Meet the ballpark chasers, an ambitious group of travelers who dedicate their summers—and often their lives—to seeking serenity in the grandstands.
The crack of the bat . The roaring of the crowd . The scent ofwarm hot dogsand pour forth beer . The pure elation of jump from your ass , mitt screen your eyes from the Sunday as you find out a fly ball empty the outfield bulwark . For the country ’s 171.1 million Major League Baseball fan , those sounds , smells , and raft come together each twelvemonth to form their summertime asylum : the almighty ballpark .
As with most religions , the consuming legal age of casual following are content to worship at the altar of rest home political campaign and shutouts just once or twice a class , file into the pews on crucial holidays or exceptional social function when fellow Congregationalist derive to townsfolk . But for a prime group of in particular devout fans , the ultimate show of devotion is making a pilgrimage—30 of them , to be exact . These are the ballpark chasers , starry - eyed travelers on a pursuit to honour America ’s pastime by visitingevery alive MLB stadiumon the map .
It ’s a residential district Craig B. Landgren have sex well . He ’s the chairman and founder ofBallpark Chasers , a social - networking website he started more than 15 yr ago . A platform for all things baseball game touristry , the site serves as a imagination for aspiring chasers , connect them with fellow pilgrims via blog , substance boards , travel guides , and more . Between its onsite exploiter andvery popular private Facebook mathematical group , the residential district has roll up more than 90,000 members to date .
A road trip to all 30 MLB stadiums is guaranteed to scratch any baseball fan’s nostalgic itch—especially if it includes Chicago’s legendary Wrigley Field.|Art by Caitlyn Grabenstein for Thrillist
“ I grew up in Colorado , so while I did n’t have baseball game for most of my childhood , I ’ve always been a real openhanded fan , ” says Landgren . “ My first Major League approximate range was Kauffman Stadium [ inKansas City ] , and as a youngster , seeing the big fountains in the outfield , I got the itch to desire to see them all . With baseball , every approximate range is so unparalleled . ”
If you conceive sitting through a minimum of 30 baseball games spread across 15 US country and Canada sounds like a slog , you would n’t be wrong . Baseballis notoriously slow — it ’s a athletics where player spend half their prison term put up around chewing on helianthus seminal fluid and where each of the regular time of year ’s 162 lucifer can easily extend past the three - minute mark . But for the pious , that almost meditative tempo is part of what piss baseball — and the act of ballpark chasing — so special .
baseball game is a pot of things to a bunch of hoi polloi . It ’s a secret plan of statistics , percentage , and personalities as well as the subject of countlessfilms , book , plays , and articles . It ’s romantic , uplifting , and often heartbreaking . And for the indoctrinated , it ’s universally interlace with chronicle , both on a interior and personal floor .
Citi Field in Queens is just the second stadium to host the New York Mets, a team with a long-struggling record but a die-hard fan base.|Mary DeCicco/MLB/Getty Images
“ My mom is a vast baseball game fan and so is her female parent , so it was passed down through my maternal side , ” says Asonta Benetti , an Arizona - based freelance author who , along with her pardner , has been ballpark chasing since 2021 . “ Who does n’t want to spend a drowsily tender Sunday afternoonwatching a plot ? What smells better than the pasture and dirt of Opening Day ? ”
When Benetti met her cooperator , a shared love of baseball brought them together . Today , that same love actuate their travels . “ My better half and I are both huge baseball rooter ; baseball plug in us when we first started go steady because we both were so passionate about the sport , ” she says . “ During 2020 , while thinking of all the things we could n’t do , he brought up the idea to bulge score all 30 parks . ”
The couple has been to seven stadiums so far , kick back thing off with a 10 - dayroad tripcarefully plan to pink off five different park in one go . “ That was a fun misstep to design — we had to download all the schedules and do some body of work in Excel to hit all five sports stadium with enough meter to beat back between each , ” she recalls . Since then , however , they ’ve scaled back a turn , adopting a quality - over - amount ethos that allows them to really bask the biz while also hold open an heart out for “ opportunities to tweet in parks during other trips . ”
Rebuilt in 2006 atop a part of the previous stadium’s footprint, the latest version of Busch Stadium in St. Louis is the third iteration of the Cardinal’s iconic home field.|Photo courtesy of Asonta Benetti
Landgren , who has 17 ballparks under his belt , mirror Benetti ’s philosophy , relishing the pleasance of attending a game or else of buying into a mad dash to catch ’em all . “ I meet a guy that did them all in 23 days — he set the world record , ” he says . “ Some people are so obsessed . For me , anytime I move , I really like to see the urban center and do the tourist poppycock . I ’ll see a couple secret plan but take in the vision , too . ”
To make thing even sweeter , Landgren visited five of his 17 common attach to by members of the on-line community of interests he base . “ I arrest a lot of feedback that people wanted to play up when they locomote , ” he say . “ So every summertime for five year , we met at a unlike ballpark around the country . ”
Landgren ’s fellow chasers share his holistic approach . “ We would do some kind of tourer natural action within that urban center , ” he continue . “ For instance , that first year inDenver , we went to theNational Ballpark Museumand did a private tour , then to a eatery to have lunch , and then took in the plot that eventide . ”
Ballpark chaser Asonta Benetti, who captured this shot of Houston’s Minute Maid Park, always sits in the same section so she can fairly compare stadium views.|Photo courtesy Asonta Benetti
Just as there are dissimilar approaches to organise a ballpark chase , there are dissent opinions about what exactly qualify as a sojourn . When Reddit userraymalaspinaasked others on the radius / mlb Subreddit about their “ ‘ rules ’ when furrow all 30 stadium , ” he was met with an onslaught of answer , run from food and imbibe must ( “ bring forth ta get a hot andiron ” ) to required souvenir purchase like mini squash racquet , egg capital , fridge attracter , and squad baseballs .
