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199-761: The Kingdome (officially the King County Stadium ) was a multi-purpose stadium located in the Industrial District (later SoDo ) neighborhood of Seattle , Washington , United States. Owned and operated by King County , it was best known as the home stadium of the Seattle Seahawks of the National Football League (NFL) and the Seattle Mariners of Major League Baseball (MLB); it was also home to

398-424: A major professional sports franchise. A domed stadium was thought to be a must because of Seattle's frequent rain. At the time, the city had Husky Stadium and Sick's Stadium for college football and minor league baseball , respectively, but both were deemed inadequate for a major league team. In 1960, King County commissioners placed a $ 15 million bond issue measure on the ballot to fund construction of

597-568: A $ 280 million renovation that was completed in 2013 . Its U-shaped design was specifically oriented (18.167° south of due east) to minimize glare from the early afternoon sun in the athletes' eyes. The stadium's open end overlooks Lake Washington and the Cascade Mountains , including Mount Rainier . Prior to the 2013 renovation, its total capacity of 72,500 made it the largest stadium in the Pacific Northwest and one of

796-423: A 23-by-42-foot (7.0 m × 12.8 m) "HuskyTron" video screen. Improved lighting for television, including corner lights, was added in 1999 , and official NFL goalposts (optic yellow, 40 ft (12.2 m) in height) were installed in 2000 . The Husky Stadium end zones were painted gold during the 1980s and early 1990s; the new AstroTurf in 1995 changed them to purple. They became natural green with

995-451: A cantilevered steel roof covering a portion of the lower seats. The project made headlines on February 25, 1987, when the grandstand collapsed during construction as a result of miscommunication between the workers and the contractor, which led to the premature removal during the intended replacement of several support cables. Although there were no casualties, property damage ranged from $ 500,000 to $ 1 million and resulted in setbacks; however,

1194-723: A college baseball stadium, now sitting on its former site. Most other inflatable domes, such as the Hoosier Dome and Pontiac Silverdome , were football-only stadiums, although both stadiums hosted basketball; the later-RCA Dome hosted the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament many times and hosted the Final Four multiple times while the Silverdome was the home arena for the Detroit Pistons for most of

1393-468: A college football stadium. The north and south parking lots are packed with cars for tailgating . Husky Stadium is unusual in that fans can travel to football games by boat, known locally as "sailgating" (other stadiums with this feature include Neyland Stadium at Tennessee , Heinz Field at Pittsburgh , and McLane Stadium at Baylor ). There can be upwards of 12,000 people out on Lake Washington next to Husky Stadium during game days. Before kickoff,

1592-471: A double that scored Remy, who had stolen second and third base after drawing a walk from Seguí. The Mariners' first batter, Dave Collins , struck out; however, the next batter, José Báez , singled for the franchise's first ever hit. The first home run at the venue was hit in the top of the third inning by Joe Rudi ; designated hitter Juan Bernhardt scored the Mariners' first home run in their fifth game at

1791-613: A few years). Wrigley Field , while originally built for baseball, also hosted the Chicago Bears , Comiskey Park hosted the Chicago Cardinals , and Tiger Stadium hosted the Detroit Lions . Later venues such as Cleveland Stadium , Milwaukee County Stadium and Baltimore Memorial Stadium were all built to accommodate both baseball and football. In 1920s New England, outdoor wood-track velodromes such as

1990-753: A future MLB team by adding a third deck to the Mezzanine roof. It ultimately served as a temporary home to the Toronto Blue Jays of MLB in 2020 and 2021, when they were displaced by the COVID-19 pandemic after the government of Canada denied them permission to play at Rogers Centre . During the 1990s and 2000s, most of the multipurpose stadiums used for MLB in the United States were replaced by "retro-style" ballparks. These parks were built in two varieties: "retro-classic" parks, which combine

2189-413: A hitter's park, especially in the 1990s when Ken Griffey Jr. , Edgar Martínez , Jay Buhner , Alex Rodriguez , and other sluggers played there. The large number of in-play objects—speakers, roof support wires and streamers—contributed to an "arena baseball" feel. The Kingdome was somewhat improved in 1982 with the addition of a 23-foot (7.0 m) wall in right field nicknamed the "Walla Walla" (after

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2388-400: A major-league stadium, and stipulated that as a condition of being awarded the franchise, bonds had to be issued to fund construction of a domed stadium that had to be completed by 1970; additionally, the capacity at Sick's Stadium had to be expanded from 11,000 to 30,000 by Opening Day 1969, when the team was scheduled to begin playing. The Pilots were supposed to begin play in 1971 along with

2587-417: A movable natural grass surface for soccer, and the other a synthetic turf surface for gridiron. To accommodate the different sight lines preferred for each sport, the soccer surface is positioned several feet above the gridiron, so that the seats are closer to the field in its soccer configuration and elevated above the sidelines and coaches in its gridiron configuration. The idea of a sharp difference between

2786-585: A multi-purpose stadium is that a singular infrastructure and piece of real estate can support both teams in terms of transportation and playing area, while money (often public funds) that would have been spent to support infrastructure for two stadiums can be spent elsewhere. Also playing into the advent of the multipurpose stadium was Americans' growing use of automobiles, which required professional sports stadiums surrounded by parking: most cities lacked affordable space for such stadiums near their city centers, so multi-purpose stadiums were typically built farther from

2985-470: A multipurpose stadium and a single-sport stadium is less important outside of North America, since in most countries stadiums that are constructed with football in mind are easily able to accommodate rugby , track and field, and other popular sports, which tend to have a similarly sized playing field. For example, any large stadium in most of Latin America, part of Asia, most of Africa, or continental Europe

3184-642: A new $ 19 million Husky Ballpark , a new track and field stadium, renovated soccer stadium, $ 50 million basketball operations and practice facility and recently completed projects such as the Husky Legends Center, the Conibear Shellhouse and Alaska Airlines Arena renovations, and the construction of the Dempsey Indoor facility. This major remodel of the athletic village coincided with construction for an underground station for

3383-418: A new variation of synthetic turf, was installed in 2000 at a cost of $ 1,074,958. The new turf features enhanced drainage and reduced abrasion through the use of synthetic fibers that are tufted into an infill of sand and rubber. The project was funded by Seattle Seahawks owner Paul Allen , who used Husky Stadium as a temporary home venue during the construction of CenturyLink Field . The first of its kind in

3582-586: A northern extension of the Link light rail system and a replacement of the Evergreen Point Floating Bridge . The renovation project incorporated a new grand concourse, press box, video and audio system, and football offices, as well as new and improved amenities, concession stands, and bathrooms. The track that had enclosed the playing field was removed, and the field itself lowered by four feet to make room for additional seating closer to

3781-462: A pitching change as Indians' pitcher Orel Hershiser was walking off the mound following a home run by Edgar Martínez . After an inspection by engineers, the game was continued the next evening, resulting in a 6–4 win for the Indians. Seguí, who retired from professional baseball after the 1977 season, was invited by the Mariners to throw the ceremonial last pitch after the final Mariners game at

3980-734: A playing surface that was despised by both football and baseball players alike; after the 1998 season, a survey by the NFL Players Association found that 56.7 percent of Seahawks players rated the surface as "poor" or "fair", and was the worst-rated one in the AFC West . Injuries from playing at the Kingdome and its contemporaries occurred more often compared to stadiums with natural grass. Of note, Seahawks running backs Sherman Smith and Curt Warner respectively suffered season-ending knee injuries in 1980 and 1984 during games at

4179-450: A potential MLB expansion franchise, opened. Pilot Field replaced the long-obsolete War Memorial Stadium , which had been designed mainly for football, and hosted the NFL's Buffalo Bills ; but it had been (awkwardly) fit for baseball after the city's baseball park, Offermann Stadium , was condemned and torn down in 1960 to build a high school in its place . Pilot Field was also designed to host

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4378-482: A potential temporary home for a Major League Soccer team in the mid-1990s. The University of Washington offered to let a prospective team, including the Seattle Sounders , use the stadium for two years if a plan to build a permanent soccer stadium was in place. Husky Stadium was also considered as a potential 1994 FIFA World Cup venue, but lacked a suitable grass surface; it was also a candidate venue in

4577-550: A press box in the upper tier on the third-base line oriented specifically for football, along with space beyond right field for a movable grandstand to accommodate an additional 13,000 fans for a future pro football franchise. This additional grandstand was indeed added to Anaheim Stadium in 1980 to accommodate the Los Angeles Rams' move from the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum . Anaheim Stadium

4776-499: A ramp and plunged 47 feet to his death; this was despite the installation of signs warning about the chest-level barriers the previous year. Logistics would be a problem throughout the team's tenure at the Kingdome because the Seahawks and Mariners had scheduling priority over them, especially during the playoffs when the Mariners were playing there at the same time in the spring. As part of the 1977 agreement, King County agreed to pay

4975-416: A rectangular playing field, but cricket and Australian-rules fields are rounded, while baseball is played on a diamond. This makes them much harder to accommodate within a rectangular-shaped stadium. Likewise, accommodating athletics, such as for a Summer Olympics, means constructing a curved 400-m track around the infield. This often means the sports simply find it easier to be played in separate stadiums. In

