Chicago Cubs: A Cubs fan takes a tour of the Cactus League

Chicago Cubs: Peoria Sports Complex

Peoria Sports Complex is home to the San Diego Padres and Seattle Mariners, and on this night, I saw the Cubs play the former. USA Today ranked this stadium as the second-best in the Cactus League. I guess I’m not sure why.

Though I didn’t have a bad experience there – far from it – I wouldn’t say that it was among my favorites. I will add to that the fact that we attended a night game there, so it’s a little challenging to compare it to the other stadiums that we visited in the daytime.

Peoria, like Surprise, is in the northwest part of the Phoenix area, though it’s a bit of a shorter drive, and there isn’t as much city traffic that we had to go through. We had little trouble finding a parking spot for $5.

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There are two things about this stadium that I liked. One was the view from the outfield, as we came in from one of the outfield gates. It was a magnificent view, though I don’t like the fact that, when you’re walking around the perimeter inside the stadium, much of it is blocked from the view of the playing field. (This is unlike Sloan Park or Salt River Fields, where you can see the action no matter where you are.)

The other thing I like is the scoreboard, which might have been the best one of the stadiums I attended. (Sloan Park’s scoreboard, for example, seems way too small.) It’s a colossal scoreboard that hovers over the otherwise pretty essential stadium like a giant. The other “scoreboards” behind home plate, for example, are not graphics-based, while the rest of the stadium lacks many frills. Meanwhile, our seats, which were in the second row on the third-base side, were pretty cramped. Food selection isn’t the best there, either.

This is not a bad stadium, but I don’t think it’s up to par with some of the other ones in the Cactus League. Visit it if you can, though don’t make it your top priority.