Return to Fenway Park! April 2, 2021

First batter on Opening Day 2021

 

On April 2, 2021, fans returned to see a baseball game 551 days after the last time they could do that.  On September 29, 2019, 35,427 fans watched the Sox beat the Orioles 5 to 4.  On April 2, 2021, 4,452 fans watched the Orioles beat the Sox 3 to 0, in a disappointing start to the season.

The return to Fenway meant a lot more than watching a dreary game in chilly 37° conditions, at least for me.  I had gone through Fenway withdrawal during the shortened Covid season of 2020 with zero fans.  After the festivities of Winter Weekend in Springfield, Mass. in January of that year, and after the heartwarming delivery of 193 paper tickets in the Purist’s mailbox, the virus dashed our hopes of ever using those tickets and seeing those players we saw in Springfield.  We STHs — Season Ticket Holders — would be literally holding season tickets all year, unable to use them.  Maybe in fifty years they will be worth a lot on eBay as the last paper tickets sold by the Red Sox.

Returning to Fenway meant not just reentering our shrine to baseball, “America’s Most Beloved Ballpark”, but reconnecting with friends I’ve made over the years.  Before each game, I make the rounds through the park checking in with about a dozen employee friends.  Some of them I correspond with sporadically through text or email, but seeing them again in person helped bring back one aspect of normalcy.  And it was great to reconnect with a good baseball buddy as we shared seats in my socially distanced “pod” for two.  Our sharing of baseball philosophy, Fenway minutiae, and life experiences helped make up for the poor brand of baseball in front of us.

In making the rounds outside and inside the park, there were lots of changes noticed since 2019.  They include:

MGM Music Hall crowding the bleachers

 

— The MGM Music Hall Theatre is being built in the triangle of Lansdowne and Ipswich Streets, in the aftermath of destruction of much of the “Laundry Building” which occupied the section next to Fenway.  The destroyed portion was recently a parking garage; the remaining portion houses trash handling, Aramark’s employee and vendor operations, the Champions Club, the Royal Rooters Club, and the remote WEEI studio.  In plans of this project published two years ago, the theatre was shown as rising behind the bleachers with spaces designed to connect to the back of the bleachers, offering a new concession and gathering area.  Unfortunately this would necessitate the destruction of the original 1934 rear wall of the bleachers.  This non-reversible act would violate the integrity and sanctity of Fenway Park.

Hornitos Cantina in Section 5

 

— In the rear of Grandstand Section 5, the Tully Tavern whisky bar has been transformed into the Hornitos Cantina tequila bar.  Whereas the Tully Tavern seats were sold individually, the Hornitos Cantina is, at least through May, a group ticketing area sold as one private space for 12 or 24 guests on “socially distanced barstool seats”.  For Opening Day, $5400 bought seats and meals for 24 guests (including clam chowder, garden salad, chicken sandwich, Italian sausage, Fenway franks, cookies, brownies, soft drinks, beer, and wine).  For the Tampa Bay series, $3600 for 24, or $150 apiece.  That’s a lot of money for good food and seats in what many fans consider the worst grandstand section.

Paper towels are back!

 — A Purist prayer has been answered, thanks to Covid:  paper towel dispensers have been restored in all restrooms, and electric hand dryers have been deactivated.  Blowing bacteria or viruses around with those dryers is obviously a health hazard.  But beyond that, the fan experience at Fenway Park is inarguably improved by making paper towels available once again, as I wrote here in 2017:  “Why?  Because paper towels have many more uses at a ballpark than merely to dry hands.  They are much better for drying faces, and they are the only proper way to clean up children’s messy hands or faces, wipe sweat from the brow or neck on a hot day, or wipe moisture off a seat if it has rained (and an usher is unavailable).  In most cases napkins are a poor substitute in doing these tasks.  Napkins disintegrate when wiping off a wet seat, for example.”