5174-562: A stadium, but voters on November 8 defeated it with only 48 percent approval because of doubt the stadium could be built within that budget, and lack of a guarantee the city would have a team to play in the stadium. By 1966, the National Football League and the American League were both considering granting the city an expansion franchise , and as a result, the King County Council placed another bond issue measure on

5373-473: A temporary wall. The Oakland Coliseum uses a configuration such that its football sideline runs along a line drawn from first base to third base (the former Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium also used this configuration). This was done presumably to make the same coveted seats behind home plate at a baseball game also coveted 50-yard line seats at a football game, and also so the stadium would need only one press box . Different stadiums have different angles between

5572-801: A venue for Major League Baseball or the Summer Olympics and felt no need to replace their smaller, open-air stadiums used mostly for Canadian football. For example, Calgary 's open-air McMahon Stadium dates from 1960 and has been used only for Canadian football,and later was chosen to host the 1988 Winter Olympics opening and closing ceremonies, and an outdoor ice hockey event (the 2011 Heritage Classic ). Similar situations hold in Ottawa, Winnipeg, Hamilton, and Regina. No large stadiums of any kind are in cities such as Quebec City, London, or Saskatoon, or in Atlantic Canada ; in those places (with

5771-556: A way that it could be converted to a new baseball stadium, and ACOG paid for the conversion. Despite being considered controversial at the time, the International Olympic Committee considered the action innovative, due to the fact that there were no local needs for another stadium with a capacity for more than 70.000, given the existence of the Georgia Dome which was completed in 1992. Furthermore,

5970-736: Is an outdoor football stadium in the northwest United States, located on the campus of the University of Washington in Seattle , Washington . It has been home to the Washington Huskies of the Big Ten Conference since 1920 , hosting their football games. It also briefly hosted the Seattle Seahawks of the NFL in 2000 and 2001 while Qwest Field (now Lumen Field) was being constructed. Aside from football,

6169-541: Is capable of hosting baseball but has been primarily a football venue. Rogers Centre was built to accommodate baseball (MLB's Toronto Blue Jays play there), but was a football venue until the CFL's Toronto Argonauts moved to BMO Field after the 2015 CFL season . Montreal's Olympic Stadium was built primarily for a multisport event (the 1976 Summer Olympics ), during which it hosted the athletics , equestrian , football . Latterly, it hosted professional team sports: it became

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6368-605: Is harder than the grass and is also a significant injury risk. Baseball purists disliked artificial turf, though the Cincinnati Reds took advantage of this on Riverfront Stadium 's artificial turf: on offense by recruiting players who combined power and speed and encouraging line drive hitting that could produce doubles, triples, and high-bouncing infield hits; while for defense the fast surface and virtually dirtless infield rewarded range and quickness by both outfielders and infielders, like shortstop Dave Concepción , who used

6567-593: Is likely to be used mostly for association football. The majority of the largest stadiums in the world were built for either association football or American football. The regions where other outdoor sports can draw numbers comparable to association football or American football are limited. They include baseball in Japan and the Spanish Caribbean ; cricket in United Kingdom,South Africa, Australia,

6766-717: Is the only major outdoor team sport in many countries; in many other countries, association football and rugby can easily coexist with limited venue conversion required beyond goalpost changes and line markings. In Australia, many sports grounds are suited to both Australian rules football and cricket , as Australian Rules fields and laws are laid out on cricket ovals. In some cases, such as at Stadium Australia in Sydney, Docklands Stadium in Melbourne, and National Stadium, in Singapore , stadiums are designed to be converted between

6965-611: The 1970 NFL season , Ralph Wilson came close to moving the Buffalo Bills from dilapidated War Memorial Stadium to Husky Stadium. The threat of relocation prompted the developers in the Buffalo suburbs to construct Rich Stadium in Orchard Park (later Ralph Wilson Stadium and now Highmark Stadium ), which opened in 1973. The Bills have resided there ever since. Husky Stadium was among several local venues considered as

7164-537: The 1978–79 season after the expiration of their contract with the city of Seattle, the owner of the Coliseum; the team pushed for a move to the Kingdome after the city balked at a $ 30 million plan to expand the Coliseum to 20,000 seats the previous year. On August 22, the King County Council voted 7–2 to approve a 17-year lease with the SuperSonics, with the agreement signed the following day. The following week,

7363-541: The 1983 Summer Universiade . In Canada, several large multisport stadiums were built during this style's heyday. However, unlike in the United States, an NFL team has never been based primarily in Canada (though the Buffalo Bills played some home games in Toronto between 2008 and 2013) and only two MLB teams have been based there. So, teams from these leagues have not been the major impetus behind stadium construction (with

7562-565: The 2006 FIFA World Cup . A different take on the multipurpose concept can be seen in the Saitama Super Arena in Japan and Paris La Défense Arena in the inner suburbs of Paris. Both venues are similar to JMA Wireless Dome in that they are fully enclosed stadiums (though with fixed roofs instead of the Dome's original air-supported roof) that can accommodate field and indoor court sports. However, they differ from JMA Wireless Dome in

7761-801: The Anglophone Caribbean , and the Indian subcontinent ; rugby (union or league) in Wales, England, Ireland, South Africa, New Zealand, Fiji, the country of Georgia, and parts of Australia and France; Australian rules football in Australia; bandy in Russia and Scandinavia; and Gaelic games in Ireland. However, even in these areas, the amount of compromise needed to accommodate multiple sports varies considerably. Most outdoor team sports require

7960-674: The Arup Group cited history to show that a rarely-used athletics track does not work for association football, as these multi-purpose stadiums substantially lengthen the viewing distance for spectators, as compared to football-specific stadiums. Notable unsuccessful past examples, of football matches played within athletics stadiums, include the former Stadio delle Alpi and the Munich Olympic Stadium , with both Juventus and Bayern Munich moving to new stadiums less than 40 years after inheriting them. The delle Alpi's design

8159-560: The Atlanta Braves had already been exploring opportunities for a new venue to replace the outdated Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium . The southwest corner of the Olympic Stadium was built to accommodate the future baseball infield and seating. This is observable in aerial views and plans of the stadium in its Olympic configuration, where the temporary seats are not placed next to the oval running track. The southwest part of

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8358-522: The Coppa Italia home match against Sampdoria in the 2001–02 season, while in the 2005–06 season, the average attendance was 35,880. Manchester City Council wished to avoid creating a white elephant , so to give the stadium long-term financial viability, extensive work was carried out to convert the City of Manchester Stadium from a track and field arena to a football stadium. The old Estádio da Luz

8557-664: The DC United soccer club moved out, and its demolition began in 2022. Thus, only the Oakland Coliseum remains in use, while the Athletics are now the sole tenants of the Oakland Coliseum after the Raiders relocated to Las Vegas in 2020 . However, in 2023, the A's announced their own intentions of moving to Las Vegas . The Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome was unusual as one of the few air-supported dome stadiums that

8756-593: The East Hartford Velodrome and Providence's Cycledrome could, with some compromises, fit an American football field in their infields: early NFL franchises in each city (the Hartford Blues and Providence Steam Roller , respectively) used the velodromes as their home stadiums. In the 1960s, multipurpose stadiums began replacing their baseball-only and football-only predecessors, now known as "classics" or "jewel box" parks. The advantage of

8955-553: The Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA), and the rules of each game are mapped onto the same dimensions—although some pitches in areas where hurling is the dominant code have longer pitches slightly more suited to faster, longer passes in the hurling game. When the Aviva was being rebuilt, Croke Park stepped in as home for the national teams in both soccer and rugby union, a decision of significant political weight in

9154-618: The Kansas City Royals . However, when Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri got wind of those plans, he demanded both teams begin play in 1969. The American League had birthed the Royals and Pilots as a result of the Kansas City Athletics moving to Oakland , and Symington would not accept the prospect of Kansas City waiting three years for baseball's return. On February 13, 1968, King County voters approved

9353-612: The Kingdome in 1976. Eight of these eleven stadiums have been since demolished, with Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium demolished in 1997, the Kingdome in 2000, Three Rivers Stadium in 2001, Riverfront Stadium in 2002, Veterans Stadium in 2004, Busch Memorial Stadium in 2005, Shea Stadium in 2009, and San Diego Stadium in 2021. Furthermore, the Astrodome has been vacant since 2008 due to its failure to meet current fire and building code requirements. RFK Stadium has been vacant since 2017 when

9552-636: The Pac-8 single-game rushing record; the Trojans won by nine points, 23–14. In 1994, under then-new athletic director Rick Dickson , the Cougars flirted with the idea of hosting an additional home game at the Kingdome starting in 1997; however, the plan never came to fruition. In the late 1970s, the Kingdome hosted both instances of a Pacific-10 Conference all-star game called the Challenge Bowl;

9751-690: The Phoenix Suns at the Kingdome on April 7, 1985, in their final game as a regular tenant, losing 110–125 with 5,672 in attendance. However, exemplifying the scheduling issues, it was not their final home game of the season; the SuperSonics were forced to play at the Tacoma Dome on April 11 because the Mariners hosted the Oakland Athletics at the Kingdome that day. By that point, the SuperSonics had an average attendance of 7,399, failing to surpass 10,000 seats sold in 29 of 37 games held at

