August 13, 2006
A lot has been made of the concession prices at PAETEC Park versus what prices are like at Frontier Field and the Blue Cross Arena. Since I was forced to attend the Red Wings game on Wednesday with my work group, I figured I'd use my trip to Frontier Field to do a little research. I didn't buy everything I'm comparing either at Frontier Field or at PAETEC Park, so I can't comment on the quality, but here are the prices I saw listed at the two stadiums:
Bottled Water -
$2.50 at Frontier Field and $3.00 at PAETEC Park. Also, I believe the
bottles at Frontier were slightly bigger at 20 oz to 16.9 oz at PAETEC
Park.
Bottled Soda - $3.00 at Frontier Field and $3.50 at PAETEC Park.
Off the top of my head, I remember the bottled water and bottled soda prices being $3.00 and $3.50 last year for Rhinos games at Frontier Field. So, either they cut their prices in the offseason or they charged more for the drinks at Rhinos games.
Red Osier Original Sandwich - $5.50 at Frontier Field and $6.00 at PAETEC Park.
Soft Pretzel - $3.00 at both Frontier Field and PAETEC Park.
Zweigle's White Hot - $3.00 at Frontier Field and $3.75 at PAETEC Park.
Slice of pepperoni pizza - $3.25 at Frontier Field and $3.50 at PAETEC Park.
Chicken Fingers and Fries - $4.25 at Frontier Field and $6.50 at PAETEC Park.
Souvenir sized fountain soda - $3.50 at Frontier Field and $4.00 at PAETEC Park. Also, the souvenir cup at Frontier Field doesn't look as nice, but is twice the size of the one at Frontier Field.
Bottled beer - $4.50 at Frontier Field and $5.50 for domestic and $6.00 for imported beers at PAETEC Park.
It appears that SportService has a ways to go before they are cost competitive with the concessions at Frontier Field.
Real Salt Lake is staying in Utah
Summary of RSL stadium proposal
Stadium deal brings pomp before details
Rocky an unlikely hero in 11th-hour agreement
On the eve of the August 12th deadline set by Real Salt Lake owner Dave Checketts to get a stadium deal done, the team and officials in Sandy, Utah finally appear to have agreed on a deal to build a soccer specific stadium.
The deal still has to be approved by Salt Lake County council, but everyone involved believes that this time the votes really are there to get the deal done.
So yet again, someone in an MLS
market brings up the possibility of the team moving to Rochester and
they end up getting a new stadium deal done. But, did anyone really
expect anything else to happen?
Rhinos get a split with first place Montreal and then lose in Minnesota
The Rhinos looked lethargic in a 2-0 loss in Montreal and then it was the Impact that looked less than stellar in a 1-0 Rhinos win on Friday night at PAETEC Park.
The Rhinos once again failed to get a result in Montreal. This time things fell apart late in the first half when rookie midfielder Josh Bolton, who was starting only the second match of his career, turned the ball over and it ended up in the back of the Rhinos net when ex-Syracuse Salty Dog Lars Lyssand beat Scott Vallow.
Then, six minutes later and four minutes into the second half, Leonardo Di Lorenzo put Montreal up 2-0 on an assist from Mauro Biello.
Montreal controlled the match for the most part as they outshot the Rhinos 10 to 4 and Greg Sutton only needed to make two saves to get the clean sheet.
Things were pretty much the exact opposite on Friday evening as the Rhinos celebrated Doug Miller Night to start things off. The ceremony was really nice as the Rhinos unveiled the two retired numbers in franchise history: the #14 for the late Mickey Trotman and #19 for Doug Miller.
Then the Rhinos came out with a 4-3-3 as Coach Calloway went with Rey Martinez and Jonny Steele up top with Matthew Delicate and the added speed made all the difference in the world.
The Rhinos were only able to beat Sutton once as Matthew Delicate scored his team leading eighth goal off a cross from Frankie Sanfilippo. The cross came in from the right wing, John Ball made a nice near post dummy run drawing both Sutton and the Impact defense and then Delicate had a sitter from about 3 yards out.
Scott Vallow only needed to make two saves to get his league leading 11th clean sheet on the season.
Unfortunately, my Man of the Match, Rey Martinez, left the match with a groin injury and was unable to make the trip to Minnesota. Also joining Martinez on the injury list are defender Kenney Bertz (hamstring) and Aaran Lines (concussion) who missed the second match versus Montreal and did not make the trip to take on the Thunder.
In Minnesota, the Thunder knocked off another top team at home. Two weeks ago, Minnesota upset the Montreal Impact 2-1 and today they defeated the Rhinos on a Terry Alvino second half goal.
The Rhinos had a quality chance to take the lead in the first half when Greg Howes hit the post. But after that, the Rhinos offense never really got going and they ended up on the short end of the 1-0 scoreline.
The good news is that the Rhinos have a home and home with the Toronto Lynx coming up next weekend and the Charleston Battery lost to Miami FC, so the Rhinos are still in second place in the USL First Division.
Rhinos upping the marketing push
First it was Doug Miller Night and now it's a $10,000 cash giveaway.
Doug Miller Night helped the Rhinos draw their largest crowd since opening night as over 11,000 fans came out to honor the Rhinos all time leading scorer and take on their arch rival Montreal Impact.
And coming up on Friday night versus the Toronto Lynx, the Rhinos will be handing out 1700 envelopes that will contain $10,000 in cash. The pay outs will range from $2 to $500. Also, 2300 envelopes will have merchandise and concession gift certificates.
Add in the Rhinos sponsoring the Channel 13 morning news and the Rhinos are trying to put a little more marketing dollars and energy into drawing fans to PAETEC Park.
Hopefully this promotion on Friday works as well, or better, than Doug Miller Night did.
The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author, and not necessarily those of the Rochester Rhinos or SoccerSam.com. Feel free to send any comments or complaints to news@soccersam.com. James promises to read (but not to respond) to all of them.
