Watching Sports Has Never Been Simpler

This post originally appeared in the Blotch section of the Fort Worth Weekly's website. To consume it there : https://www.fwweekly.com/2017/12/14/sports-rush-a-simpler-time-for-sports/

So, how do you watch sports? This used to be a simple question, right? You either went to the game or you turned on the television (after checking the newspaper or the TV Guide to see if one of a handful of  television stations had scheduled it).

Has the sports viewing landscape has grown more complicated in the last 30-40 years? Instead of a few broadcast stations, you now have a multiplicity of outlets, and, consequently, a lot more games. And no longer do you just adjust the rabbit ears on the household’s only TV. You have a wide choice of devices on which to consume broadcasts.
You’ve still got the legacy broadcast networks, and they do still show some sports. They each own cable channels dedicated solely to sporting content, like ESPN and the Fox regional sports networks (RSNs). They’ve got joint ventures with other entities, like the SEC Network, the Longhorn Network, and the Big Ten Network. Other companies compete with them, too, as the likes of beIN Sports, the Tennis Channel, and AT&T-owned RSNs try to carve out market share.

And telecasts don’t actually require a television channel. The likes of Amazon, Facebook, YouTube, MLB Advanced Media, and others allow one to stream video feeds of athletic contests. The networks themselves, in fact, operate “over-the-top” services to enable streaming of events whose rights they control, like FOX Sports GO or WatchESPN.

So do all these choices make it more complicated to watch sports? I don’t think so, especially when you consider the entire process of game-watching.

If you just want to watch sport the way the casual fan did in the 1970s, you still can. Check the TV listings in the newspaper sports section that morning, watch a game or two on network affiliates on Saturdays and Sundays, and occasionally go to one of your local team’s matches.
What if you wanted to plan ahead a bit, though? Even just knowing when your team played required effort. You either had to have clipped the schedule out of the newspaper when it came out at the beginning of the season or you had to acquire a physical copy, often in the form of a pocket schedule. You would have acquired one of those by traveling to a local merchant, assuming you had been able to find out which ones sponsored the team, or the team offices. And you had to hope it hadn’t changed since the printing date. Game times, broadcast carrier changes, and rainouts could all invalidate a given date on an analog schedule.

Today, you simply pick up your phone on a whim and use a search engine (or a league or team app) to find the latest schedule in a minute.

And say you wanted to watch a game played in another city that didn’t involve your local team? If it didn’t happen to be the game of the week on TV, what would you do? How would you even know the game was being played? If you had purchased a season preview magazine at the beginning of the season and prevented your spouse from throwing it away, it might have schedules for all the teams. You could write a physical letter to the out-of-town team and include a self-addressed stamped envelope, or call the team long distance after first dialing directory assistance for the number. The newspaper might list games a day or two out. Once you decided you wanted to see the game, you had to drive or fly there, and you’d have had a lot fewer flight options before deregulation.

Isn’t it much simpler to just watch it via an ESPN network or one of those NHL Center Ice or NFL Sunday Ticket packages that permit you to access out-of-market contests (and you get a whole season for a less than most plane trips)?

And what about the ancillary parts of watching a game? If a player intrigued you and you wanted to find out more about him, you might have had access to some limited information in a game program. If you wanted to see the rest of his career statistics, you might have needed to buy packs of bubblegum cards until you can across his entry, or travel to the library or bookstore and hope they had the latest edition of the Baseball Encyclopedia or the like. And in terms of asking your buddy what he thought about the game? Well, you could go to a payphone at halftime and hope he was home, though if the game wasn’t on TV he wouldn’t know what you were talking about until he read the story in the paper the next morning or saw 20 seconds of highlights on the evening news. Now you ping him on an easy-to-use social media or messaging app.

For most women’s sports, and any minor league sports, you would have had to go to even greater lengths to find out the information you wanted or see a game played. Almost no television coverage existed, and all the rigmarole noted above for getting to games was extra challenging for non-mainstream sports.

Today, sources like StubHub let you attend even the sold-out games without the complications of resorting to black-market ticket scalpers, and the electronic means listed above let you find a way to watch them with minimal effort.