9950-747: The Portland Trail Blazers on September 22, 1978. A few weeks later, a crowd of 15,219 watched as the SuperSonics defeated the Chicago Bulls , 104–86, on October 14 in their first regular-season game as a tenant. Captain Fred Brown and leading scorer Gus Williams helped lead the team to their first and only championship that season, defeating the Washington Bullets in the Finals and avenging their Finals loss to them

10149-409: The Seattle Mariners was born. The Mariners held their first game in franchise history at the Kingdome on April 6, 1977 , against the California Angels . The Angels shut out the Mariners 7–0 in front of a sellout crowd of 57,762. The first pitch was a strike thrown by the Mariners' Diego Seguí to Jerry Remy . In the top of the first inning, Don Baylor registered the first hit at the stadium with

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10348-542: The Seattle Sounders and New York Cosmos of the NASL . It set a record for the largest soccer audience in North America at 58,120. The stadium was finished at $ 20 million over budget, with part of the cost overrun covered by a $ 12.8 million out-of-court settlement in 1980 between the county and Drake's liability insurers. Like virtually all other multi-purpose stadiums, the Kingdome featured AstroTurf artificial turf for its playing surface, with its baseball configuration featuring dirt sliding pits around each base. When it

10547-403: The Seattle SuperSonics of the National Basketball Association (NBA) (from 1978 to 1985) and additionally served as both the home outdoor and indoor venue for the Seattle Sounders of the North American Soccer League (NASL). The Kingdome measured 660 feet (200 m) wide from its inside walls. The idea of constructing a covered stadium for a major league football or baseball team

10746-414: The Seattle market . After the blackout of the October 24, 1993 game versus the New England Patriots , one more game was blacked out that year, with five games blacked out the following year; KING-TV , which as Seattle's NBC affiliate was the Seahawks' local broadcast home at the time, prevented further blackouts by purchasing all remaining unsold tickets for three games in 1993 and two games in 1994. In

10945-420: The following year , and the SuperSonics moved in the year after that , only to move back to the Seattle Center Coliseum in 1985. The stadium hosted several major sports events, including the Soccer Bowl in August 1976 , the Pro Bowl in January 1977 , the Major League Baseball All-Star Game in July 1979 , the NBA All-Star Game in 1987 , and the NCAA Final Four in 1984 , 1989 , and 1995 . During

11144-413: The soccer-specific stadium movement. As of 2020 , 18 of Major League Soccer 's 26 clubs play in their own, soccer-specific stadiums, and two of the exceptions ( FC Cincinnati and Nashville SC ) are currently building their own soccer-specific stadiums. In addition, three of the four teams that will join MLS in 2021 and 2022 plan to open soccer-specific stadiums in time for their MLS debuts. Scheduling

11343-425: The 1978 NBA Finals; they set it again on April 15, 1980, during a conference semifinal game against the Milwaukee Bucks with an attendance record of 40,172 (also since broken). The Kingdome regular season, single-game attendance record of 38,067 was set on November 22, 1991, when the SuperSonics faced the Chicago Bulls . While leaving a SuperSonics game on February 16, 1983, a 21-year-old man from Olympia fell off

11542-451: The 1980s. The Carrier Dome was another such air-supported, multipurpose stadium; it was built to accommodate outdoor sports such as football and indoor sports such as basketball. The Carrier Dome, since renamed JMA Wireless Dome, remains in use, although its air-supported roof was replaced by a fixed roof in 2020. Air-supported domes fell out of favor in the 21st century after notable weather-related collapses in Minnesota and Pontiac exposed

11741-439: The 1988 season. The Dolphins scored a fourth-quarter touchdown to win 20–17; it marked the first home playoff loss for the Seahawks as well as the first road playoff win in 28 years for the Dolphins. It was the last NFL victory for Hall of Fame quarterback Dan Marino and head coach Jimmy Johnson , and it was also the last event the Kingdome ever hosted before its implosion. The Seahawks had an overall record of 101–83 (.549) in

11940-444: The 1990s, in light of the growing trend of "walkable urbanism", as teams sought to return to the city core where they could develop or take advantage of existing hospitality in order to grow their fanbase. Many teams also relocated to where they could control mixed-use development around their new stadium. Contrary to the above trend of teams moving away from suburbs, the Atlanta Braves left Turner Field for SunTrust Park . Often

12139-402: The 1990s, the Seahawks' and Mariners' respective ownership groups began to question the suitability of the Kingdome as a venue for each team, threatening to relocate unless new, publicly funded stadiums were built. An issue was that neither team saw their shared tenancy as profitable; both teams also questioned the integrity of the stadium's roof as highlighted by the collapse of ceiling tiles onto

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12338-584: The 1990s, with the SkyDome (in Canada) that opened in 1989 being the last such stadium completed to accommodate baseball and football. With the completion of the Truman Sports Complex in Kansas City in 1973, a model for purpose-built stadiums was laid down. Since the Baltimore Orioles left the multi-purpose Memorial Stadium for the baseball-only Oriole Park at Camden Yards in 1992, most major league sports stadiums have been built specifically for one sport. However, some newer NFL stadiums (e.g. Seattle, Atlanta, Charlotte) have been built with consideration for

12537-502: The Aviva and for the ultimately unsuccessful 2023 Rugby World Cup bid. Croke Park has also occasionally hosted visiting American football college matches, especially those featuring the Army and Navy , or Notre Dame , with which Ireland has a long-standing connection. Several stadiums hosted multiple sports teams before the advent of multi-purpose stadiums. In New York City, the Polo Grounds hosted football teams early on, as its rectangular nature lent itself well to football and

12736-477: The CFL. It has also hosted many association football events, as well as the 2003 Heritage Classic , the first major outdoor ice hockey event in Canada. Tim Hortons Field , which opened in 2014, was built both as a venue for the 2015 Pan American Games and as the new home of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats football team; its predecessor, Ivor Wynne Stadium , was originally built for the first Commonwealth Games . Other Canadian cities never expressed interest in building

12935-447: The Chicago Cubs, the same day the San Francisco 49ers were scheduled to host their division rival New Orleans Saints . The October 8 game was moved to New Orleans and the November 6 game was moved to San Francisco. In Australia, most major stadiums that can hold over 50,000, such as the Melbourne Cricket Ground and Adelaide Oval , are circular or oval-shaped venues which – while suitable for cricket and Australian rules football – pose

13134-728: The Gaelic games community, most notably manifested in GAA Rule 42 , means that football and rugby clubs have generally had to play on separate grounds. True multisport facilities, where teams from a variety of sports use the same stadium as their home ground, exist outside North America in a few cases, most of those as smaller stadiums. A handful are notable for having 60,000 seats or more. The Melbourne Cricket Ground hosts athletics,cricket, Australian rules football, and association football. Accor Stadium hosts cricket and Australian rules football, as well as both rugby codes and association football. Wembley Stadium in London, Stade de France near Paris, and Millennium Stadium in Cardiff are not

13333-477: The Huskies' homecoming football game against Stanford . His initial concept for the wave was for it to travel vertically, from the bottom of the stands to the top, within the Husky student section. When the stunt was met with limited interest, he then decided to reverse the movement of the wave to travel from top to bottom. This failed miserably, as it was necessary to turn backward to see the wave progressing downward. Weller then gave up and returned his attention to

13532-458: The Husky Marching Band. Husky Stadium had developed numerous structural problems over the years as a result of standing for nine decades in Seattle's moist weather, particularly in the lower bowl. In November 2011, Husky Stadium began a $ 261 million renovation, the largest single capital project in the university's history. Home games were played at CenturyLink Field during the 2012 season while construction took place. The Apple Cup in 2011

13731-433: The Kingdome and the Coliseum were unavailable. Along with the scheduling issues, as with other multipurpose stadiums used by the NBA the Kingdome proved itself to be a less-than-ideal venue for basketball. Although the Kingdome's capacity allowed the SuperSonics to set attendance records, the vast space it afforded meant that it did not have the intimate environment of a dedicated arena; furthermore, fans were displeased about

13930-471: The Kingdome in 1999. However, while they were able to make the tickets and reservations for Seguí, a payment mix-up prevented him from boarding the flight out of Kansas City International Airport on the day of the game; the incident made him irate such that he refused to visit Seattle again until 2012 , when he was invited as part of the Mariners' 35th anniversary celebration. Despite the disappointment from Seguí's son, then-Mariners first baseman David Segui ,

14129-781: The Kingdome in their final season there. Multi-purpose stadium In North America, multipurpose stadiums were primarily built during the 1960s and 1970s as shared home stadiums for Major League Baseball and National Football League or Canadian Football League teams. Some stadiums were renovated to allow multipurpose configurations during the 1980s. This type of stadium is associated with an era of suburbanization , in which many sports teams followed their fans out of large cities into areas with cheaper, more plentiful land. They were usually built near highways and had large parking lots , but were rarely connected to public transit . As multipurpose stadiums were rarely ideal for both sports usually housed in them, they had fallen out of favor by

14328-515: The Kingdome in which they lost 27–20 before a crowd of 60,825. The Seahawks' first regular season game was against the St. Louis Cardinals at the Kingdome on September 12. The Cardinals defeated the Seahawks, 30–24, with 58,441 fans in attendance. At the end of that season, the venue hosted the Pro Bowl , the NFL's all-star game, on January 17, 1977. The Seahawks hosted Monday Night Football games at

