Terps Sports

it was awful and a little dated...the gays have long migrated beyond Dupont.

ive been to like five games there...and im not saying the ravens walk is the tailgate scene im saying ive never seen their tailgate scene and it seems as tho most people are at the ravens walk or in bars as opposed to in a traditional parking lot tailgate setting...so it took me aback when you said their tailgating is "widely known" as the best

the Fed Hill development and bar scene existed prior to OPACY-it continued on after it was built but that area was actually one of the few nice spots downtown in the late 80s.

anytime you bring 70K into town for a Ravens game, of course the size of the crowd makes the party. If the Skins had a stadium near Capitol Hill, do you think the tailgate scene in the surrounding hoods would be any different? And that's a far cry from most Orioles games.

I was just in the inner harbor not long ago-what scenary are we talking about? The powerplant live? it's not bad but a tad cheesy, don't you think? There were a lot of empty spaces in the inner harbor area and what was left were chain restaurants and stores-hardly this image of charm city.

PennQ/chinatown is a commercial area that turned into mixed development...it's not a neighborhood with brownstones or corner pubs...that's why they built lofts and high end condos, and brought in higher end restaurants and shops. Baltimore folks like to claim DC is sterile and without character, but that's largely in part due to Baltimore's make-up where nice little cozy hoods are adjacent to sketchy streets. There are a lot of hoods (mentioned below) that are not sterile, but in general DC is just segregated differently because when the wealth comes in, it takes the entire hood, not gentrification by the block as is done in Bmore.

The bottom line is whether the team is good or not to bring the crowd in. I went to an O's game pre-Buck and the scene outside the stadium was nothing special as evident by the small crowd inside the stadium. When they build around Nats park, it will be a good scene. DC has turned one hood after another (H street, U street, 14th Street, Ledroit, Logan, Eastern Market/Mt. Vernon, Adams Morgan, etc...) for the past dozen years...I doubt that will stop if the developers pour money into SW Dc outside the stadium.

if comparing outdoor tailgating at football and baseball games to the scene of a downtown arena is the objective, I'm not sure what the point would be. Hopefully the Nats will ultimately have a similar tailgate/bar scene when they develop that area.

You say this like Verizon Center/GP/Chinatown/PQ was one huge planned development. Let's put the arena here, the AT&T store here, Legal Seafood there, Fuddrucker's over there, turn on the lights and watch the people come. That whole area was absolutely nubs before VC. There was nothing doing. Do I wish there were less franchise/chains occupying spots down there? Sure, but they only went there because VC brought people down and opened that area up.

I'm not going to lose sleep because that area isn't "keeping it real" considering what it was before. I can get a Thai dinner and four beers for $25 before a game...I don't really feel I'm missing out because it's not $2 Bud products all night with 98 Rock broadcasting live in the corner underneath the Eddie Murray jersey on the wall.

It's less than a mile walk. Don't even bother with the metro from Cantina Marina.

http://goo.gl/maps/EaiE

I really don't agree with this.

KC, sure awesome tailgating scene.

nothing that memorable about either Philly or Meadowlands though.

as a Redskins fan, the absolute worst is FedEx field. thankfully, I'm done going there after last season.

the "best" tailgating environments that I have seen are Green Bay (#1 by a long shot, the whole town shuts down, and it's a big party), and Pittsburgh.

Raven's tailgating kicks the Redskins's asses, and it isn't close. I'd rank the Ravens in/at/around a top 5. Lots of stuff to do, and good atmosphere.

The new Nat's stadium is OK, nothing more, and nothing less. They should have definitely taken a page from both Camden Yards and PNC in regard to site lines. But they didn't. They HAD to build that big ass garage just outside the Stadium because they needed the Parking to comply with Zoning requirements. It WILL be better once the neighborhood around it improves/starts development. It'll probably be 5-10 years before this is fully built out.

Haven't been to Wrigley, but I've been to just about every ballpark on the East Coast, plus a few other random places and I think Pickles/Sliders is a close second to Fenway for best bar scene around the ballpark. Fenway is relatively expensive too, so I honestly could see that going either way. Yankee Stadium has a few good bars across the street from the old place but it just way too expensive. Everywhere else I've been has little to no pregame scene, unless you count tailgating in the parking lot (Philly).

Federal Hill did exist in the 80's but it is nothing like it is now. The entire penninsula is nice now, 10 years ago you didn't go south of Fort Ave, 20 years ago you didn't go south of Cross St. The Whole Cross St. area has changed a lot too. I've lived in Fed Hill for 8 years, and it gets nicer and more rehabbed every month, and most people credit the stadiums for the renaissance.

Didn't you do just this above:

"I've been to Pickles and the other local spots near the Park a million times, you're acting like it's something ridiculously special...they're sportsbars! As noted prior, what developed around Verizon Center has turned out to be much cooler than anything around the Baltimore stadiums..."

That is what the Baltimore folks are responding to. Also, as noted in my post above, the actual indoors bar of Pickles and Sliders is not anything special at all... they are divey sports bars. The roped off outside area is great though.

Theres generally a good crowd there on a Friday or Saturday, especially if the weather is nice. As I stated before, I prefer the local bars of Federal Hill to the chain / franchise bars of Chinatown. Thats not to say DC doesnt have plenty of areas with solid local bars.

Is that beer garden across the street from the nats park still open? I think it was called the bullpen?