BallparkTour - Former ballparks of Detroit

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Comerica Park

• Former Detroit ballparks •

Tiger Stadium
Formerly, Navin Field and Briggs Stadium

Detroit, Michigan

Tenants: Detroit Tigers (AL 1912-1999); Detroit Lions (NFL 1937-1974)
Groundbreaking: 1911
First American League game: April 20, 1912
First night game: June 15,1948
Last American League game: September 27, 1999
Surface: Grass
Capacity: 23,000 (1912); 30,000; (1923); 53,000 (1937); 52,416 (final)

Architect: Osborn Engineering
Owner: Detroit Tigers (1912-1977); City of Detroit (1977-present)
Cost: $300,000 (1912)

Dimensions:
LF foul line: 345 (1921), 341 (1926), 339 (1930), 367 (1931), 339 (1934) 340 (1938), 342 (1939), 340 (1942)
Center field: 467 (1927), 455 (1930), 464 (1931), 459 (1936), 450 (1937), 440 (1938), 450 (1939), 420 (1942), 440 (1944)
RF foul line: 370 (1921), 371 (1926), 372 (1930), 367 (1931), 325 (1936), 315 (1939), 325 (1942), 302 (1954), 325 (1955)

Fences: All fences: 5 concrete topped by screen; left field 20 (1935), 30 (1937), 10 (1938), 12 (1940), 15 (1946), 12 (1953), 14 (1954), 12 (1955), 11 (1958), 9 (1962); center field: 9 (1940), 15 (1946), 11 (1950), 9 (1953), 14 (1954), 9 (1955); right of flag pole: 7 (1946); right field: 8 (1940), 30 (1944), 10 (1945), 20 (1950), 8 (1953), 9 (1958), 30 (1961), 9 (1962)
Flag pole: 125 ft high, in play (5 feet in front of fence in center field, just left of dead center).

Hosted World Series: 1907*, 1908*, 1909*, 1934, 1935, 1940, 1945, 1968, 1984
Hosted All-Star Game: 1941, 1951, 1971

*Played at original Michigan & Trumbull site, Bennett Park.

Tiger Stadium's final baseball dimensions (right). A look at the famous overhanging upper deck stands during Tiger Stadium's final season, 1999 (left). The right-field home run porch in Arlington was designed in homage to Detroit's right-field grandstand. Tiger Stadium as it appeared in the Tigers championship season of 1984 (below).

Baseball habits in Detroit had remained virtually unchanged for nearly a century. Whether they went by carriage, car or on foot, whether they went to Bennett Park, Navin Field, Briggs Stadium or Tiger Stadium, their destination was always the intersection of Michigan and Trumbull avenues.

Detroit's first pro team was a National League franchise in 1881. The "Detroits" played at Recreation Park, near what is now the intersection of Brady and Brush streets. Although the team won a pennant in 1887, dreary attendance contributed to the city losing the club after eight seasons. After a five year absence from organized ball, the city joined Ban Johnson's Western League in 1894 and began playing in a small park at Helen Avenue and Lafayette Boulevard in the eastern limits of the city. It was at this time that the team was first called Tigers. Manager Tweedy Stallings thought it would change the team's luck to have new uniforms which featured striped sox that inadvertantly looked like tiger stripes. Reporters noticed this and the new nickname stuck.

A new, more centrally located site was needed for the Tigers. Detroit Tiger owner Van der Beck spent $10,000 to convert an old hay market at Michigan and Trumbull into a baseball park. The hastily built park had seating for about 5,000 fans, and on opening day, April 28, 1896, it had a crowd of 8,000 spilling onto the sidelines of the soggy field.

