On Sunday morning, we awoke to heavy rains in the Kansas City area and we were very concerned about the game being washed out. But fortunately, the skies cleared as we were heading into Kauffman Stadium. To be honest, I am not a big Kansas City Royals fan and I was not really excited about seeing this game. Especially after just having been to Busch Stadium, I didn't really expect this stop to be that impressive. I was wrong. Kauffman Stadium is amazing. It has one of the most beautiful backdrops behind the outfield wall that I have ever seen. The waterfalls and open-air views are very impressive.
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| The spectacular view from our seats |
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From down near the field. Fortunately, the rains held off.
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This game was a special event where they would commemorate the Negro Leagues that played back during the times of segregation. Both teams dressed in the uniforms of Negro League teams that were located close to their respective cities. The Royals wore the uniforms of the Kansas City Monarchs and the Twins wore the uniforms of the St. Paul Gophers. In fact, the promotional give away for this game was Kansas City Monarch hats to the first 10,000 fans.
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Tate, Tammy, and Trey sporting their KC Monarchs Throw Back Hats
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Kauffman Stadium has a lot for the fans to see and do. There is a great activity area behind the outfield where kids of all ages can participate in a variety of things like batting cages and clocking their pitches (which Tate said was broken because his speed was not accurate!).
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Human Statue Guy was pretty cool.
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While Tate did that, Trey was among the autograph seekers down by the Twins' dugout where he was able to get a few signatures (Jonathan Scoop, Jake Odorizzi, and Luis Arraez). There is a Kansas City Royals Hall of Fame which is quite impressive that fans can visit which does not require an extra charge. And of course, there is a wide variety of foods and beverages for the fans to enjoy. There was not a sell out crowd like the one we saw in St. Louis the day before, but the Kansas City Faithful that were there were very supportive of their Royals even though they are not having a very good season. The game turned out to be very enjoyable. The Royals must have been fired up in the Monarch uniforms as they were able to win the game to upset the first place twins by the score of 6-1. We saw two home runs hit - one by the Royals' Hunter Dozier and one by the Twins' Eddie Rosario. After the game, they let the kids run the bases so Trey and Tate took advantage of another opportunity to run on a Major League field.
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| Tate and Tammy in front of the iconic waterfall in right field. |
For me, Kauffman Stadium turned out to be very impressive. Maybe because I wasn't expecting a whole lot. But the Royals are just four years removed from winning the World Series and you can tell that the fan base is still pretty charged up. All in all, our time in Missouri turned out to be most impressive. I guess they really did "Show Me" that baseball is pretty special in both St. Louis and Kansas City (See what I did there? Missouri is the "Show Me State"). Another thing that was really nice is that Kansas City has a sports complex where both their Baseball and Football teams' venues are located right next to each other so they can share parking. And both are not in their downtown areas so the flow of traffic in and out is quite smooth.
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Kauffman Stadium to the right with Arrowhead Stadium, where the Chiefs play, to the left.
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After the game, we headed north to Iowa where we would stop for the night, but not before going through Kansas City into Kansas just to say that we had been to another state.
The next day we would head to Dyersville, Iowa to check out the Field of Dreams Movie Site.
