Visiting more MLB stadiums doesn’t have to be an all-in-one-year deal.
All baseball fans know there’s nothing like going to see their favorite team play in their home stadium with friends or family. There’s the excitement, the atmosphere, the food, and the game itself. Throw in souvenirs, pictures and social media posts, and you have a great time and perhaps a lifelong memory.
Baseball stadiums are like sports shrines and are a big part of the fan experience in Major League Baseball. As adults, we usually never forget how we felt the first time we saw a Major League Baseball diamond. It was and remains magical. When you walk into a ballpark for the first time, you can have that experience all over again.
So right now, do a count. Use your fingers and your toes to figure out how many big-league ballparks you’ve visited to see a game. Does the number surprise you or disappoint you? You can change that in 2025.
Maybe you have a friend or family member who always talks about traveling to different stadiums, or has said something like, “I’d love to visit all the ballparks one day.” You can help start them on that journey. There are 30 teams in MLB, which translates into 30 ballparks where you can catch a game between April and the end of September during the regular season, plus a few weeks more if you want to catch a playoff game in a city you’ve never been to.
IDEAS TO GET YOU STARTED
Buy a stadium scratch-off chart to track your past, present and future visits.
To put yourself or someone in the traveling mood, get a chart that shows all the baseball stadiums and lets you scratch off or fill in each stadium as you visit them, or that you’ve visited already. Go to Google or any search engine and look for “MLB Stadium Scratch-off Chart.” You’ll find a handful to choose from.
Pick up an MLB stadium passport and get it stamped.
Like a travel passport for going out of the country, you can get an official “Validation Pass-Port” from Major League Baseball. Every time you go to a game, you can get your passport stamped with the date at the stadium’s customer service stand or even a team store. If you go to a playoff game or All-Star Game, you’ll have a record of that. Not only can you record all visits, but it also helps you recall what games you attended and remember the highlights. See your options at mlbballparkpassport.com.
Use the Ballpark App and digitally track your attendance.
Do you use the Ballpark App to buy tickets? When you do, the stadium scans the digital ticket on your phone at the gate. Better yet, the app keeps a record of your visit, so if your memory fails you, the app can help. Check it out at MLB.com/apps/ballpark.
DON’T MAKE VISITING BALLPARKS MORE DIFFICULT THAN IT HAS TO BE
You don’t have to take on the “30 parks in a year” challenge.
Every year, there are adventurous fans who strive to visit all 30 ballparks in one season, in one ambitious endeavor. That’s impressive but not easy to do. There’s no reason to believe that’s the best or only way. Besides, it takes a combination of factors to make something like that happen. That was the case with two Philadelphia fans/cousins in 2022, who visited all 30 stadiums in 90 days. Here’s what they had going for them:
- One of them had just finished college and had newfound freedom
- Both were not employed then, so they had no job responsibilities
- They borrowed a relative’s van with a built-in bathroom and room to sleep in
- They traveled without wives or girlfriends, and baseball was their sole focus
THINK OUTSIDE THE (BATTER’S) BOX
Visit a ballpark while you’re on vacation.
Thousands of fans each year keep in mind the chance to visit a ballpark while on their annual vacation. You might be able to visit several ballparks if you’re in the right city. If you took a trip to the East Coast, you might be able to visit a handful of ballparks.
Take a baseball-themed vacation in a region of the country to visit multiple stadiums.
Maybe you can talk your family into a trip to the East Coast and catch several games during a few homestands. You could visit New York City and two stadiums (Yankee Stadium and Citi Field, home of the Mets); then perhaps Baltimore, Boston, Washington—you get the idea. If you visited Southern California, you could see the Padres in San Diego, then the Angels in Anaheim, and finally the Dodgers at world-famous Dodger Stadium in L.A. They’re all within a 125-mile stretch.
Make it happen through a packaged trip/tour to MLB games.
Did you know some companies will chart a trip for you and your family and make all the reservations and ticket purchases? Others have prescheduled package tours that offer several games and different stadiums in regions of the country. You could add a handful of games and new stadiums to your list with just a few clicks. To find some helpful resources, do an online search using the term “MLB travel packages.”
Squeeze in a game when traveling to a wedding or attending a conference.
Visiting a new stadium doesn’t have to be an intentional decision. In fact, the opportunity could pop up unexpectedly and fortuitously. Here’s what could happen:
- Someone’s getting married and it’s a destination wedding in a city with an MLB stadium you’ve yet to see
- You’re attending an industry conference with colleagues in a Major League city
- You have a business trip planned, and it’s got an MLB park you’ve yet to visit
- You have a music gig, and it happens to coincide with a team’s homestand
Get a difficult-to-reach stadium off your list this season.
Think about visiting Seattle or Miami. Why those cities? They are two of the more difficult cities to reach, on opposite sides of the map. No other MLB park is close to the Seattle Mariners’ ballpark, Safeco Field. On the flip side of the country, if you traveled to loanDepot Park in Miami, home of the National League Marlins, you’re less than three hundred miles away from Tampa Bay, where you can see the Rays. This season, they’re at George M. Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, their temporary stadium while Tropicana Field gets repaired from last year’s hurricane.
You can put an asterisk next to a stadium you visited…or not.*
Maybe you took a tour of a stadium on a vacation but didn’t get to see the team play because the team was out of town, it was their day off or it was during the offseason. Go ahead and count it if you want.
*Who has to know you didn’t get to see any action? (If pressed, tell people it was a rainout.)
Count stadiums you’ve been to that are no longer where a team plays.
If you’re of a certain age or have been a fan for a few years, you can count those stadiums you’ve been to that are no longer used by the team. Most MLB teams have acquired a new stadium in the past 25 years, so you can add to your total if you’ve visited the old stadiums. Senior citizens might be able to count stadiums that are long gone.
Relax! It’s early in the long baseball season and there are thousands of games left.
If you look at going to more stadiums this season as an adventure, even a privilege, you can put fun and excitement into the planning without stress or worry.
Resources: Touring stadiums notes; dreambaseballtours.com; axios.com/justin-hemminger-mlb-ballpark-tour-baseball; audacy.com/94wip/philadelphia-ballpark-tour-trip; beyondthebell.mlblogs.com/30-ballparks-in-90-days; wanderu.com/the-ultimate-baseball-stadium-road-trip; YouTube-Giants-fan has-visited-all-ballparks; mlbballparkpassport.com; bookseats.com/mlb-travel-packages; jaybucklely.com