14527-530: The Kingdome on April 10. The Mariners had their first win at the Kingdome and team history two games after the opener (they were also shut out in their second game 2–0), defeating the Angels 7–6 on April 8 via a walk-off double from Larry Milbourne . The venue hosted the All-Star Game on July 17, 1979 . The Kingdome was somewhat problematic as a baseball venue. Foul territory was quite large, and seats in

14726-537: The Kingdome twelve times in their history and were 9–3 in those games. The Seahawks and the Oakland / Los Angeles Raiders played five Monday Night games in the Kingdome in the 1980s with Seattle holding a 3–2 edge including a 37–0 blowout victory in 1986. The next year, in 1987 , Bo Jackson of the Los Angeles Raiders rushed for 221 yards, the most ever on MNF, and scored 2 touchdowns. One of his scores

14925-575: The Kingdome twice; the Loggers won both contests, defeating the Lutes 23–21 on September 17, 1977, with 13,167 in attendance, and then defeating them again 27–14 on September 23, 1978, before a crowd of 8,329. The 1977 game set a series attendance record at the time. The stadium also hosted the annual WIAA high school football state championships in an event called the Kingbowl from 1977 through 1994;

15124-477: The Kingdome was demolished by implosion . The Seahawks' new stadium, now known as Lumen Field , was built on the site and opened in 2002 . King County finally paid off the bonds used to build and repair the Kingdome in 2015, fifteen years after its demolition. In 1959, Seattle restaurateur David L. Cohn wrote a letter to the Seattle City Council suggesting the city needed a covered stadium for

15323-678: The Kingdome was ultimately not needed as the grandstand was completed in time for the team's first home game against the Stanford Cardinal on September 5. (Seven years later, the Seattle Seahawks would use Husky Stadium as their home field during the first half of the 1994 season while the Kingdome's ceiling was under repair. ) The Kingdome also hosted a game between the Washington State Cougars and USC Trojans on October 9, 1976. With 37,268 in attendance, USC running back Ricky Bell rushed for 346 yards and set

15522-462: The Kingdome, and were 2–1 in the postseason. The first football (and college football by extension) game played in the Kingdome occurred just after it opened in 1976, when the Washington Huskies varsity team won 10–7 against a team of Husky alumni on May 1 before 20,470 fans. The Huskies looked into temporarily renting the Kingdome for the 1987 season when the north grandstand of Husky Stadium collapsed during construction on February 25; however,

15721-639: The Kingdome, compiling an overall home record of 852–903 (.485) during their 22½-season tenure there. Besides the Mariners and Seahawks, the stadium also hosted the Seattle SuperSonics of the National Basketball Association (NBA) for seven seasons. The SuperSonics, having previously played at the Seattle Center Coliseum , announced on July 29, 1977, that they intended to move into the Kingdome for

15920-465: The Kingdome; additionally, the Kingdome's surface is partly blamed for Ken Griffey Jr. 's subsequent injuries and decline in performance after the Mariners traded him to the Cincinnati Reds at the end of the 1999 season. The expansion Seattle Seahawks of the National Football League (NFL) played their first game ever on August 1, 1976 , a preseason game against the San Francisco 49ers at

16119-581: The Mariners 9–8 in 17 innings via a three-run homer from Manny Ramirez off Bob Wells ; Paul Shuey staved off a comeback by the Mariners in the bottom of the inning to end the game the next morning after five hours and 23 minutes. The most noteworthy baseball game in the Kingdome's history took place on October 8, 1995 ; in the rubber game of the ALDS , the Mariners defeated the New York Yankees 6–5 in 11 innings in front of 57,411 raucous fans. In

16318-580: The Mariners and Seahawks, it was replaced again in October and December 1990 at a cost of $ 2.56 million; the previous surface was sold off thereafter, with 25 rolls of it sold to the Tacoma Dome for $ 108,200. A strip 40 feet by 4 inches was ripped off left field near second base during a field invasion by celebrating fans after the Mariners won the AL West tiebreaker game in 1995; it was replaced before

16517-443: The Mariners covered seats in the upper decks in right and right-center with a tarp in order to make the stadium feel "less empty". Additionally, the Kingdome's acoustics created problems for stadium announcers, who had to deal with significant echo issues. However, when the team's fortunes began to change in the mid-1990s and they began drawing larger crowds, especially in the post-season, the noise created an electric atmosphere and gave

16716-482: The Mariners' first 18 years, their poor play (they did not have a winning season until 1991 ) combined with the Kingdome's design, led to poor attendance. Some writers and fans called it "the Tomb" (because of its gray concrete and lack of noise) and " Puget Puke." After their inaugural home opener, the Mariners didn't have another sellout for the next 1,018 home games until their 1990 home opener on April 13. At one point

16915-495: The NFL, the surface was so popular with the players that the Seahawks, who had planned to use natural grass at their new stadium, instead installed their own FieldTurf surface. The FieldTurf at Husky Stadium was replaced with a newer one after nine seasons in 2009 at a cost of $ 350,000. In addition to the new playing surface, the Seahawks made other improvements to Husky stadium in preparation for its tenure as an NFL venue for two seasons. A larger scoreboard debuted in 1998 , with

17114-774: The Oakland Athletics were the last team in the U.S. still sharing a stadium with an NFL team (the Oakland Raiders ), the Oakland Coliseum (now RingCentral Coliseum). This arrangement ended once the Raiders settled into the new Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada in 2020, leaving no stadiums shared between NFL and MLB franchises. The Athletics officially announced they would begin their relocation process to Las Vegas by 2024. Husky Stadium Former capacity : Husky Stadium (officially Alaska Airlines Field at Husky Stadium for sponsorship purposes)

17313-468: The Pilots would not survive long enough to move to their new stadium without new ownership. It was also obvious that the timetable for a new stadium would have to be significantly advanced, as Sick's Stadium was completely unsuitable even for temporary use. However, a petition by stadium opponents brought the dome project to a halt. The Pilots' ownership group ran out of money by the end of the season, and with

17512-500: The Seahawks specifically wanted a stiffer variation of AstroTurf. The replacement surfaces were attached together via zippers . The underlying base of the surface was asphalt , with the AstroTurf essentially consisting of a carpet on top of a pad with respective thicknesses of one-half inch and five-eights inch. Lumps, holes, and ridges were also present in the surface along with gaps within its seams. These factors combined to create

17711-422: The Seahawks' heyday, the Kingdome was known as one of the loudest stadiums in the league. Opposing teams were known to practice with jet engine sounds blaring at full blast to prepare for the painfully high decibel levels typical of Seahawks games. It was where Seahawks fans, who were long called "the 12th Man " and led the Seahawks to retire the number 12 in honor of them in 1984 , made their reputation as one of

17910-409: The SuperSonics $ 15,000 for each game (up to five) that was moved elsewhere because of booking issues. Even then, the scheduling priority meant that the SuperSonics would only play home playoff games at the Kingdome while the Mariners were on the road, with most of the games played at the Coliseum; the team even had to use Hec Edmundson Pavilion at the University of Washington for a few games when both

18109-406: The Tacoma Dome; the game came back for one final time in 1999 before the stadium was demolished. Shortly after the Pilots' departure for Milwaukee, the city of Seattle, King County, and the state of Washington sued the American League , claiming a breach of contract . The league agreed to grant Seattle another franchise in exchange for dropping the lawsuit, and the team that would later be known as

18308-560: The United States. Though hailed as revolutionary at the time, the Truman Sports Complex model of stadium design was widely ignored for the next 20 years, though the influence of both Arrowhead and Kauffman Stadiums were easily seen in venues such as Giants Stadium. The true end of the multipurpose era began in 1987, when Buffalo 's Pilot Field , a stadium built for the Buffalo Bisons minor league baseball team and

18507-690: The Washington crew team offers shuttles to anyone that wants to go to and from the boats and docks for the game. Fans also gather at the Dempsey Indoor Facility just north of the stadium for Husky Huddles. After the game, the Tyee Sports Council and the University of Washington Athletic Department put on events where fans can gather and hear analysis of the game from Washington coaches and Husky Legends, and listen to

18706-699: The action if needed. Lang Park in Brisbane is currently (as of 2020) the only purpose-built rectangle stadium in Australia (with fixed seating) with a capacity exceeding 50,000. The first real departure from the multipurpose stadium design occurred in 1972, when the Jackson County Sports Authority in Kansas City, Missouri , opened the Truman Sports Complex , which houses Kauffman Stadium (named Royals Stadium at

18905-539: The athletic village were renovated. Before the arrival of the Seattle Seahawks in 1976, Husky Stadium hosted 12 NFL preseason games between 1955 and 1975. The San Francisco 49ers played six times at the stadium, the most of any team. Other teams to make multiple appearances include the New York Giants , Los Angeles Rams , Cleveland Browns , and Chicago/St. Louis Cardinals . At one point after

19104-539: The ballot for a September vote. While it received 51.5 percent approval, it did not reach the 60 percent required to proceed; the requirement was due to a 1932 initiative that mandated a supermajority for tax levies over 40 mills . In 1967, the American League granted Seattle an expansion franchise that would be known as the Seattle Pilots . The league clearly stated Sick's Stadium was not adequate as