We often refer to the past as a simpler era. Maybe that’s true in some respects, but not the sports viewing world. It’s never been easier to watch what you want.


Rush Olson has spent two decades directing creative efforts for sports teams and broadcasters. He currently creates ad campaigns, television programs, and related creative projects for sports entities through Rush Olson Creative & Sports, Mint Farm Films, and FourNine Productions.

RushOlson.com
Linkedin.com/company/rush-olson-creative-&-sports
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Ron Thulin on the Dallas Wings

This post originally appeared in the Blotch section of the Fort Worth Weekly's website. To consume it there : https://www.fwweekly.com/2017/09/05/sports-rush-state-of-the-wings-with-ron-thulin/

The Dallas Wings have made the postseason in their second year playing in Arlington. Ron Thulin has called their games for both of those seasons on Fox Sports Southwest and the play-by-play man is excited about the team’s prospects for the upcoming WNBA playoffs, and also the future.

In this video interview, Ron and I discussed the team’s youth, depth, and the possibility of acquiring Australian Olympian Liz Cambage.

The Wings will play the Washington Mystics in D.C. Wednesday, with television coverage by ESPN2. If they win that game, they’ll move on to play another single-elimination contest at either New York or Connecticut. Minnesota or Los Angeles await in a best-of-five series after that.

Rush Olson has spent two decades directing creative efforts for sports teams and broadcasters. He currently creates ad campaigns, television programs, and related creative projects for sports entities through Rush Olson Creative & Sports, Mint Farm Films, and FourNine Productions.

RushOlson.com
Linkedin.com/company/rush-olson-creative-&-sports
Facebook.com/RushOlsonCreativeandSports

Why It's My Texas (and Also My Rangers)

This post originally appeared in the Blotch section of the Fort Worth Weekly's website. To consume it there : https://www.fwweekly.com/2017/07/13/sports-rush-putting-the-texas-in-texas-rangers/

Why did Tom Grieve say my name on the TV Friday?

OK, my first name is also a common noun, but he wasn’t referring to a pitcher rushing his delivery or a runner in a rush to beat a throw while going from first to third. He meant me.

Grieve and his broadcast partner, C.J. Nitkowski had noticed the Rangers’ home jerseys have script across the front reading “Texas.” The more common practice in baseball is to have a team’s geographical home printed on the road jerseys, while the home versions boast the name of the team’s mascot. The Rangers, however, use “Texas” on both. The announcers wondered why.

So I sent Grieve a text that read “My memory of why Texas is on the front of the home jersey is that it was part of an effort to brand the club with the qualities of the state a few years ago. We ended up doing a whole ad campaign around My Texas My Rangers. I think the jersey branding was related to that.”

The longtime Rangers analyst then read the message on the air. Later in the game, Rangers Executive Vice President of Communications John Blake confirmed my memory was correct (which caused them to say my name again, pleasing my parents who were watching the telecast in Fort Worth). While it’s always cool having an esteemed personality like Tom Grieve say nice things about you, one of the bonuses of the situation was it got me thinking about the ad campaign and how it came about.

it started intuitively, but was ultimately backed up by data. Nolan Ryan had taken over as team president in February of 2008 and the ownership group in which he participated took over the team in August of 2010. The new head of business-side operations, Chuck Greenberg, wanted to direct fans to identify the Rangers as their team, so we quickly shot and edited some new spots consisting of highlights mixed with fans telling the camera some variant of “these are my Rangers.” Though that advertising effort was an unscientific one, in the offseason, Greenberg directed resources toward something the Rangers had done only sporadically during my years there: audience research.
I found the process truly valuable. As a creative director, one likes to know to whom one is speaking (through the medium of television or radio or the internet). It helps you craft better material, because once you know what you’re trying to accomplish, you can find innovative ways of achieving it. As consultant Corky Hall of Stellus Consulting put it, “Give me the freedom of a tightly defined strategy.”

