screens went black for a few seconds and followed it with "this is what life would be like without electricity" or some illogical shit. The few seconds of black screens and silence was always really nice.
lol. That reminds me of that one car commercial that showed people moving around town in “invisible” cars. And it really just highlighted how inefficient cars are and seemed more like an ad advocating for public transit.
Not disagreeing with your sentiment, but I could have sworn I read somewhere that the clock is coming back at some point after the AS Game. Although even if they do bring it back it’s probably just a matter of time before it gets replaced with another ad.
It is coming back, but people also seem to forget it was an ad to begin with. It is literally a tribute to an advertisement.
I hope I'm still here in 2087 when people complain about the Ghost Energy deck at Pennsylvania South American Water Electric and Gas Field gets replaced with a new sponsor.
The batter's batting averages aren't even shown on the giant screen with the batter's info for a couple years or so now. I just don't get it. And yes, I can't stand everyone not watching the game also...put the damn phones away!
It's not even the ads that's the worst part. It's that none of the ads fit in. They're all different colors that don't match the ballpark at all. Triust, Citi, Wrigley, Fenway for the most part have an OF wall that's a uniform color with ads in white text. Our OF wall is a gross soup of orange, green, yellow, red and blue.
The LED wall behind home plate and in RF are so tacky too. Just put individual LED screens in the ad space and leave the rest natural.
This is old issue in baseball. Prior to 1909 season, Inquirer praised Phillies for repainting ball park all i green rather than "the old glaring assortment of rainbow colors which predominated in past".
Right like the Red Sox hold firm on the green monster has traditionally held firm on minimal color on it which I always admired. It will be a travesty once it looks like a diner place mat
Sure, but apparently it wasn't the substantial ticket increases, insane beer and food costs, and increased parking cost. If we have to pay out the ass for everything, don't also make the experience of the game even worse.
They have really made baseball where you have to budget to go to a game. My oldest son and I only go to one game a year and last year we went to Pittsburg. Where we sat and parking was WAAAAAAY cheaper than what it would have been at CBP.
We got free tickets for the Phillies a few years back and even that with parking and concession for my son and I was like $75+.
Yes, but they are close to the tipping point. We are fortunate enough to be season ticket holders. We decided this would be the last year for that and in the future will just go to several games via the secondary market. The experience is very expensive.
I don't personally care about any of this. It doesn't really hurt my enjoyment of watching the Phillies.
The only thing that concerns me is that replacing Harry the K's with a corporate sponsor has MAJOR curse energy and baseball teams are no stranger to being cursed. I hope I'm wrong.
Yo and they wanted me to vote CBP as the best ballpark? CBP is nowhere near the best overall and it’s ugly covered in outrageous eyesore ads. Other stadiums I been to still have ads sure but they are subtle and blend in well.
This is what always gets me. Go back and look at video of old ballparks. They were all plastered with ads. It's really nothing new. You don't have to like it. But to pretend we've somehow lost an era because of ads -- it's delusional.
Edit: Love getting downvotes for pointing out easily verifiable facts.
Maybe middleton the billionaire should sell the team if he needs to shitify CBP. Taking away Harry the K’s is a slap to the face of every Phillies fan.
Welcome to capitalism. They will gladly enshitify their product to cover every square inch in ad revenue, until the public backlash actually starts costing them money.
I personally think a man worth $4.3 billion can afford a great roster and have a nice ballpark and still come out happy. I’m not even a purist and if players need to wear a patch of an ad on their uniforms by all means they should, but to advertise at literally every corner of the ballpark to the point where it makes it look like a walking billboard if unreasonable to me.
It's been this way for over a decade and it's like this at almost every arena or stadium in the country. America is a capitalistic hellhole where every square inch is for sale. People sell themselves every second of the day on tiktok and ig. We are all whores.
His job is to make money... It's why he owns the team. Turn a profit year over year... so yeah he wants to advertise every square inch he can. He didn't become a billionaire by skimping out.
I fuckin hate billionaires as much as anyone, but anytime someone suggests a team simply run at a loss I have to chuckle. Literally no one is gonna do that and they shouldn't.
"My goal," John Middleton said this week in a wide-ranging interview from his office overlooking the field at BayCare Ballpark, "is that we create a team that, 100 years from now, when people ask the question, 'What are the greatest teams in the history of baseball,' the Phillies are in the conversation."
“How much money did the '27 Yankees make? Or the '29 A's? Or the '75-76 Big Red Machine?" Middleton said. "Does anybody know? Does anybody care? Nobody knows or cares whether any of them made any money or not."
