Citi Field Could Have Had A Retractable Roof And Still May Get One

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SOURCE - Mets owner Steve Cohen is one who’s looked into building a retractable roof for Citi Field, no surprise since he’ll consider anything to improve Mets fan experience. 

And word is Cohen was told it would cost $800 million to add a retractable roof, which seems to have given him pause to the point where he is currently considering it a missed opportunity. (The cost would have been a mere fraction of that upon construction.)

This envelops the Mets fan experience pretty well. You have the Wilpons who build a stadium which could have had a retractable roof for roughly $150 million extra but instead treated dimes like manhole covers. Even when we get an owner that isn't cheap and shitty, it costs so much more money to fix the mistakes already made.

Look at this past weekend for the Mets. Friday's game was a rain-shortened shutout loss to the Braves. This was followed by both Saturday and Sunday getting rained out. Saturday's game will now be part of a day/night doubleheader in August but Sunday's game was moved to a single admission doubleheader for today. That's got to be a ton of lost revenue for the team to have a Sunday's ticket and parking fees completely wiped away.

Alas, Wilpon.

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Other than San Diego and Los Angeles, I don't understand why every new baseball stadium doesn't have a retractable roof. It helps everyone. The fan experience is wildly improved. TV ratings would go up because the games could be played at their natural times. The teams would get more revenue from not having single admission doubleheaders. 

My biggest issue is once teams get retractable roofs, they use them far too often. Obviously for a weekend like this past one, it would be ideal. But that doesn't mean if the weather is not absolutely perfect that you need to close the roof. It's so much nicer with the roof open in Miami.

Miami obviously has to deal with humidity in the summer and thunderstorms but they still only have the roof open about 10-15 times a year. In New York (or other Northeast cities), you could have a roof but use it when it's really necessary. Whether it be rain or really cold temperatures (maybe under 50 degrees?), you could close the roof. But otherwise, leave it open. Baseball is so much better outdoors. 

The Skydome (now the Rogers Centre) is much more likely to leave the roof open than in Miami. 

SOURCE - The Blue Jays made their debut at Rogers Centre (then SkyDome) in June 1989.  The Blue Jays entered the season with an all-time record of 768-570 with the roof open at Rogers Centre.

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That's works out to be roughly 40% of the time. That's still not ideal but much better than Miami. It's shocking to me that you had new parks built in New York, Philadelphia and Washington and none of them had a retractable roof. I love going to games and try to go whenever possible. But even when I have tickets to a game that has rain in the forecast, I dread going or stay home. I'm still kicking myself for missing out on the Max Scherzer no-hitter at the end of the 2015 season. I had tickets and stayed home because it was raining and the playoffs were starting the following week. 

If Steve Cohen was owner when the Citi Field was built, it would obviously have had a roof. But would Cohen actually pay $800 million for a roof now? His net worth is somewhere in the $15-$18 billion dollar range. It's one thing to build a giant scoreboard. It's another thing to spend 5% of your wealth building a roof. I also can't think of an owner doing anything as massive simply to improve the fan experience. It would be so generous that I would completely forgive the patches on the uniforms.

I'll be the first fan to say if he ever built the Cohen Canopy, I'd buy full season tickets. I can't imagine I'd be alone.