Hall’s firm had taken existing data and spearheaded new research initiatives so we could find out what our fans thought of us. We also wanted to know what they liked and what we could do to position ourselves to better reflect their preferences. One of the things we discovered (not that it was a surprise) was that people liked Texas symbols and values like loyalty, toughness, and friendliness they felt reflected those of Texas and Texans.

The Rangers had long sported a Texas flag patch on their jersey sleeves and the Lone Star State had found its way into plenty of branding elements over the years. The year before (2009), in fact, was when the club had made the move to have all its jerseys read “Texas.” Identifying with the state made sense instinctively, but now we had data to back it up. Out of those brainstorming sessions came a tag line that combined elements of the previous year’s end of season spots with the new research, one that encouraged people to take pride in their team the same way they did in their state: My Texas, My Rangers.

The next step was to figure out how to embody the concept in actual creative executions that would both encourage ballpark attendance and create the brand perceptions we wanted. The solution we adopted involved portraying what was then known as Rangers Ballpark in Arlington as a place where Texas values were ever-present. For television commercials, what I thought might be funny (and therefore memorable) was if the images symbolic of those values actually existed at the park. Some manifestations included:

Grazing
Longhorns grazed in the outfield, ostensibly to save on mower fuel. This spot starred Mitch Moreland and Head Groundskeeper Dennis Klein and no, those were not real cows in the outfield. We digitally manipulated some stock footage.

photo credit: Brian Gagnon/Texas Rangers

Bass Fishing Texans love their bass fishing, so Alexi Ogando and Neftali Feliz demonstrated an innovative way of doing it, as observed by Pitching Coach Mike Maddox and Bullpen Coach Andy Hawkins. For props, we used old batting practice balls and some whole fish carcasses I bought at an Arlington Asian market. Yes, our marketing budget went to buy dead fish. I did check, by the way, to make sure the fish I purchased could actually be found in Texas lakes. I didn’t want a detail-minded angler hating on our spot because we used the wrong bass.

Pecans
A pecan tree grew in the upper deck, with Nelson Cruz and Thad Bosley in charge of cracking the nuts of the official state tree. I wandered the Central Arlington neighborhood in which I lived at the time picking up sticks and pecan fragments dropped from the local trees. For Bosley and Cruz’s part, shot in spring training in Surprise, Arizona, I had to trek to Tempe to find unshelled pecans.

Horns
Horses are pretty Texan, and the Rangers happen to have one working for them. During the Rangers’ first World Series run, the “claw and antler” craze consumed the local fandom. After this spot starring Rangers Captain began running, the mascot reported kids coming up to him doing the antlers sign.

Lots of Dogs
Grilling out with friends and family is a Texas tradition, but apparently some Texans can take it too far. This was one of the most fun shoots I ever did, and not just because Nolan and Ruth Ryan are great people (two of their granddaughters appeared in the commercial, too). Ballpark chef Cris Vazquez hauled out a humungous quantity of hot dogs and an enormous grill that morning and started cooking. We grabbed every cooler in the ballpark to ostensibly be full of hot dogs and the crew brought some ice chests from home, too.

If you don’t watch the Spanish-language version, too, you do yourself a disservice. We knew Nolan would be reluctant to speak a phrase in Spanish, so we recruited his former teammate Jose Guzman to help. The scheme was that Jose was going to say the Spanish line, but we plotted all along to try to get Nolan to say it. So we cut a take where Jose said the line, then I asked Nolan if we could try one more thing. Nolan guardedly agreed, and Jose, with help from team videographer Hugo Carbajal, coached him in what is, as far as I know, the Hall of Famer’s only appearance ever speaking in Spanish on camera.

photo credit: Alan H. Rose/Texas Rangers

This spot got a lot of discussion on the Ticket radio station, too, thanks to a shot Carbajal added in the edit of a well-inked lady eating a hot dog.
Nolan’s image as the quintessential Texan helped the My Texas, My Rangers campaign a lot. We referenced him in the copy (it was ostensibly his idea to put in the pecan tree and, in another spot I didn’t mention above because it’s unfortunately not available to view online, an oil well along the right field wall).