19303-449: The baseball dimensions roughly symmetrical. Qualcomm Stadium's square-circle " octorad " layout was considered an improvement over the other cookie cutter stadiums of the time, and it was the last of the old multi-purpose stadiums to host a Super Bowl ( Super Bowl XXXVII ). More-modern multi-purpose stadiums have used more elaborate methods to accommodate multiple sports; Tottenham Hotspur Stadium , for example, uses two sets of turfs, one

19502-553: The best solution at the time. The first of these "cookie-cutter" or "concrete donut" stadiums was Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Stadium in 1961 (then known as District of Columbia Stadium); it was followed during the 1960s and 1970s by Shea Stadium in 1964, Atlanta–Fulton County Stadium and the Astrodome in 1965, Busch Memorial Stadium and Oakland Coliseum in 1966, San Diego Stadium in 1967, Riverfront Stadium and Three Rivers Stadium in 1970, Veterans Stadium in 1971, and

19701-557: The bottom of the 11th, Martinez doubled to left , sending Joey Cora and Griffey home with the winning runs and vaulting the Mariners into the ALCS for the first time in franchise history. On May 2, 1996 , a game at the Kingdome between the Mariners and the Cleveland Indians was suspended in the bottom of the seventh inning because of a minor earthquake . The earthquake, estimated at a magnitude of 5.3 to 5.4, occurred during

19900-669: The bowl, sponsored by the Olympia Brewing Company , pitted an all-star team of Pac-10 players against a similar team from another conference. The Pac-10 went undefeated with a 27–20 victory (as the Pac-8) over the Big Ten on January 15, 1978, and a 36–23 victory over the Big Eight on January 13, 1979. During the same period, the University of Puget Sound Loggers and Pacific Lutheran University Lutes also faced off at

20099-468: The case of Ireland, grounds built for Gaelic games are physically capable of hosting association football and the rugby codes without changing the seating configuration. Because the Gaelic games' pitch is rectangular and also longer and wider than that for football or either rugby code, the only changes required are the physical goals and field markings. However, opposition to those sports within large parts of

20298-655: The center of the field rather than towards the logical center of the game action (home plate for baseball and the 50-yard line for football). In the baseball configuration, most had symmetrical field dimensions. This detracted from the unique, individual identity enjoyed by the sport-specific "jewel box" stadiums with odd or asymmetrical field dimensions, and further supported the "cookie cutter stadium" nickname. The large capacities of multipurpose stadiums were usually more than adequate for football. However, baseball crowds tend to be much smaller than football crowds, resulting in baseball games at these stadiums being swallowed up in

20497-472: The ceremony went on as planned; David's son, then-seven-year-old Cory Segui, threw the last pitch to Bob Stinson , who was the Mariners' catcher in their first game. In 1989 , Griffey Jr. hit a home run in his first-ever plate appearance at the Kingdome on April 10. On June 27, 1999 , Griffey Jr. hit the last home run ever at the Kingdome against the Texas Rangers . The Mariners played 1,755 games at

20696-405: The city in southeastern Washington); a nearly $ 100,000 Daktronics out-of-town scoreboard was later installed on it in 1990. In 1990 and 1991 , the moving of home plate closer to the backstop, the addition of box seats down the third base line and the removal of a few rows of seats in left field reduced foul territory and made the outfield dimensions longer and asymmetrical. In its early years,

20895-432: The city center with freeway access. Subsets of the multipurpose stadiums were the so-called "cookie-cutter stadiums" or "concrete donuts" which were all very similar in design. They featured a completely circular or nearly circular design and accommodated both baseball and football by rotating sections of the box seat areas to fit the respective playing fields. These fields often used artificial turf , as it could withstand

21094-565: The company using its own design consultant. To help alleviate tension between the International District community and county officials, Drake emphasized the hiring of minorities, with minorities eventually representing 13 percent of the workers at the site; a community center and a shelter were also built in the neighborhood. However, the stadium's construction encountered numerous issues; in January 1973, six support beams for

21293-583: The contract failed, and on November 22, Drake stopped work on the Kingdome. The county fired Drake on December 10, bringing in Kiewit to finish construction on the stadium. On December 5, 1974, the NFL awarded Seattle an expansion franchise to occupy the new stadium; the team was later named the Seattle Seahawks . Construction lasted another two years, and the stadium held an opening ceremony on March 27, 1976. It hosted its first professional sporting event two weeks later on April 9, an exhibition soccer game between

21492-463: The council unanimously voted on August 29 to spend $ 1.5 million on improvements to the Kingdome in preparation for the team; the team would pay the same amount over the first seven years as part of the agreement. Additional terms of the agreement had the SuperSonics pay the county 10 percent of ticket sale proceeds (not including admissions taxes) and $ 2,539 in personnel costs per game; the county additionally kept all game concession and parking revenue. On

21691-495: The domed stadium continued despite the lack of a major league sports team to occupy it. In May 1970 voters rejected the proposal to build the stadium at Seattle Center. From 1970 to 1972, the commission studied the feasibility and economic impact of building the stadium on King Street adjacent to Pioneer Square and the International District —a site that ranked at the bottom when the commission originally narrowed

21890-403: The drawbacks of air-supported domes in snowy locales. During the height of the multipurpose stadium construction era of the 1960s and 1970s, three baseball-only stadiums were constructed: Candlestick Park (1960), Dodger Stadium (1962), and Royals Stadium (1973; now Kauffman Stadium). Anaheim Stadium (now known as Angel Stadium ), although designed primarily for baseball, opened in 1966 with

22089-526: The earlier turfs, it has been seen as easier to build new stadiums for each sport rather than attempt to share an inflexible turf installation among multiple sports. Some 21st-century multi-purpose stadiums, such as Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and State Farm Stadium , have developed a more elaborate method of placing an entire playing surface, such as a grass surface for association football and an artificial turf one for gridiron football, on one or more slabs (one at State Farm, three at Tottenham Hotspur) and towing

22288-501: The early 2000s, also has had a role in the decline of the multipurpose stadium. While first-generation, short-pile turfs such as AstroTurf lent themselves well to multiple sports, this was not the case with FieldTurf and its competitors. Modern artificial turf requires a more permanent installation, including a sand and rubber base or infill that is not easily removed, and thus does not lend itself well to multipurpose stadiums. Because of such turfs' superiority in other features, compared to

22487-442: The environment. This was especially true if a baseball team were not doing particularly well either on the field or in the box office. This was another reason some baseball teams closed sections of the upper level during the regular season. Many multipurpose stadiums also had artificial turf playing surfaces, to ease the transition from baseball field to football field and vice versa. Most early installations of artificial turf such as

22686-487: The exception of Saskatoon), smaller stadiums (less than 13,000 seats) exist, which can be augmented with temporary seating to bring their capacities close to that of the smaller CFL stadiums. Most multipurpose stadiums that existed in North America overlaid one sideline of the football field along one of the baseball foul lines , with one corner of the football field being located where home plate would be. Because

22885-514: The fans closer to the field. This has created some difficulties with creating large athletics venues for major championships, as fans are less willing to accept the compromises required in the design of such stadiums, an issue that has bedevilled, e.g. the London Stadium since the 2012 Summer Olympics and was avoided in the commonwealth Games stadiums of 2000 and 2014 by returning the stadiums to football-only use, and in 2022 by having

23084-487: The field of possible sites in 1968. This drew sharp opposition primarily from the International District community, which feared the impact of the stadium on neighborhood businesses located east of the site. The King Street site was approved 8–1 by the county council in late 1971, and the groundbreaking ceremony in 1972 was held on November 2. Several protesters attended the ceremony, disrupted the speakers, and at one point threw mud balls at them. In bidding for construction of

23283-417: The field that were exploded as P-38 planes flew overhead to demonstrate how citizens should react. The first of the stadium's iconic covered grandstands was constructed in 1950 , adding 15,000 seats to the south side. Several thousand additional seats were added in 1968. In 1987 , 13,000 seats were added with the construction of the north grandstand. Similar to the south stand, this structure included

23482-463: The first audience wave originated in Husky Stadium on Halloween 1981 , at the prompting of Husky band trumpeter Dave Hunter, although it is documented to have begun at the Oakland Coliseum two weeks earlier during an MLB playoff game. Contrary to Hunter's account, former Washington yell leader Robb Weller has also claimed credit for the first wave. Weller was the guest yell-king during

23681-494: The first Mariners home game in the ALDS. Before the 1990 replacement, the AstroTurf surface was converted from baseball to football configuration via the covering of the infield with turf strips; a one-piece surface was placed over the infield after the conclusion of the Mariners season. The surface was attached together via both Velcro and Ziploc fasteners. After the 1990 replacement, separate surfaces were installed for each team;

23880-403: The first of two national stadiums, Aviva Stadium , is shared by football and rugby union, although only rugby union has a club team, Leinster Rugby , that regularly uses the facility. The other larger national stadium, Croke Park , hosts three different sports regularly: gaelic football , hurling , and its women's equivalent, camogie . All three are gaelic games run by the same organisation,

24079-408: The floor of the arena as well as additional scoreboards and a new basketball court. The center circle of the court was positioned over first base, with the court itself laid parallel and adjacent to the right-field seats; the portable seats were positioned across the court with one end hovering over home plate. The first SuperSonics game in the Kingdome under the agreement was an exhibition game versus