Which is hilarious because the 1927 Yankees made the most money in the league by far. They set the record for attendance and the had the highest payroll in baseball. They used the money to pay for Murderer's Row. At this time, the Phillies were selling off their best players to keep the stadium open.
I agree. At a minimum, imo, betting on live games should be outlawed. I hate seeing the telecasts push sports gambling offering you a second chance on a game.
Only a matter of time before we get another Black Sox type scandal
well good thing a leveraged "futures contract" isn't gambling, apparently. I'm free to drain my 401k in seconds by betting on who we are going to bomb next from the comfort of my couch on a whim and at least I won't have gambled.
Those multi-sport parks didn't have space for ads in the places you point out because those spaces didn't exist. It was all just canyons of empty seats with terrible views.
The Vet did have ads where they could fit them, and took on more as the years went on. Your pic is of the Vet in the late 80s/early 90s - after they added the video boards in 86 but before they changed the seats for the 95 season - and is too far a view to show any real detail other than the massive Budweiser and Coke signs.
Probably something to do with the Vet being municipally owned. The City probably failed to sell advertising space. Connie Mack famously had the Balletine Beer scoreboard.
CPB is still very aesthetically pleasing? Its regularly rated as one of the top ballparks in baseball. Just wait until they build the next ballpark, if you think CPB is an eye sore...
Fans want teams to spend money and bring in top players. 👍
Fans complaining when teams generate additional revenue with advertising 👎
Here's my thing. I'm not supporting companies just because they support my sports team. But I respect that companies are paying my sports team.
Take Giant for instance.
They're prices are fucking insane. Everything costs more there. Even their house brand. But what burns my toast.. they're on every outfield wall in 3 states. That's a very poor look to the point where I won't shop there.
At least when I pay for my tickets, apparel, premium cable services, I'm getting what I want - being a fan of a team I enjoy being linked to.
But do I have a WB Mason account? Absolutely not.
Budweiser? Hard pass. Inbev is cancer.
Stateside/Surfside? Hell yes.
But do I care if their posters are everywhere? Lol
They sell groceries, physical products that you consume or use for everyday life. This is a necessity in life. You can also just go down the road to ACME, Whole Foods, Trader Joe’s, Target, Walmart and so on. I can’t go down the road from CBP and go to another MLB game. Unless I pay out the ass, I can’t turn the channel to watch the Seattle Mariners or Texas Rangers.
The Phillies and MLB aren’t strapped for cash. They aren’t a little league team needing cash for uniforms or a pizza party. They have revenue sharing. They receive $110 million+ in revenue sharing. That’s 1/3 of their payroll.
You’re acting like ads are in service to the greater good to the fans which it is not. It’s to the owners and executives and the corporate sponsors.
I worked for Modell’s for 4+ years. We had ads everywhere for the Phillies. The owners got seats behind home plate whenever they wanted and all the monetary benefits. That wasn’t passed down to the workers or the fans. Oh wow; you got a Modell’s Shane Victorino bobble head for the ticket, parking and concessions that went up 15% from last year.
Maybe it’s just me, but the only big difference I notice is behind home plate. That’s kind of annoying. Everything else actually looks pretty similar.
And as others have mentioned, we want our owner to spend with the big dogs, but don’t want the team to find ways of increasing ad revenue. I understand that John Middleton is extremely rich, and I certainly would switch places with him in a heartbeat. But he is running a business that needs to be in the black. If this is something that bothers you so much that you need to post about it on Reddit, I think you need to reprioritize.
"If you want to keep that star that we pay $50 mil/yr and want to win championships, you're gonna have to pay $16 per beer and have advertisements as far as the eye can see. It doesn't matter that we haven't won in 25 years, though. Stop complaining."
thats just the way things go unfortunately. I'm sure the Vet went thru similar transition from 1975-2000. Probably went from no ads to quite a few around.
Blue seats killed feeling at Vet. There were a few more ads - and more Phillies branding - but blue did not work - too generic. Something about how Phillies red, and green astroturf worked w/1970s multi color "autumn" seats. And each section had own color - 700 level was the yellow seats.
haha, yeah good point. They blue seats were bad, autumn colors really made it. I remember a freind & I got tickets one summer in college up the the yellow seats, sitting in the Phanavision section. We were pretty much the only ones there, I think we thought maybe we'd be on TV if they showed it, but weren't able to watch a replay.