We created other media besides television. Billboards offered baseball variations on state themes, like its country-and-western dancing and miles of open road.

design by: Rainer Uhlir/Texas Rangers

design by: Rainer Uhlir/Texas Rangers

We had radio, too. Can Texans sometimes exaggerate? We decided Texas Tall Tales was a worthwhile theme, so Eric Nadel voiced a series of spots positing Texas ties to certain team-related items. For instance, did you know the word Tejas means “he who hits with the strength of a bear?” Or that the dye in the Rangers’ blue uniforms is made from organic bluebonnets? Or that Nolan Ryan gives the Rangers employee of the year a heifer from his personal herd? Of course, those are all made up, but Eric would go on to emphasize that it was not a Texas Tall Tale that the Rangers did, in fact, embody many of the good qualities of the Lone Star State. You can check out some samples of the radio campaign here.
We also didn’t want to turn off non-Texans, so we did some radio and TV themed as “Welcome to Texas,” that suggested you didn’t have to be from the state of Texas to cheer for the team named “Texas.” And when the pennant race heated up, we did some new spots that hit on Texas pride in retaining the American League title (which that 2011 team did).

When one thinks of the Texas Rangers, one inescapably thinks of the state – heck, it’s the team’s first name. In the latter part of the first decade of the 2000s, the team made that connection a little more explicit. Tom Grieve noticed.


 Rush Olson has spent two decades directing creative efforts for sports teams and broadcasters. He currently creates ad campaigns, television programs, and related creative projects for sports entities through Rush Olson Creative & Sports and FourNine Productions.

RushOlson.com
Linkedin.com/company/rush-olson-creative-&-sports
Facebook.com/RushOlsonCreativeandSports

Sports Drinks and Eating Contests : An Interview With Emily Jones

This post originally appeared at the Fort Worth Weekly's website. To view it there : https://www.fwweekly.com/2017/03/22/sports-rush-spor…ers-with-a-smile/ ‎


How would you feel if your co-workers frequently amused themselves by flinging large containers of sugary liquid at each other with you getting caught in the crossfire? Would you be ok with it if it came following a week in which you met your sales quota?

Emily Jones goes to one of her jobs every day knowing the above might be a possibility. She performs reporter duties on Fox Sports Southwest’s Texas Rangers broadcasts that originate from Globe Life Park in Arlington,  and her duties include postgame interviews on the field if the home team wins. Certain players have adopted the custom of dousing whichever star of the game she’s interviewing with leftover sports drink from the dugout cooler. In this video interview, I asked Jones how she manages that nuance of her occupation, and how she juggles her various duties as reporter, entrepreneur, pitchwoman, and mom.

I also asked her about one of the favorite videos I worked on with her during my tenure at the Rangers. Check the piece we referenced here. She explains the story behind it and then also indulges my absurd follow-up question. I felt comfortable asking it, because, one thing we know about Emily Jones is that she's pretty good at accommodating ridiculous conduct in the workplace.

One other thing you should know about this interview: Emily is modest, but her rapport with players and everyone else in the organization owes as much to her professionalism, commitment to knowing her stuff, and consistently pleasant demeanor as it does to her longevity with the club. She brings her A-game every day and it shows in her work.


Rush Olson has spent two decades directing creative efforts for sports teams and broadcasters. He currently creates ad campaigns, television programs, and related creative projects for sports entities through Rush Olson Creative & Sports and FourNine Productions.

RushOlson.com
Linkedin.com/company/rush-olson-creative-&-sports
Facebook.com/RushOlsonCreativeandSports

The Look of 2016 From Our Perspective

This post originally appeared at the Fort Worth Weekly's website. To view it there : https://www.fwweekly.com/2016/12/15/what-2016-looked-like-to-rush/

Every December, I choose a photo from the year gone by to use for my company Christmas card. If I like you and I have your address, you have probably gotten one whether you wanted it or not. Don’t be insulted if you didn’t get one. It doesn’t mean you were naughty, it just indicates my spotty address list isn’t up to date.
In any case, as I went through 2016’s collection, I thought some of them were either good images or had a good story behind them, or both. I could only use one for the card, so I thought I’d share some of the other interesting ones in this post. What did Martina Navratilova say when she realized we were shooting her video in a hotel room? What the heck are those men in shorts doing on the Dell Diamond baseball field? And, wow, showgirls? See it all here.
I took these photos unless otherwise credited, so any mistakes are mostly on me.

