Ballpark: Oakland Coliseum

I attended Monday's (May 13) A's vs. Rangers game at the O.co Oakland Coliseum. While there were few people attending the game, the fans that were in attendance were passionate. I bought a $14 general admission bleacher ticket and sat in right field because that is where I have heard the die hard A's fans sit. The fans in right field lived up to their reputation. In order of the most believable to the most unbelievable, these are strange things I witnessed in right field:

• A game long mission to heckle Texas right fielder Nelson Cruz on topics that ranged from him blowing the 2011 World Series against the Cardinals to Texas Manager Ron Washington's positive drug test for crack cocaine.
• A male fan with a ponytail thanking another fan for saving "his seat" (since the bleachers are general admission).
• Homemade posters for every player on the A's.
• A fan collecting money from other fans for "right field diehards" t-shirts that he will bring for the next game.
• A female fan threatening to get in the face of a male fan if he didn't throw a home run ball hit by the Ranger's Mitch Moreland back onto the field.
• About 15 fans with drums, bongos, flags, and cowbells.
• About 12 fans behind me and a section over who were lighting up joints the entire game.
• Two female fans who were making out for a good 5 minutes straight during the bottom of the 8th inning.

The Coliseum itself was right off the BART line making the stadium easily accessible. Since the Oakland Coliseum also doubles as the home of the Oakland Raiders, the field had some unique features which gave the playing surface character. The outfield is uniquely shaped and the walls vary drastically in height across the field. The amount of foul ground is enormous which pushes the fans in the lower bowl infield seats far away from the action compared to nearly all other ballparks. Fortunately for me I had an outfield seat and was reasonable close to field albeit 30 feet up. There wasn't a lot of specialty food items, but I did buy some peanuts, a souvenir pop, and a BBQ sandwich which was only average tasting. In a stark difference from the Bay Area's other ballpark (AT&T Park), the Coliseum has plenty of concourse space but no views whatsoever. The upper deck wraps almost entirely around the field with green tarps draped over many of the seats with "Home of the Athletics" written on them. 

As for the game, the Rangers got out to an early lead thanks to the aforementioned Mitch Moreland home run. The A's answered back and built a 4-1 by the 3rd inning with back-to-back home runs by Yoenis Cespedes and Brandon Moss. A's starter A.J. Griffin and the bullpen made sure that lead held up as the A's won 5-1.

My take-away from Oakland Coliseum is that the A's have some different but passionate fans. The ballpark is very large but felt empty because of how few people were at the game (all but two sections in the upper deck were closed). The ballpark doesn't offer anything special in terms of city views or regional flavor. That being said, Oakland Coliseum is decent place to watch as ball game and has the potential to give the A's a huge home field advantage when the fans fill up the ballpark.