24278-403: The fundamentally different sizes and shapes of the playing fields made them inadequate for either sport. When used for baseball, the lower-level boxes were usually set back much farther from the field than comparable seats in baseball-only parks because they swiveled into position for American football and association football. In the case of stadiums that hosted both baseball and Canadian football,

24477-401: The game. However, a fan named Omar Parker sitting on the open (east) end of the stadium at the student side started yelling "sideways". Weller did not hear him, but then many students tried to initiate a "sideways" wave on their own. After a few attempts, and more yelling of "sideways" by students, Weller took notice. He instructed the crowd to stand as he ran past. He moved along the track toward

24676-419: The grounds of Seattle Center , site of the 1962 World's Fair . Community members decried the idea, claiming the committee was influenced by special interest groups. The Pilots began play as planned in 1969 , but Sick's Stadium proved to be a problematic venue for fans, media, and visiting players alike. The Pilots only drew 677,000 fans that season, not nearly enough to break even. It soon became apparent that

24875-715: The home of the Montreal Alouettes football team and the Montreal Expos baseball team, and began serving as an alternate home to the Montreal Impact when that team entered Major League Soccer in 2012. Similarly, the open-air Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton was constructed for the 1978 Commonwealth Games and the 1983 Summer Universiade but has also become home to the Edmonton Elks of

25074-410: The home team a distinct advantage similar to the effect on football games. The average attendance of 22,064 in 1995 was the lowest in three years with the removal of nine home games for the season, but when put in perspective, it was still higher compared to any of the Mariners' first 14 seasons. Despite its cavernous interior, the Kingdome's field dimensions were relatively small. It had a reputation as

25273-535: The installation of FieldTurf in 2000 , which lasted until 2009 when they reverted to gold for one season. Purple end zones returned prior to the 2010 season, and were temporarily painted black for the Huskies' first "blackout" game against UCLA on November 18. On September 3, 2015 , Alaska Airlines purchased naming rights to the field, which changed its official name to "Alaska Airlines Field at Husky Stadium." The agreement, worth $ 41 million over 10 years, became

25472-536: The interior and exterior design of the "classic" ballparks with the amenities of newer facilities; and "retro-modern" parks, which have modern amenities and "retro" interiors, but have modern exterior designs. The first "retro-classic" park in MLB was Oriole Park at Camden Yards in Baltimore, which opened in 1992 and was based mostly on Pilot Field's design. The "retro-modern" park made its first appearance in 1994 with

25671-481: The issue of $ 40 million in bonds to fund construction of the "King County Multipurpose Domed Stadium" with 62 percent in favor; it was part of the Forward Thrust group of bond propositions that, among other items, had a regional rapid transit system rejected. That year, a committee considered over 100 sites throughout Seattle and King County for the stadium; they unanimously decided the best site would be on

25870-399: The largest college football stadiums. The original stadium was built in 1920 by Puget Sound Bridge and Dredging Company with a seating capacity of 30,000. It replaced Denny Field , located at the north end of campus, south of NE 45th St. and 20th Ave NE. Husky Stadium's first game was the concluding game of the 1920 season, a 28–7 loss to Dartmouth on November 27. On July 27, 1923,

26069-630: The largest of its kind in college athletics. The Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA) will hold the Washington state championship games for high school football , called the Gridiron Classic, at Husky Stadium on a trial basis in December 2023. Announced by the WIAA in June, it will mark the return of the annual games to Seattle, which last hosted them at the Kingdome in 1994;

26268-466: The left- and right-field seats. In stadiums that were primarily football stadiums converted to baseball stadiums, the stands were at nearly right angles. This allowed the football field to be squared within the bleachers, but left the baseball configuration with many undesirable views farther away from home plate or facing away from the diamond, such as at the Kingdome, the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, and

26467-484: The length of a regulation American football field is 360 feet, longer than the roughly 330-foot average for foul lines in Major League Baseball, this requires an unusually long distance from the home plate to the fence along the foul line on which the football field is constructed, part of the football field to be constructed in foul territory (and the size of said territory to be increased accordingly), or

26666-419: The lines, the distance was also listed in fathoms (52.7 fm), presumably to maintain a nautical theme in line with the team name; however, this practice was ditched after the 1980 season . Like the Kingdome's contemporaries, the bullpens were located in foul territory adjacent to the baselines and the stands. The longest game in the Kingdome took place on July 30, 1998 , when the Cleveland Indians defeated

26865-475: The lower boxes were set even farther back than their American counterparts, because Canadian football fields are 30 yards longer and considerably wider than their American counterparts. Likewise, attempts to build stadiums without support columns to obstruct spectators' views, as was the case with sport-specific "jewel box" stadiums, resulted in upper decks being placed very high above the field—as far as 600 feet away in some cases. Several teams closed off sections of

27064-413: The most ravenous fan bases in the NFL, a reputation that has carried over to what is now Lumen Field. The Kingdome's reputation contributed to the NFL's 1989 vote in favor of enacting a rule penalizing home teams for excessive crowd noise; it was especially loathed by Seahawks fans during preseason games, with fan displeasure throughout the league leading commissioner Pete Rozelle to soften enforcement of

27263-460: The nation's history. Gaelic grounds can easily accommodate both as the typical Gaelic pitch, while similarly rectangular, is significantly longer and wider than the fields used for soccer and rugby union, which are almost identical in dimensions. Historically, however, the GAA has been reluctant to allow 'foreign' sports to use its facilities, although these objections were set aside both for the rebuild of

27462-408: The national athletics body as the sole primary tenant of a renovated stadium. Winter sports facilities, especially speed skating rinks , can be multi-purpose stadiums. Very often, a rink or two of approximately 61 by 30 meters—the regulation size of an IIHF ice hockey rink —are placed inside the oval. Sometimes the ice surface is even larger, allowing for both bandy and curling . In Ireland,

27661-618: The notable exception of Toronto). Instead, stadiums were built primarily for Canadian Football League (CFL) teams and to host multiple-sport events, such as the Winter Olympics , Commonwealth Games , and Pan American Games . Three of Canada's largest stadiums from this era and type feature domed or retractable roofs : namely BC Place in Vancouver, SkyDome/Rogers Centre in Toronto, and Olympic Stadium in Montreal. BC Place

27860-428: The open end of the stadium, explaining to the student crowd what he would do, then ran along the track toward the closed end of the stadium, in front of the student section. The stunt caught on after a couple of tries and continued around the entire stadium, and was then repeated throughout the rest of the game and the season. Longtime UW band director Bill Bissell also claimed co-creator credit with Weller, suggesting that

28059-499: The opening of Jacobs Field, now known as Progressive Field , in Cleveland . Many football teams that shared a stadium with a baseball team had their stadiums converted into football-only facilities shortly after the baseball tenant left, while other football teams followed their baseball counterparts and had new football-only stadiums constructed. The widespread adoption of FieldTurf , and similar modern artificial turfs beginning in

28258-416: The original AstroTurf was nothing more than carpet on top of concrete with little padding, material that was easy to apply and remove. Such types of removable artificial turf caused frequent injuries to players and eventually made free agents wary of signing with teams whose home fields had artificial turf. During the first month of the football season, the playing field included the baseball infield soil that

28457-484: The outfield was symmetrical with a uniform wall height: deep in center, and short elsewhere. For the All-Star Game in 1979, center field was 410 feet (120 m), power alleys were 357 feet (109 m), and the foul lines were 316 feet (96 m); the unpadded wall was green with a top yellow stripe, approximately twelve feet (3.7 m) in height and did not have the power alley distances listed on it. Down

28656-557: The oval configuration for cricket and Australian rules football and a rectangular configuration for rugby and association football, and in the case of Singapore's National Stadium, an athletics configuration as well. Association football stadiums have historically served as track and field arenas, too, and some (like the Olympiastadion in Berlin) still do, whereas a newer generation frequently has no running track, in order to allow

28855-830: The permanent homes to any club teams, but are used primarily for international competitions and major tournament finals, mostly for association football and rugby (though Wembley has regularly hosted American football). In South Africa, Soccer City and Ellis Park Stadium have hosted rugby union and football, while Moses Mabhida Stadium has hosted football and cricket. Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, Kochi , in India hosts cricket and football. Eden Park in New Zealand hosts rugby union and cricket. Sky Stadium in Wellington, New Zealand , has hosted both rugby codes, cricket, association football, and Australian rules football. Architects from

29054-428: The poor sight lines and cold temperatures in the Kingdome. All these factors, plus dwindling attendance due to poor team performance towards the end of their tenancy at the Kingdome, led SuperSonics general manager Zollie Volchok to sign a 10-year contract with the city of Seattle in 1983, agreeing to have the team move back to the Coliseum after the 1984–85 season in exchange for upgrades there. The SuperSonics faced

29253-422: The portable sections would be placed in the western quadrant of the stadium and serve as the third-base half of the infield. In the football configuration, these would be placed in the northern quadrant of the stadium (covering what is used as left field in the baseball configuration) to allow for the football field to be laid out east–west. This had the advantage of improving sight lines for both sports while keeping

29452-452: The possible use of the stadium for Major League Soccer or international soccer, which has similar field dimensions to American football. Fields that are suitable for soccer are almost always equally suitable for either rugby code ( rugby union or rugby league ), and the 2031 Rugby World Cup is expected to employ the same stadiums as the NFL and MLS. Outside North America, the term is rarely used, since association football (i.e., soccer)

