Our Vision For The Mysterious Grandstand Party Deck

While most new stadiums undergo some cosmetic tweaks between their first and second seasons, there has been surprisingly little talk about potential improvements to the "new" Yankee Stadium.

Back in December, River Ave. Blues caught a minor note in a the Sports Business Journal about a Grandstand level "Party Deck," which garnered a bit of buzz, but there hasn't been any news since. This vague description of a party deck was especially appealing after experiencing Yankee Stadium in 2009.

We contacted multiple sources at Yankee Stadium, and they were unable to provide any additional information about the party deck. The only improvements we could get out of them was that they were "adjusting some of the handrails in the grandstand and some of the bars/mesh in the stair areas on the terrace level to cut down on obstructions." Even without any further information, we'll still speculate.

As we mentioned at various points during the season, the new venue is extremely conducive to milling around and catching the game from different vantage points, meeting people and having a good time. Unfortunately, the only area where fans can gather in large groups with easy access to food and drink along with a view of the field is the center field "bleacher cafe area." While this could have been a great feature of the new Yankee Stadium, it is usually frustrating. Many of the fans with obstructed view bleacher seats don't en

joy seeing half of the field, so the bleacher cafe area becomes packed with fans as soon as the stadium starts to fill up.

When we first heard about the Grandstand "party deck," w

e immediately thought of the upper deck wheelchair seating behind home plate (below section

420). Yankee Stadium is extremely handicapped accessible with wheelchair seats spread throughout the structure. Because of this, the "nosebleed" wheelchair seats are often empty. The vie

w from this wheelchair section is a great bird's eye view of the field, but there are better options on lower levels.

In addition to the great view, this area is very close to the currently exclusive "Jim Beam Suite Lounge." It's no secret that the Jim Beam Suites haven't been well-received by their owners. Most feel they aren't getting the promised value out of the $150 seats and that the "exclusive" dining suite is a glorified food court. Our proposal would be to

replace the brick oven pizza with some classic ballpark fare,

serve plenty of beer and open the former Jim Beam Suite Lounge to the public.

At the end of the day, our party deck idea probably won't pan out. Owners of Jim Beam seats are in the midst of multi-year plans and the Yankees aren't going to water down the product and give them an excuse to break their contracts. Further, the Yankees will probably want to sell standing room tickets for these "party deck" seats, so the general public will likely be shut out.

Does anyone out there have any crazy ideas for the grandstand party deck? Anyone have some insider information? Feel free to let us know in the comments, and we'll be sure to post an update if we hear more.

Read the full post, after the jump

The lost revelation from Lonn Trost: you get to pay more NOT to have a seat in the bleachers

Wait. What?

Lost amidst all of the other news about fans being too stupid to read the relocation documentation and price changes for obstructed few bleacher seats, came the revelation that standing room only (known in the biz as SRO) seats will be $20. Trost's entire interview can be downloaded from WFAN's website.

As Neil deMause points out over at Field Of Schemes, this is definitely a sign of things to come in regard to future bleacher prices. The Yankees were all about the PR move of keeping the bleacher seats at their 2008 prices, but when you are paying $8 more ($20) to stand in the same area as $12 seats, something has to give.

While some like Lisa over at Subway Squawkers are enraged by the SRO pricing, I'm not bothered by it. There are some people who like to go to baseball games and roam around to take in the sights and sounds. I mentioned this is previous posts, but I am one of those people. It is definitely nice to have good seats in the stadium, don't get me wrong. However, if you have the choice of sitting on uncomfortable bench seating in the bleachers, or standing up, eating food, drinking beers and meeting new people while enjoying a baseball game in a nearly 2 billion dollar state of the art facility, I'd go with the latter.

The skeptics will say that the Yankees only gave the bleacher creatures and the SROs access to the rest of the stadium to spend money at the gift shops and concessions. While that is probably true, it also serves the purpose of building up an atmosphere in and around the new stadium.

Yankee Stadium has always been a great place to see a baseball game because of the action on the field, but not because of the surrounding area or ballpark atmosphere. That is nothing to be embarrassed about, but in the greatest city in the world, there is no reason for there not to be great food, great surroundings and a fun culture within the entire facility.

I'm not sure of the ticketing strategy for the SRO seats, but I think it would be a benefit to the true fans if they only put them on sale the day of the game at the stadium. It would be nice to have the option of heading up to the stadium early on the day of a sold out game, knowing that the opportunity existed to snag some standing room seats that are exclusively sold on the day of the game. Not sure if this aspect of the SRO seats will come to fruition, but it sure would be nice.

Talk about it in the Stadium Insider Forums! Read the full post, after the jump