The ceremonial first pitch that day was caught by Charlie Bennett, a star catcher for Detroit's old National League team who had lost his legs in a railroad accident. The new ballfield was named for him -- Bennett Park (below left). The Tigers won the game 17-2 after a fan wandered onto the field and collided with the center fielder for the visiting Columbus Senators. The fielder was knocked unconscious and retired from the game.
Since then, the park has been renamed and rebuilt several times over, and it has hosted the greatest players and some of the rowdiest fans in baseball. One of the "features" of Bennett Park were the "wildcat bleachers" built by homeowners living along the edges of the park (below right). These entrepreneurs built rickety wooden scaffolding that towered above the fences and seats in the park. They charged fans five to 50 cents each for the opportunity to climb up and see the game.

The occupants of theses cheap seats often spit tobacco juice on legitimate customers and hurled insults and vegetables at opposing players. Tigers management tried to wall off the rowdies by hanging strips of canvas in front of the wildcat seats. But it was a tight-fisted bookkeeper named Frank Navin who finally got rid of them. Navin, who joined the Tiger operation as a bookkeeper, took control of the ball club as a co-owner in 1903. Over the winter of 1911-12, he spent $300,000 to build a concrete and steel grandstand and expand the park. The expansion also demolished the homes of the wildcatters.

    Navin Field opened on April 20, 1912, with the legless Charlie Bennett catching the first pitch, a rite that continued until his death in 1927. The new field was rotated 90 degrees to the right and featured a single deck design down both lines and bleacher seats in right field - seating capacity was 23,000. The first game on April 20th saw George Mullin single in Donie Bush in the 11th for a 6-5 win over Cleveland. In the game, Ty Cobb and Sam Crawford pulled a pair of double-steals in the 1st inning, and Cobb later stole home.

In 1924, the stands between first and third base were double-decked with a new press box installed on the roof (below left). The next year, an elevator was installed to the press box - the first of its kind in the big leagues. After the Tigers had won two pennants and a World Series, they invested their money into park improvements in 1936. The right-field pavilion and center-field bleachers were double-decked which raised capacity to nearly 40,000. After the Tigers won the pennant in 1934, Navin built a 17,000-seat bleacher section along the left field wall just in time for the World Series. During one game in the series, which the Tigers lost, fans in the new bleachers pelted St. Louis Cardinal outfielder Joe "Ducky" Medwick with fruit, vegetables and even their shoes. Medwick was forced from the game for his own safety by commissioner Landis. Navin kept the bleachers, but the baseball commissioner ordered him to put up a screen between the fans and the field.

After the Tigers won the series the following year, Navin announced plans to expand the park. But he died in November and co-owner Walter O. Briggs bought Navin's shares to become sole owner of the team. Over the next few years, Briggs, the owner of an automotive supply company, spent more than $1 million to expand the stadium to a seating capacity of 53,000. The ballpark, now the third largest in the major leagues, was dedicated as Briggs Stadium on April 22, 1938.

      By 1948, the stadium was the only park in the American League without lighting for night games. Briggs was a traditionalist who thought baseball should be played during the day, but Detroit fans wanted to see night games. Briggs gave in and erected eight light towers with 1,458 light bulbs. The first night game was played June, 15, 1948, and night games soon became a hit. Briggs died in 1952, and after a series of court battles his heirs sold the club to a syndicate headed by broadcasting executive Frank Knorr. Broadcaster John E. Fetzer bought up shares in the club and became sole owner in 1961. He renamed the park Tiger Stadium.

      Proposals to replace the stadium first surfaced in the late 1940s. But the calls for a new stadium increased in the late 1960s. Most of the proposals called for public funding of a new stadium, following the trend in other cities. The Lions moved out of the stadium to the new publicly supported Pontiac Silverdome in 1975.

      In 1977, Fetzer sold Tiger Stadium to the city of Detroit for $1 and promised to lease it back for 30 years. In return, the city agreed to renovate the old park. Renovations included a new center-field scoreboard, a new blue paint scheme, which replaced the familiar green, and new blue and orange plastic seats, replacing the green wooden seats. The park was renovated, but the push for a new baseball stadium continued. On March 19, 1996, Detroit voters backed plans to build a new stadium in the city's downtown theater district.