29651-559: The previous season . At the time, the Kingdome was known in the NBA for being the noisiest arena for basketball and for having the largest crowds, with stadium vendor Bill Scott ( a.k.a. Bill the Beerman) taking the duties as cheerleader. In the 1979–80 season , the SuperSonics set an NBA record average attendance of 21,725 fans per game (since broken). The SuperSonics set the NBA single-game playoff attendance record at 39,457 during Game 4 of

29850-401: The reconfiguration process more easily, or be removed for non-sporting events. Furthermore, many of these stadiums were either enclosed domes (where natural grass could not grow without sunlight) or located in cold-weather cities (where undersoil heating was expensive and unreliable) and before the development of hybrid grass and improved natural grass cultivation techniques, artificial turf was

30049-518: The roof were toppled as one or two of them buckled, bringing down the others in a domino effect . By January 1974, the stadium reached 50 percent completion; only reaching 60 percent completion in July, it was clear that Drake would not reach the December deadline at that point. It was also apparent that Drake was ill-prepared to work on a project with such scale, with numerous errors, delays, and short-staffing slowing down construction. Efforts to renegotiate

30248-482: The rule before the start of the regular season. Raucous Seahawk fans at the Kingdome were also some of the earliest performers of The Wave . The city of Seattle made numerous bids to host the Super Bowl during the Seahawks' tenure at the Kingdome. However, despite five bids over 12 years, the Kingdome was never awarded the opportunity to host a Super Bowl; its closest chance was in 1989 for Super Bowl XXVI , which

30447-421: The same day as the agreement signing, longtime Kingdome critic Frank Ruano filed a referendum petition in an attempt to halt the move, but he announced on September 17 that he would withdraw support from the petition for lack of support. While the SuperSonics had played a few games at the Kingdome over the previous two seasons, their full-time tenancy required the addition of 5,000 portable stadium seats added onto

30646-607: The same sight-line problems for football, rugby league, and rugby union as an athletics venue would. Playing sports with rectangle-shaped pitches on larger ovals often means fans can be as much as 30 metres (98 ft) or more from the sidelines. Both Stadium Australia in Sydney and the Docklands Stadium in Melbourne have retractable seating, to be able to change from an oval to rectangle shape and bring fans closer to

30845-400: The seating area before a scheduled Mariners game in 1994. As a result, public funding packages for new, purpose-built stadiums for the Mariners and Seahawks were respectively approved in 1995 and 1997. The Mariners moved to Safeco Field, now known as T-Mobile Park , midway through the 1999 season, and the Seahawks temporarily moved to Husky Stadium after the 1999 season . On March 26, 2000,

31044-476: The sidelines. The student section was relocated from the north sideline to the west end zone, and the temporary bleachers in the east end zone were replaced with a permanent structure featuring field-level suites. The addition of box suites reduced the seating capacity from 72,500 to 70,138. Despite the reduction in capacity, the renovated stadium is expected to be as loud as its predecessor. Additionally, new parking garages were constructed and facilities throughout

31243-530: The slab(s) in and out of place for each sport. Because of the expense of using this method, it is generally only used for the highest-level professional sports. The Miami Marlins moved to Marlins Park , a new retractable-roof stadium in Miami, in 2012. Sun Life Stadium (now Hard Rock Stadium) was then renovated to eliminate its baseball functionality, making it a football-only stadium. With the Marlins' relocation,

31442-416: The sound. On occasion, the high decibel levels at Husky games along with fans stomping their feet in the bleachers cause television cameras to shake. During the night game against #12 Nebraska on September 19, 1992 , ESPN measured the noise level at over 130 decibels , well above the threshold of pain . The maximum recorded level of 133.6 decibels, according to ESPN, is the highest ever recorded at

31641-467: The specific way they accommodate court sports. Both the Super Arena (used mainly for basketball, volleyball, mixed martial arts , and professional wrestling events) and Paris La Défense Arena (home of rugby union's Racing 92 ) feature movable seating blocks that allow each facility to serve as an appropriately sized venue for either field or court sports. In 2014, Singapore's new National Stadium

31840-466: The stadium addition was completed in time for the start of the 1987 Husky football season . Husky Stadium was a primary venue for the 1990 Goodwill Games , where the crowd saw an address by former President Ronald Reagan , as well as an address by Arnold Schwarzenegger , and a performance by the Moody Blues & Gorky Park . The stadium hosted the opening and closing ceremonies, as well as

32039-493: The stadium also had four tiers of seats, luxury boxes , a facade facing the street, and a roof, whereas the northern half of the stadium used a simpler two-tiered seating configuration. During reconstruction, the athletics track was removed, and the north half of the stadium was demolished, reducing the capacity to 49,000 when it reopened as Turner Field . Because of the former track area, the field of play , particularly foul territory , although not large by historical standards,

32238-461: The stadium feel too enclosed, and cut off panoramic views of the stadium's aesthetic surroundings (waterfront, skyline, mountains). The suburban locales of many multipurpose stadiums (as well as other sport-specific stadiums also built there) were also a focal point of criticism. Choosing a suburb over a city core was meant to take advantage of lower land values and new freeways. Suburbs were often poorly serviced by public transit, and when coupled with

32437-532: The stadium plans in limbo, the team was forced to declare bankruptcy . Despite efforts by Seattle-area businessmen to buy the team as well as an attempt to keep the team in Seattle through the court system, the Pilots were sold to Milwaukee businessman Bud Selig , who relocated the team to Milwaukee and renamed it the Milwaukee Brewers a week before the start of the 1970 season . The push to build

32636-467: The stadium was the site of President Warren G. Harding 's final public address; he died in San Francisco six days later. The capacity of the lower bowl was expanded with the addition of 10,000 seats around the rim in 1936. In 1943, 35,000 people watched a demonstration of a mock WWII bombing raid, showing how local forces would respond in an attack. The Seattle fire department and emergency response teams rescued mock victims and buildings constructed on

32835-406: The stadium, which had separate offers for the dome and the rest of the stadium, Donald M. Drake Construction Company of Portland, Oregon , was the winning contractor for both with respective bids of $ 28.9 million and $ 5.9 million. Peter Kiewit Sons Construction Company was the only other bidder, offering $ 30.57 million for the stadium and $ 5.8 million for the roof; the latter came with the caveat of

33034-483: The stands. This made the football viewing farther away, and in some cases partially obscured as in Candlestick Park. In the case of Qualcomm Stadium, it was constructed with half of the field-level seating being permanent (built of concrete, in the southern quadrant of the stadium), and the other half portable (modular construction using aluminum or steel framing). When the stadium was configured for baseball,

33233-465: The suburban stadium was not located in the municipality that the team purportedly represented, and in some cases the stadium was over a state border. An instance of this was Giants Stadium , which primarily hosted football, but was also an association football stadium at times. Its primary tenants, the New York Giants and New York Jets , were nominally based in New York City, but Giants Stadium

33432-442: The team began to decline in performance; after winning the AFC West that year, it suffered a franchise-worst 2–14 record in 1992 . Season ticket sales, which had reached 62,000 that year with a waiting list of 30,000, gradually decreased to 46,000 in 1995 , with the team averaging 46,218 in attendance over five games at the Kingdome in 1994 ; as a result, the Seahawks began failing to sell out games, resulting in their blackout in

33631-416: The time of opening) and Arrowhead Stadium . The Truman Sports Complex was the first example of multiple stadiums being built for specific sports at the same time. The designers, Kivett and Myers, were then absorbed by Kansas City architecture firm Hellmuth, Obata, and Kassabaum to become HOK Sport + Venue + Event (now the independent firm Populous ), which went on to design many professional sports venues in

33830-500: The title games were moved to the Tacoma Dome in nearby Tacoma in 1995. The Seattle and Tacoma Police Departments played a yearly game named the Bacon Bowl to raise money for charity from 1980 to 2005; the Kingdome hosted it from the beginning until 1982, then had a one-off in 1985 during a nine-year span in which the Tacoma Dome hosted the rest of the games. The Kingdome hosted the game again from 1992 to 1994 before it returned to

34029-469: The track & field competition. Husky Stadium was the temporary home of the Seattle Seahawks for five games (two preseason and three regular season) in 1994 while the Kingdome was temporarily closed for repairs to its damaged roof. After the demolition of the Kingdome in March 2000, the Seahawks played at Husky Stadium for the 2000 and 2001 seasons before moving into Seahawks Stadium (now Lumen Field ) in 2002 . The playing field at Husky Stadium

34228-451: The trend of personal transportation shifting from public transit to private cars in the mid-20th century, meant that many of the stadiums of that period (multipurpose or sport-specific) were surrounded by large parking lots. In some suburban locales, hospitality, entertainment, and shopping facilities were often non-existent due to lacking the supporting population or due to municipality zoning restrictions. Suburban stadiums fell out of favor by

34427-402: The turf to bounce many of his long throws to first. The concrete or painted concrete façades of many stadiums of that era (multipurpose or sport-specific) were criticized by architects as uninviting. Most such stadiums were built in the relatively plain brutalist and international styles popular at the time, which fell out of fashion in the 1980s. Furthermore, the "concrete donut" design made

