The Colorado Home Opener!

Although I didn't attend the game, I did take the light rail train down to Denver's Coors Field yesterday afternoon to walk around the Ballpark neighborhood and take a few photographs of the activities taking place leading up to the Colorado Rockies Home Opener. It was a sellout, as usual, despite the team's 1-6 start. And on a beautiful, warm, sunny afternoon, the Rockies did indeed come through, beating the Tampa Bay Rays 10-7 on a walk-off grand slam homer by Ryan McMahon. 

The fans and the local news broadcasters were ecstatic about the victory, believing that this was the start of a comeback season. My opinion is that the Rockies are still only 2 and 6, and time will tell just how good or bad they are. And by the way, my South Side heroes, the Chicago White Sox, lost to Kansas City once again, falling to 1 and 6 and losing their two best players to the injured list. Which is always bad, but for the White Sox, disastrous. As for their North Side rivals, the Chicago Cubs, to my surprise, they beat the LA Dodgers, arguably the best team in baseball, 9 to 7 and have a 5-2 record, only a half game out of first. Maybe they really will be a good team this year. But I digress. Today is all about my adopted hometown team, the Colorado Rockies, and yesterday it looked like all of Denver was down here celebrating.

In McGregor Square, which is right across the street from Coors Field and features a giant screen for fans to watch the game, it was so crowded that it was hard to move around. And needless to say, all the bars in McGregor Square, as well as the rest of the neighborhood, were packed, especially the rooftop bars. As I have mentioned before, I stopped attending Opening Day after 2017 due to the high cost of those tickets. And the next year, when I went up to one of those rooftop patios to take a few photos, I was shocked to find that when the game started, nobody left, or even went inside to watch the game. They weren't interested in baseball - they just wanted an excuse to take the day off and party, which they still do to this day.

All in all, it was a fun afternoon. Everyone was in a great mood, and virtually all the businesses in the Ballpark and LoDo neighborhoods were having some sort of special event going on. At Union Station, they hired two giants with baseball bats, one of whom can be seen in the photograph on the right, to entertain the fans. And after the game the lines to get into all those bars and restaurants and rooftop patios appeared to be blocks long. Of course, tomorrow it will be back to normal, and the season will grind on until the last Sunday in September. And the price of a seat in the upper deck behind home plate will return to earth. See you at the ballpark!