USA Rugby in Round Rock – February, 2016
In one of these shots, you see me with a microphone in front of a baseball stadium. But the day’s work had nothing to do with baseball. USA Rugby’s men’s XVs side defeated Canada in an Americas Rugby Championship tournament match. It was fascinating to see the pitch laid out on the ballfield. USA Rugby must have liked it, since they’re returning to the venue in 2017.

photo by Lori Gunter French

Fort Worth Weekly Celebrity Chef Chili Cook-Off – March, 2016
The Weekly held a chili cook-off earlier this year and I just loved this shot of a steaming pot of Fred’s chili. I also included a shot of the awards, not because it’s a great photo but because it includes a shot of Weekly associate editor Eric Griffey applauding and I’m attempting to shamelessly curry favor by including him in this no doubt critically-acclaimed post. Eric edits my stuff.

Texas Rangers – Spring/Summer 2016
I made it out to a few Rangers events this year, including the unveiling of the new food items you’d consume at the ballpark during the season. Pictured here is the Wicked Pig, a sandwich packed with more pork than an energy subsidies bill. There’s also a shot of Pudge Rodriguez, clearly coaching with the same intensity he displayed while playing. I also added a shot of Rougned Odor by the batting cages in Oakland just because I thought it was a cool shot.




LaGrave Field – Spring/Summer 2016
These baseball images are less cool than the Rangers ones. LaGrave Field, historic home of the Fort Worth Cats, sits abandoned. These photographs came from March and June, and unfortunately the little ballpark with the great view of downtown and the prestigious past still has an uncertain future.



Nancy Lieberman Charities Dream Ball - April 2016
These photos feature Toby Keith, one of a number of celebrities who were honored or appeared at this annual gala. One shows Keith conversing with Big Joe Walker, an on-the-rise Texas country singer. The other shows what many no doubt consider the highlight of the evening – the star jamming with the house band. His impromptu performance featured a powerful rendition of the Bill Withers classic “Ain’t No Sunshine” followed by Keith’s own “Should’ve Been a Cowboy.” I will always remember how graciously he treated the local musicians backing him, praising the Jordan Kahn Orchestra by name and calling on the sax player to take a solo.
The fundraising event, by the way, has moved to February this year, with tickets available at nancyliebermancharities.org.


Taste of the NFL – May 2016
I found a shot of another country musician at a charity event, this time with a photo of Jack Ingram playing at the Taste of the NFL event at the Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium. In addition to the musical entertainment, the event offers attendees a chance to sample tasty morsels from many of the area’s most prominent chefs. The other photo shows me apparently amazed at something Jack Perkins (at the time the owner of The Slow Bone barbecue restaurant in Dallas) said. The other guy in the photo is my frequent collaborator Dave French. Despite the plethora of tech gear that seems to be protruding from his body, French is, in fact, a human and not a video production cyborg.

photo by Lori Gunter French

Dallas Wings – Summer 2016
I really enjoyed covering the WNBA’s Dallas Wings during their first season in Arlington. Here’s a photo from practice that shows members of the Wings and their male practice partners desperate to grab a rebound. I liked the intensity evident in this image.

C3 Cryo Club – May 2016
Yep, that’s me shirtless. I’ll do a lot for the Weekly, apparently. Back in May, I tried cryotherapy after an especially vigorous evening of softball and blogged about it.

photo by William Pruett

Presidential Press – June 2016
I do some work for the George W. Bush Presidential Center on some of the webcasts of their public programs. One that hit especially close to home this year involved an examination of how the presidency interacts with the media and popular culture. The Bush Center worked with the Pulitzer Prize Board and three other nearby presidential libraries to put it on. A highlight included actors from the Dallas Theater Center presenting excerpts from Pulitzer-winning plays, including the number from Hamilton seen in this photo.
 