34626-406: The university granted significantly discounted venue fees for the WIAA, with the latter hoping for a long-term agreement if the games are successfully held. The games were previously rotated among three Pierce County high school venues after the WIAA elected to move them out of the Tacoma Dome in 2019 amid rising costs and impaired sight lines from the latter's 2018 renovations. Many claim that

34825-459: The university holds its annual commencement at the stadium each June. It sits at the southeast corner of campus, between Montlake Boulevard Northeast and Union Bay , just north of the Montlake Cut . The stadium is served by the University of Washington Link light rail station, which provides rail service to downtown , Rainier Valley and Seattle–Tacoma International Airport . It is also accessible by several bus routes. The stadium underwent

35024-438: The upcoming meeting on the road and playing the home game during the latter meeting. An example of the former happening was in 1997 when the Florida Marlins played game 7 of the World Series at home on Sunday, October 26, which moved the Miami Dolphins game against the Chicago Bears to Monday night. An example of the latter happening was in 1989 when the San Francisco Giants hosted a postseason game on Sunday, October 8, against

35223-431: The upper deck as far as 617 feet (188 m) from home plate. Part of the problem was that the Kingdome was not a multipurpose stadium in the truest sense. Instead, it was built as a football stadium that could convert into a baseball stadium. For instance, most fans in the outfield seats on the 300 level were unable to see parts of right and center field; these areas were not part of the football playing field. For most of

35422-488: The upper level and only sold them during the playoffs, as they were too far away to be of any use during the regular season. For football, the seats nearest the field were set farther back than at football-only stadiums to accommodate the larger baseball field. In some cases, the seats closest to the field, normally prime seats for baseball, were almost at field level for football. In general, spectator sight lines were not optimized for either sport, i.e., seats were angled towards

35621-452: The venue now known as Hard Rock Stadium . For stadiums such as the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum , where the Los Angeles Dodgers played their home games from 1958 through 1961 while awaiting completion of Dodger Stadium , this also had the undesirable effect of having unusually short foul lines, making it easier to hit so-called " Chinese home runs ". Baseball stadiums that were converted to football stadiums had more of an obtuse angle between

35820-446: The wave was devised by both of them prior to the game. The following week Bill Scott (known as "Bill the Beer Man") started the wave in Husky Stadium and also at the Seattle Seahawks game in the Kingdome. Husky Stadium has long been recognized as one of the loudest stadiums in the nation. This is in part due to the stadium's design; almost 70% of the seats are located between the end zones, covered by cantilevered metal roofs that trap

36019-419: Was a 91-yard touchdown and the other was a historic plowing into Seahawks high-profile rookie linebacker Brian "The Boz" Bosworth . The Seahawks regularly sold out games at the Kingdome from its inception and throughout the 1980s; 117 consecutive regular-season home games were sold out between 1979 and 1993 . However, after Ken Behring took over ownership of the team from the Nordstrom family in 1988 ,

36218-400: Was also a big issue since the MLB postseason overlaps with the NFL regular season. If a baseball team advances in the postseason to the point where it is scheduled to play a postseason game on the same day the football team plays a home game, adjustments had to be made, such as having the game moved to Monday night or – if a division opponent were scheduled – have the game sites switched, putting

36417-400: Was also renovated with additional seating, including a 4,500-ton, three-tier movable grandstand to accommodate both baseball and football configurations. Mile High Stadium was home to the AFL / NFL Denver Broncos and the MLB Colorado Rockies franchises. For the 1996 Summer Olympics , the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG) built the temporary Centennial Olympic Stadium in

36616-440: Was also used for baseball. The original Yankee Stadium was designed to accommodate football, as well as track and field (Yankee Stadium popularized the warning track , originally designed as a running track around baseball fields), in addition to its primary use for baseball. In addition to baseball, Fenway Park and Braves Field would host college football and several professional football teams (all of whom relocated within

36815-419: Was awarded to the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome in Minneapolis , Minnesota . In its 1982 bid for Super Bowl XIX , the Seattle City Council voted to give tax exemptions to the NFL if the league selected the Kingdome to host the game. The Seahawks played their final game at the Kingdome on January 9, 2000 , suffering a first-round playoff loss to the Miami Dolphins in their first playoff appearance since

37014-401: Was constructed, artificial turf was considered a must because the roof was likely to inhibit the growth of natural grass, like the Astrodome 's roof. The AstroTurf surface was first replaced in July 1983 during the MLB All-Star break; Monsanto , the then-owner of AstroTurf, won the turf replacement contract over SuperTurf (then used by the Metrodome) with a bid of $ 1.2 million. By request of

37213-441: Was criticized for leaving spectators exposed to the elements, and for the long distance between the stands and the pitch resulting in poor visibility. This was because the athletics track, which was seldom used, was constructed around the outside of the pitch, while views from the lower tier were also restricted due to the positioning of advertising boards. These factors contributed to low attendances; only 237 spectators showed up for

37412-422: Was demolished so that a football-specific replacement could be built on the site as part of Portugal's bid to host Euro 2004 . German stadiums such as the AWD-Arena , Commerzbank-Arena , MHPArena , RheinEnergieStadion , AOL Arena , and Zentralstadion also underwent reconstruction/renovation to remove the running track an thus become football-only venues. Several of these projects were done in preparation for

37611-410: Was first proposed to Seattle officials in 1959. Voters rejected separate measures to approve public funding for such a stadium in 1960 and 1966, but the outcome was different in 1968; King County voters approved the issue of $ 40 million in municipal bonds to construct the stadium. Construction began in 1972 and the stadium opened in 1976 as the home of the Sounders and Seahawks. The Mariners moved in

37810-444: Was larger than most MLB stadiums of its era. After the 2016 season, the Braves moved to the new SunTrust Park , and Georgia State University purchased Turner Field and surrounding parking lots for a major campus expansion project. As part of this project, Turner Field was reconfigured as Center Parc Stadium , a downsized rectangular stadium that is now home to the university's football team . The first multipurpose stadium in Canada

38009-421: Was moved to CenturyLink (Qwest Field through 2011) to advance the start of the project by several weeks. The new Husky Stadium was developed by Wright Runstad & Company, designed by 360 Architecture , and constructed by Turner Construction company. The steel decking was supplied by Profile Steel. The new stadium is the first and primary income source of a completely remodeled athletic district which includes

38208-456: Was multipurpose in practice, being convertible between football and baseball. Home of the Minnesota Vikings through the 2013 season, it was also home to the Minnesota Twins until 2009 and the Minnesota Golden Gophers football team (NCAA) until 2008 as well as the Minnesota Golden Gophers baseball team (NCAA) until 2012. The Metrodome has been demolished, with U.S. Bank Stadium , built mainly for professional football but able to convert to

38407-435: Was neither in New York City or even New York State . Instead, it was in the Meadowlands of East Rutherford, New Jersey . As a result, then-Governor Mario Cuomo would not attend any games at Giants Stadium (instead choosing to attend the home games of the Buffalo Bills as they were "New York State's only team" in the NFL). A similar criticism applied to Giants Stadium's replacement, MetLife Stadium . Association football

38606-406: Was opened. It can convert between an oval for cricket, rectangle for rugby and association football, and a running track for athletics. Kalinga Stadium is a multi-purpose international sports complex in Bhubaneswar , Odisha , India . Construction was begun in 1978. It is best known as the home ground of the Indian Super League football club Odisha FC since that club's inception in 2019 . It

38805-455: Was originally dirt, which was then replaced with natural grass in 1938 . In 1968 , Washington became one of the first major college teams to play on AstroTurf at home; at the time, the Houston Astrodome , Neyland Stadium in Knoxville, Tennessee , and Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin , were the only other major facilities with artificial turf. The AstroTurf field was replaced in 1972 , 1977 , 1987 , and 1995 . FieldTurf ,

39004-411: Was perceived as an especially bad fit for this type of stadium because, in the United States, the sport does not draw as many fans to games as American football or baseball (with the exceptions of Atlanta and Seattle ), resulting in the stadium being filled to only a fraction of its capacity. This, combined with a desire for more compact, intimate stadiums akin to those of European football clubs, led to

39203-452: Was renovated to a baseball-only facility in 1997, three years after the Rams' departure for St. Louis. Similarly, Candlestick Park was renovated into a multipurpose stadium in 1970 to accommodate the San Francisco 49ers ' move from Kezar Stadium and converted to football-only after the San Francisco Giants moved to their new ballpark in 2000. Candlestick Park was demolished in 2015. Another baseball stadium, Denver's Mile High Stadium ,

39402-411: Was the Montreal Olympic Stadium , which was built for the 1976 Summer Olympics and initially had functions to host events of different sports and types. However, the project became obsolete over time and the stadium lost its original functions, becoming a "white elephant". The first successful such stadium was the Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton , which was built for the 1978 Commonwealth Games and

39601-516: Was the home ground of the I-League club Indian Arrows from 2018 until 2022 . Its main stadium is configured for football and athletics , with an 8-lane synthetic athletics track surrounding the football pitch. Field hockey , tennis , table tennis , basketball , volleyball , wall climbing , and swimming are accommodated elsewhere within the complex. While multipurpose stadiums were intended to easily accommodate both American football and baseball (and in some cases, association football),

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