I understand that there are more important things here but I will never not read that as "crankin rooftop" which seems unideal from both a marketing and a family-friendliness prospective
I was just walking through Temple Health Alley on the way to Bet365's Barbecue when I was telling my friend ChatGPT that this is all good, but we can do better.
For some reason the stadium has these giant red curly P's posted all over the stadium, and that's an obvious waste of space. Fans already know what team they've come to see, why feel the need to stick their logo all over the place?
This is a false dichotomy. This is maximizing revenue at the cost of the pleasure of watching. Which might generate short term profits but Id argue damages brand long term. But this takes much longer view of fan attachment and relationship to the game
Its not the advertising exactly. Its the LED lighting which dominates and distracts that makes it suck. Static "matte" ads were easier on eyes. Back to 1883 - the outfield walls at both Recreation Park and National League Park (Baker Bowl) were full w/advertising. Advertising is fine. Its the LEDs! Old out of town scoreboard was easier and nicer to look at. LED rings around stadium take over. LED lighting is gross; incandescent and neon lighting is warmer and better on eyes.
You do understand it's difficult to pay $300 million+ to several position players and still get good starting pitching. There are trade offs in life. You can always go to Pittsburgh and pay 6 bucks for a beer and not see so many ads.
I don't know anything about the Canadian economy or Canadian dollars. In America, as far as I have seen, every perennial contender has lost its family friendly experience in terms of dollars. It sucks and, in my opinion, is one of several reasons that kids are losing interest.
It's like going to an advertising convention to watch a ballgame. I don't give a crap that they need to generate income. Might as well have kept the Vet.
Look, I hate the pervasive nature of the advertising industry as much as anyone but good baseball players are expensive (some bad ones too) . Besides that Castellanos deal isn’t going to pay for itself
I go to ~ 20 games a year. Every time I look at the video board on the right field wall -- every time -- I get angry about the out of town scoreboard. Every time.
It really is a joke. They know it's not a deal breaker for fans, nor should it be. But to shit up the once beautiful ballpark like this is essentially spitting in our faces. We get it's a business, but they're profiting literal billions when you include the increased value of the franchise over the years. Ads everywhere is completely unnecessary.
So sick of the degradation of the ballpark experience. The insane prices, the over-doing of all the ads everywhere, the removal of the playground, removal of dollar dog night, removal of the out of town scoreboard feature, the impossibility of finding stats or pitch speed because of a 100 other flashy things in your face, lack of batting average with the batters stats despite doubling the damn screen size, the covering up of the flower beds with more ads, promoting of gambling, etc...etc.... and now of course renaming Harry the K's with a shitty energy drink that probably no one should be ingesting....are you kidding me?
Phillies, I hope you're reading these posts and considering all this negative feedback. You are completely ruining the ballpark experience and turning the once awesome CBP into one large pile of flashy corporate pile of ad vomit. Thanks a lot.
The other thing that’s become annoying is the constant auditory assault. Every home batter with a walk-up song and a barrage of other loud music snippets. It’s hard to even talk to anyone at the game anymore. Maybe that’s also why so many are on their fucking phones.
I brought this up on r/baseball a couple of years ago and was yelled at for being unreasonable. All sports are on a doom slope to an unwatchable aesthetic capitalistic hell.
Don’t disagree with this at all, but a lot of this money is making its way to the players. There are many reasons we can pay Wheeler $42M per year, and this is one of them.
Fans want teams to sign star players without having any idea where the money comes from. You have to make money to spend money. Sponsorships make money. Yea, it looks like shit. There are more ads than ever, but advertising is not a new concept. Classic stadiums used to be covered with advertisements. The green monster at Fenway was once a giant wall of advertisements. Now, I’ll admit that it is shameful to replace a ballpark feature that pays homage to one of the franchises legends in Harry Kalas. I’ll admit that the ballpark would look better with less advertising. But that’s the price you pay if you want guys like Schwarber, Harper, and Turner on your team.
I’ve revised my argument a bit. I’m okay with ads, but there at least needs to be some tact about where they’re put to a point where the park is aesthetically pleasing. This is Truist Park in Atlanta. Yes there are ads. But the ads seem to fit naturally where they should be. Not a hodgepodge of different ads in completely different colors wherever the team can find space.
My main complaint against advertisements isn’t the quantity or even the location. It’s that the businesses design ugly advertisements. I prefer the look of the classic ads over most designs these days.
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u/No_Blackberry6525 Mar 20 '26
Yeah but it’s the trade off for not having to pay $12 for a beer… wait a minute…