Changing venues

[Songbird]

Inglewood

Born in Inglewood and have yet to thrive in all ensuing venues.

 

[Starman]

I'm just having a hard time believing that changing a venue has anything more than minimal affect for a baseball team.
Exception: Giants.

In baseball I think it certainly can have a significant impact, since park effects are quite clearly a factor in how teams are constructed or play.

But I think most baseball stadium moves are usually accompanied by new management regimes which often dramatically change franchises' operational philosophies: for example the Tigers moved from golden age bandbox Tiger Stadium to 21st Century retro replica Comerica Park, which at least initially had a National League-influenced interior design with yawning cavernous outfield dimensions.

At least in theory the Tigers operational brain trust at the time, NL born and bred John McHale and Randy Smith, wanted to remold the franchise as a pitching-and-defense slap-hitting low budget operation rather than have to bid big money for sluggers.

But of course they were also in the middle of a 20-year penny pinching payroll cutting enterprise, so they didn't have any talent to win whether they were in an old style power hitters paradise or a newly built Grand Canyon nirvana for pitchers.

 

[Octave]

The Tigers were once projected (2008, I think) to score 1,000 runs. That's a well-built team for that ballpark.

A lot of it is just coincidence. Part of a team being longtime bad was the ballpark to which it was married.

 

[ChrisLong]

I was probably wrong about this for baseball. I was thinking more of pitch-catch-hit-throw. Not attracting free agents. Bad on me.
As for the Rams, they could have had equal success in Anaheim as they had in St. Louis if they spent to promote the franchise and improve the team. But Georgia wanted her hoo-hoo licked by St. Louis and got paid for it. That simple.

 

[MTM]

The Padres went the other way, building a World Series team in 1998 to con taxpayers into voting for a new stadium then pretty much sucking every year they've been in Petco Park save two division series losses until last season.

Not that we're very good in the old stadium either.

 

[micropolitan guy]

Rams moved from Anaheim to St. Louis and won a Super Bowl and got to a second. Moved from St. Louis to Inglewood and got to a Super Bowl.

Didn't the Rams still play in the Coliseum the year they got to the Super Bowl?

 

[ChrisLong]

Yes, they lost to the Steelers in the '80 Super Bowl ('79 season). Moved to Anaheim for the '80 season.

 

[MTM]

Yes, they lost to the Steelers in the '80 Super Bowl ('79 season). Moved to Anaheim for the '80 season.

And they were back in the Coliseum when they lost in the Super Bowl in 2019

 

[Baron Scicluna]

And yet the Expos lost a lot of their charm leaving Parc Jerry for overpriced, underwhelming Stade Olympique. At the time, Jerry Park was the only MLB stadium where a long homer could land in a public pool.

That is a hoot!

 

[Octave]

The Texas Rangers won a division title in their third season in a former stadium. None in the prior two decades plus.

The Mariners had probably their most memorable season in a decrepit stadium a half decade before moving into a new one.

The park formerly known as Jacobs Field didn't house a bad team for a number of years.

 

[wicked]

Pittsburgh should be a great baseball town, but the franchise has taken a massive dump on the city for 30 years. Supposedly the newer ballpark would allow the Pirates to contend, but it's the same old stuff with the Nuttings. It's a shame.

 

[Smallpotatoes]

It took the Celtics and Bruins a while before they won it all in their new building and they've each only won one title title since it opened in 1995.