New batting cages under RF grandstand

 

— Changes in the clubhouses involve spreading everyone out (each player gets three lockers, with plastic between players).  This caused spillover into the trainer’s room, and pushed the trainers into the media room.  More batting cage space was needed, and so batting cages were installed under the third base stands, screened off by fencing and opaque tarp material.

There are numerous new health safety protections and protocols everywhere, directed by signage and structures in many areas.  These include:

You can't be blocked by tall fans in front of you.

A lot of Monster seats are blocked off.

— The most basic change is limiting attendance to 4500 fans (12 percent).  Most seats have been tied in the raised position with zip ties.  Those seats that are still operable are in “pods” of two or four seats, with the pods scattered and widely spaced.  This limitation may be eased if state or local authorities permit it.  Pods are not laid out in badly obstructed spots or in the upper rows of the grandstands and bleachers.

— Signs urge fans to be socially distanced entering the park and in other congested places.

— A “no bag” policy to minimizes security employees’ contact with your belongings.  Actually there are some exceptions: diaper bags, medical equipment or supplies, and bags (basically purses) 9” x 5” or smaller.  I would guess that diaper bags unaccompanied by babies are not allowed.  Passing through the metal detectors is a little different.  There are no trays for phones and metal objects; you are told to hold your phone close to your chest and walk through.

— an all-electronic ticket policy means no more paper tickets.  Naturally, the Purist finds this most untraditional and inconvenient.  I have always chosen the paper ticket option (at the expense of some Red Sox Rewards points) for ease of handling tickets in certain situations.  For example, I donate some tickets to charities at dinners I attend (for example the annual Dinner in the Depot held by the Mass. Bay Railroad Enthusiasts).  I auction them off in person, and then hand the winner the tickets.  Or I send tickets to other charities by mail, or sell some to friends in person.  They like having the actual tickets to handle and keep as souvenirs.

The electronic tickets have new protection devices this year to prevent misuse and fraud.  Barcodes are not sent to ticket holders until 48 hours before game time.  When they do appear, they have moving images that make screenshots invalid, much like the digital tickets on the MBTA commuter rail.  One side effect of this is that scalpers will have a difficult time.  Tickets can be forwarded to friends via the Red Sox (or sent to StubHub to sell on the secondary market), but I’m not sure how sales on the street would be possible.

You must have a smartphone to enter the park, since the Ballpark App is the only way to display the barcodes.

— Only a few concession stands are open, because of the small capacity.  The open ones have plexiglass shields protecting employees.  (Similarly, plexiglass protects other employees anywhere they might be close to fans.)  And the concessions are trying to become “contactless”, encouraging RFID credit cards and discouraging cash.  Again, contact between employees and fans is being minimized any way possible.

Concessions items include several familiar offerings, but individual pre-packaged servings are more prevalent.  Don’t look for those condiment dispensers… they have been dispensed with!

— Masks must be worn at all times, unless you are actively eating or drinking IN YOUR OWN SEAT.  Or if you are younger than two years old.  Gaiters and bandanas are prohibited.

— Players and employees have been directed to refrain from throwing balls into the stands.  Players still do that anyway, but the ballboys do not.

— the security employee normally standing on the field down the third base line is no longer there… he’s just inside a gate sitting in a fan’s seat.  And the ballgirls down the foul lines are no longer on the field.

— Paper 2021 schedules are not handed out anywhere, though you can request them by mail.

— There are hand sanitizer dispensers throughout the park.

— Because of the small seating capacity, artificial background noise is piped into all the loudspeakers.  It is a very unpleasant, scratchy, abrasive noise, like the noise you get with a radio turned way up but not tuned to a station.  Even with 4500 fans, there is a fair amount of crowd noise when things are happening on the field, so the fake background isn't always necessary, but maybe the players like it that way.  Actually, the crowd noise reminded me of games in the mid-1960s when attendance was very low (attendance was only an average of 8052 in 1965).