Even Major League Baseball itself has gotten in on the action mechanism . In 2010 , ballpark chaser Tim Parks found himself on a dual mission to visit all 50 states and 30 MLB stadiums . Unsatisfied with his hodge - podge collection of ballpark memorabilia—“There was never one specific thing that I purchased , just something that proved I was there , which to be honest , I could have bought on the cyberspace , ” hewrites — Parks bone up the idea for an MLB - specific booklet that could be stamped like a passport inside each stadium . Major League Baseball concord to license their name for the undertaking and stock the stamps , and thus the officialMLB BallPark Pass - Portwas born .
Not every chaser adheres to such a straightforward playbook . In fact , a core aspect of this particular pursuit is that everyone ’s approach is unlike . “ Our motto is ‘ Your following , your rules , ’ ” say Landgren , whose personal must is “ always amaze a good local beer and one of the favoriteballpark foods . ” Benetti also incorporates a boozing into her routine , but it ’s really all about the seats . “ We corrupt lower - level seats out in the right field each prison term so we can compare the view from each parking lot as fairly as potential , ” she says .
The one thing most chaser can agree on is that you must witness some existent gameplay . “ I have to take in a steady - season game , ” says Landgren . “ If it gets rain out or whatnot , as long as I get to see some baseball game play within that park , that ’s near for me . ”
In other discussion , the biz is what matters . And just about any game will do . One cardinal element that fix ballpark pursuer aside is their loyalty not to a specific team but to baseball game itself — a foreign conception when it comes to other sports . conceive of a die - hardNew York Giantssupporter not only voluntarily attending a Philadelphia Eagles household secret plan but jazz every bit of it . This scenario plays out in baseball stadium all over the area .
“ I had season tickets for theDiamondbacksfor long time , and it ’s a nice stadium but in all likelihood not my favourite , ” says Benetti of her favorite squad ’s digs . “ I have to admit thatWrigley Fieldmanaged to tunnel into my heart . The energy in the bleachers is really unbelievable — if you have sex baseball , you have to appreciate that bowl . ”
Landgren , aCincinnatiReds fan through and through , agrees . “ Wrigley andFenwayhave always been my favorites , ” he says . “ Even though they ’re not the new fancy parks with all the thrill , being within those ballparks and just take in all the history really struck me . ”
Despite its 150 - yr - one-time root , Major League Baseball is n’t immune to change . In summation to recent controversial moves like constitute full bases , pitching timers , and other tweak in an endeavour to make the game more exciting , stadiums themselves are perpetually coming and going . It can be tough for ballpark chasers to vie with , specially when study whether to restrict themselves to alive park or numerate a beloved retired bowl toward their wondrous sum .
“ Some people do a total count , some the great unwashed never go over 30 , ” say Landgren . “ I wo n’t go over 30 , so my count is 17 . But in another class or two , it ’ll go down to 16when the A ’s mislay their ballpark and move . ”
get to get down over whenever a team break ground on a Modern home field might fathom like a setback , but if you ’re passionate about such a deadening and unfluctuating game , extending your pilgrimage to include another bowl is just part of the play . “ In a complete world where money ’s no object , perhaps I could take an intact summertime off , get an RV , and go around the country with my family view all 30 parks , ” Landgren muses . “ But that ’s not my affair . I ’m fine taking my sentence . ”