In 1999, after years of bitter and passionate debate on whether to renovate the historic stadium or build a new one, the Tigers bade farewell to Tiger Stadium on September 27. The following season the club moved into the $300 million Comerica Park. Although Tiger Stadium remains standing, its future seems doomed to the wrecking-ball. There has been continous fierce and loyal fighting to preserve the ballpark, but throughout the years, the urban area has deteriorated economically, and many feel the park should be bulldozed in the hopes of redevelopment at a later date.

Navin Field's first major change included double-decking the grandstand in the infield in 1924 (above left). Eventually the Tigers would shorten the right-field line from 367' to 325' in order to squeeze a double-decked stand between Trumbull St. and the field. By the 1950's, the facility had been renamed Briggs Stadium and was also the home of the Detroit Lions since 1937 (above right). A view through the colums from the upper deck in 1992 (below).

Below are two photgraphs of the construction of the left and center-field grandstand and bleachers. This construction was completed in time for the 1938 baseball season and raised seating capacity to more than 53,000. A view of the site from Trumbull St. is seen on the left, while the photo on the right shows a view from the baseball press-box looking out toward the new center-field bleachers.

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Notes, Facts and Features

The 125-foot-high flagpole was in play in deep center, just to the left of the 440 mark - highest outfield obstacle ever in play in baseball history. The flagpole in play was common in years past, but rare in modern parks. Yankee Stadium's flagpole was in play (along side the monuments), but removed when the stadium was remodeled in 1975. Currently only Houston's Minute Maid Park features a flagpole in the field of play. Comerica Park's flagpole was in play from 2000-2002 (as a salute to Tiger Stadium), however when the left-field fence was moved in, the pole, which stayed in the same place, is now behind the fence.

Site of Reggie Jackson's titanic home run that hit the arc-light tower transformer on the right-field roof during the 1971 All-Star Game.

May 2, 1939. Lou Gehrig takes himself out of the Yankee lineup due to the effects of ALS, ending his record streak of 2130 consecutive games.

Ted Williams wins the 1941 All-Star Game with a 3-run ninth inning homer.

September 14, 1968. Denny McLain beats the Oakland A's to become the first 30 game winner since 1934.

The home field of 12-time batting champ Ty Cobb, who retired with a lifetime .367 avg. and 4191 hits.

In 1934 the Detroit Tigers were in the middle of an American League pennant race. More newsworthy than that, was their superstar Hank Greenberg's reluctance to play on Rosh Hashana. A rabbi was consulted and Greenberg decided to play first base (in Tiger Stadium) and he hit two solo home runs including the game winner. A few days later it was Yom Kippur and Greenberg chose not to play prompting poet Edgar Guest to write the following poem which appeared in the Detroit Free Press on September 13, 1934:

We shall miss him on the field

and we shall miss him at the bat

But he's true to his religion

and I honor him for that!

In game 7 of the 1934 World Series, the Cardinals Joe Medwick slid hard into third base in the sixth inning. Tigers third baseman, Marv Owen, thought Medwick's slide was too aggressive and a short kicking match ensued. When Medwick took his left field position for the bottom of the inning, the fans in the bleachers began pelting him with rotten produce and other assorted garbage. Commissioner K.M. Landis ordered Medwick over to his box to discuss the matter.

Landis figured as long as he remained in the outfield he was in danger, and ordered Medwick removed from the game for his own protection. Medwick was only one away from the World Series record for hits (12) when he was removed. His replacement in the lineup later singled in what might have been a record for the frustrated Medwick. The Cardinals however won the game in a walk, 11-0, and the series, 4 games to 3. The next year, The Tigers again reached the World Series, this time against the Cubs. After losing star Hank Greenberg to a broken wrist in game 2, the Tigers battled bravely and beat the Cubs in 6 games, winning in thrilling fashion with a Goose Goslin single in the ninth inning to win the game 4-3, and the series 4-2. The Detroit Tigers had won their first world championship.

When Ty Cobb managed here, he had temporary bleachers installed in the outfield so home runs would be ruled ground-rule doubles.

