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ALL STAR GAME: 1985
NCAA basketball Final Four: 1992, 2001, 2006
BEEN THERE: I saw the Metrodome briefly while touring downtown Minneapolis in 1987.
Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time... The Twins foolishly let themselves be persuaded by the Minnesota Vikings to go along with a "modern" replacement all-weather stadium and moved into this soulless structure in 1982. This was the first major league baseball stadium to feature an air-supported roof, an economical innovation that several universities in northern states had pioneered in the 1970s. Heavy snow caused the roof to collapse in the fall of 1982.) The apex of the roof at the Metrodome was only 186 feet high (only Olympic Stadium had a lower roof), and batted balls actually struck it a few times. One time Dave Kingman hit a ball right through a hole in the roof, but only got credit for a ground rule double.
Of all the "hybrid" dual-use stadiums that were built during that era, the Metrodome was probably the least well suited for baseball. From the players' point of view, the original "Sport Turf" surface was absurdly hard, resulting in huge bounces and several knee injuries. It was replaced by slightly better Astroturf in 1987. Also, it was hard to see fly balls against the backdrop of the fabric roof. The confined closed arena created loud echoes, which became a famous (and controversial) home-field advantage: Crowd noise!!! Because the stadium's design was primarily geared to football spectators, the curvature of the stadiums' "corners" was tapered, that is, not a circular arc. Consequently, the backstop was not perpendicular to the line from the pitcher's mound to home plate, so wild pitches tended to bounce toward the right side dugout. From the spectators' point of view, a large proportion of the seats were pointed away from the diamond, were too far from the diamond, or (in the upper deck) lacked any view of right field, where the retractable lower deck used for football games was located. For some reason, there was hardly any "overhang" between the upper and lower decks. The one design "concession" to baseball was the recessed perimeter in the corner of the stadium where the diamond was. This made it possible to have reasonable outfield dimensions in a modest-sized football stadium, and it brought the field closer to the seats along the foul lines. There was a big downside, however: The seats in back of home plate were more than 15 feet above the ground, which detracted severely from the baseball experience. When you're watching a game on TV and the center-field camera is on, you don't see fans but rather a strange dark wall with two huge grated ducts through which air is pumped in to keep the roof up. (Some say those air currents give a boost to fly balls, which is why this place became known as the "Homerdome.")
There is one highly positive aspect of the Metrodome: its location in beautiful downtown Minneapolis, just a few blocks from the banks of the Mississippi River.
The layout of the Metrodome was quite similar to the Kingdome, though not with such short field dimensions. To cut back on all the home runs on the right field side, in 1983 they installed a plexiglass shield on top of the left field fence, which probably seemed normal to most fans in Minnesota, where hockey is the biggest winter sport. The plexiglass was removed after the 1993 season. In 1985 they put up a 23-foot high canvas "wall" in right field which became known as the "hefty bag." The center field fence is just canvas, and outfielders chasing fly balls can bend it a couple feet or so.
Amidst tumultuous indoor-amplified cheers, the Twins won their first-ever World Series in 1987, beating their rivals from downstream the Mississippi River. (This was mere months after my first-ever visit to Minneapolis; coincidence?) In terms of franchise history, it was the first world championship since the Washington Senators won in 1924. This seemed to validate the indoor baseball concept, and that conclusion was seemingly reinforced by their second world championship (beating the Braves) in 1991. The big hero both times was slugger and daredevil outfielder Kirby Puckett, whose stocky frame seemed quite out of place on a ball field. Glaucoma ended his career prematurely in 1996, but his stupendous efforts won a permanent place in Minnesotans' hearts, plus a trip to Cooperstown. His death in March 2006 came as a sad shock to Twins fans.
After 1991, however, the Twins' fortunes began to decline, and many people began to notice how unpleasant it was to see a baseball game being played inside on days when attendance was low. In 1994 the dugouts were moved forward, creating space for three more rows of box seats. In 1996 the Twins followed the example of other teams by closing off a large portion of the upper deck (those seats on the right field side were lousy for baseball anyway), hanging a big curtain with huge images of great Twins players from years past. This reduced the baseball capacity to less than 49,000. The Twins were becoming desperate to get state funding for a new baseball stadium, but in 1998 Jesse "The Body" Ventura, that populist crusader for clean, efficient, scam-free government, was elected governor. "Stadium socialism" was not his cup of tea, and the Twins' owner Carl Pohlad became so despondent that he actually volunteered to sell out his franchise as part of Bud Selig's contraction proposal in late 2001. A state court injunction kept the Twins alive for the 2002 season, but the Twins still might have been contracted out of existence after that season, had it not been for their miraculous performance that almost got them into the World Series. Talk about inspiration! In April 2005 a tentative agreement on public funding for a new stadium was reached after the Twins offered to put up $125 million of their own money, but that agreement later collapsed. After a series of hair-raising ultimatums and rejections, the Minnesota legislature finally passed the necessary funding measure in May 2006. The Twins plan to move into their new home in 2010. It has not been decided yet whether the new stadium will have a retractable roof.
The Minnesota Vikings, who made history during the 1970s by becoming the first NFL team to lose the Super Bowl four times, have not fared as well since they moved into the Metrodome. One of the goal lines coincides exactly with the right side foul line, from which (given the 343-foot distance to the left field corner) we may deduce that the distance from the back sides of the end zones to the stands is exactly 13 feet! Seating capacity for football games is 64,000. In addition, the Minnesota Timberwolves played in the Metrodome during their inaugural season (1989-1990), one of only three NBA teams ever to share a home field with a major league baseball team. Also, the Final Four games of the NCAA basketball tournament were played here in 1992 and 2001.
SUPER BOWLS: 1992
SOURCES: Lowry (1992), Gershman (1993), USA Today / Fodor's (1996), ESPN 1999 Sports Almanac, Rosen (2001)
