Petco Park
San Diego Padres
Major League
TL;DR? Here’s the long-form piece in a nutshell:
Even considering the “landmark ballparks” in Chicago and Boston, Petco Park is comfortably my favorite MLB venue.
PNC in Pittsburgh and Oracle in San Francisco may get more attention by virtue of their postcard views, but San Diego’s pad has sufficiently beautiful outfield visuals, while being filled with superlatives in all other categories and mostly lacking major flaws.
Petco Park’s exterior architecture is truly outstanding. The adaptive reuse of the left field warehouse and innovative concourse design exposed to the sky are brilliant. Aggressive cantilevers push the upper levels closer to the action than just about any MLB park, and the seating geometry is perfect.
The bevy of fan-friendly amenities—think baseball’s #1 concession stand food and craft beer, the numerous destination eateries, bars, and social spaces throughout the concourses, the Padres Museum, the fun in The Park in the Park, etc.—are cumulatively tied for #1 in baseball.
Combine all of that with its location in perhaps baseball’s premier neighborhood, the Gaslamp Quarter, and Petco Park almost hits the trifecta of perfection: 1) best ballpark to watch the game (sightlines), 2) best ballpark to not watch the game (amenities), and 3) top-5 ballpark for aesthetics.
It all adds up to the finest fan experience in the Majors by a relatively significant margin in my book.