In 1972, Tigers' owner John Fetzer announced that he was going to build a new multipurpose stadium. But the public was outraged, and a bond failed to pass during a vote.

Fire broke out at Tiger Stadium in 1977 and destroyed the press box.

In 1993, $8 million worth of renovations were done to Tiger Stadium, including building a new food court called the Tiger Plaza, located in the former players parking lot.

Tiger Stadium opened in 1912, the same day Boston opened Fenway Park

Kirk Gibson's dramatic home run off Goose Gossage in Game 5 of the 1984 World Series.

Each bullpen had its own tiny, cramped dugout down each foul line.

The right field upper deck hangs out 10 feet over the front row of the lower deck. It was built this way due to lack of space behind right field. Trumbull Avenue is only 380 ft. from home plate. During construction on the right field pavilion the RF foul line was shortened dramaticaly to make room for the new grandstand to be squeezed in between the fence and the street. The RF granstand at Tiger Stadium was the inspiration for the home run porch at Ameriquest Field in Arlington. The Texas Rangers copied the look, including the obstructive colums, but without an actual overhang.

Although plenty of home runs have ended up in Detroit’s right-field upper deck, only a few have traveled over it. Some have landed in the third-deck press box, 82 feet up, and some have made it even higher, out over the third deck’s 94-foot-high roof. Since the upper deck was extended to left and right field in 1938, 19 players have cleared the roof a total of 28 times. All but four of those sluggers - Harmon Killebrew in 1962, Frank Howard in 1968, Cecil Fielder in 1990 and Mark McGwire in 1997 - have hit the ball over the closer right-field roof.

Tiger Stadium had a fan club whose goal was to keep baseball at the same site and in the same stadium. Members drew up their own plan for refurbishing Tiger Stadium, called the Cochrane Plan, but it was more or less ignored by the team and the city who were determined to build a new stadium downtown.

Built on the same site as old Bennett Park (1896-1911) but turned around 90 degrees.

Famous sign above the visitors' clubhouse read: "Visitors’ Clubhouse - No Visitors Allowed."

Screen in right in 1944 and in 1961 required balls to be hit into the second deck to be home runs.

The scoreboard now on the left-field fence was originally placed at the 440 mark in dead center in 1961 but was moved when Norm Cash, Al Kaline, and Charlie Maxwell complained that it hindered the batters’ view of the pitch.

Several rows of seats in the right field corner were removed after outfielder Al Kaline ran into the sharp corner that used to exist there.

A string of spotlights was mounted under the right-field overhang to illuminate the warning track, which was shadowed from the normal light standards.

Cobb’s Lake was an area in front of home plate that was always soaked with water by the groundskeepers to slow down Ty Cobb’s bunts.

When slugging teams came to visit, Manager Ty Cobb had the groundskeepers put in temporary bleachers in the outfield so that long drives would be only ground-rule doubles.

In the 1930s and 1940s there was a 315 marker on the second deck in right field.

Second-to-last classic old ballpark to put in lights, in 1948 (before Wrigley Field).

Norm Cash cleared the roof four times in 13 months in 1961 and 1962, including twice in three days in July 1962. Mickey Tettleton did it twice in a week in 1991, and Mickey Mantle managed to do it three times as a visiting player.

Babe Ruth hit his 700th career homer on July 13, 1934. The ball cleared the right-field stands and rolled several hundred feet down a street. Eight years earlier he had paid $20 to a youngster who retrieved one of his home run balls which had rolled more than 800 feet from home plate.

The film, 61* was filmed here in August 2000. For Yankee Stadium scenes, a special green paint was applied to the infield seats, and a partial third deck and 1961 Bronx skyline were added digitally in post-production. After filming, the green paint was washed off with a high-pressure water hose, revealing their original blue color.

Al Kaline who spent forty-six years working there in various capacities — once said, "Tiger Stadium's strengths lie not in its dazzling architecture or creature comforts but in its character and charm."

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