Fashion’s First Down – June 2016
The Cowboys’ wives annual fashion show raises money for female-centric charities. Tony Romo’s wife, Candice, chairs the event, so we interviewed him about it. Afterward, he apparently shook my hand. You can’t see me in the photo, but, you know, who cares? That wasn’t who anybody but my mom wanted to see anyway.

photo by Dave French

photo by Dave French

North Texas Food Bank shoot – June 2016
We did a video this year for the North Texas Food Bank to help volunteers learn what to do and not do while at the facility. The video parodied a newscast and we’d like to think it was funny. This photo made the cut for this post because it features our good friend Anna Kurian in a banana suit. She was actually the understudy for the part, but gave a stunning performance when pressed into service. You’ll have to watch the video to see it of course (and go ahead and volunteer at the North Texas Food Bank or its counterpart in Tarrant County, too).


OfficiateTexas – July 2016
We worked with the Texas Association of Sports Officials and the University Interscholastic League on an event designed to let game officials from around the state learn from prominent figures in their profession. I liked this promo photo we shot from the Riverwalk in San Antonio.


Dallas Stars Media Day – September, 2016
We worked with the Dallas Stars to shoot elements they use on their AAC video boards and TV broadcasts throughout the season. Some of the coolest stuff happened on the ice with a high-speed camera capturing epic slow-motion images. My buddies Mike Traverzo and Renzo Torres tested the shots before the players came out (Traverzo is the artist behind the beautiful video you see on your TV screens).


Dallas Mavericks Media Day – September, 2016
We worked with Fox Sports Southwest on their promos for the season’s Mavs games. We were going to need a shot of Dirk Nowitzki pantomiming his famed fall-away jump shot. We got a short unathletic failed point guard to mimic it so we could set the shot.

photo by Hutton Harris

photo by Hutton Harris

 ACEP16 – October, 2016
As you might have guessed, not everything I do is sports. We worked with the American College of Emergency Physicians creating videos at their annual conference. They held it in Las Vegas, Nevada. I include this picture of my buddy Dave with showgirls just in case he “forgot” to tell his wife, Lori, about it. Lori’s a friend of mine.


Miami Trip – October, 2016
We had to take Frontier’s all-night flight from Vegas to Miami to shoot interviews for another project. We looked very sexy riding in coach. When Martina Navratilova (a former Fort Worth resident) walked in and saw we were shooting in a hotel room next to the bed, she said she hadn’t realized it was “that kind” of video. Um, it wasn’t. I swear.

photo by Dave French

photo by Dave French

Texas Motor Speedway – November, 2016
My lone Weekly cover story of the year involved the folks who do the radio broadcasts at the local racetrack. Radio waves move at the speed of light – nearly the velocity of their booth guest’s roundhouse kicks.


Virginia Trip - November, 2016
We covered basketball in Virginia. The Virginia Sports Hall of Fame has an exhibit about the ABA’s Virginia Squires. Do you realize that at one time their roster featured both Julius Erving and George Gervin? Also, the Richmond Spiders’ mascot is a real tarantula named Tarrant. They introduce him before every game.




Lagardère Sports presents the Heart of Dallas Fast Pitch Event – November 2016
This is a cool charity event in which non-profits compete to win funds to further their missions. Jamie Benn took part and we interviewed him. I include this photo because I like camera shots of other camera shots and because I think a lot of the female readers may find Benn hunky.

photo by Dave French

A Bright Future : West ISD Rises Up – Fall, 2016
Perhaps the professional highlight of my year came with the release of the documentary on which Dave and I had worked for three years, entitled A Bright Future : West ISD Rises Up. It aired in on KWTX Waco in October and on Fort Worth-based CBS 11 in November. We also showed it in the auditorium in the high school West built to replace the one they had to demolish after a 2013 fertilizer plant explosion. These photos actually both have sports tie-ins. The one in the theater shows David Woodard, the football coach and athletic director who had to rebuild his house following the blast. The young woman doing the recording is Julia Wernet, an outstanding outfielder on West’s state title-winning softball team. She and four of her fellow students narrated the film. A Bright Future : West ISD Rises Up will be available online sometime next year after it’s finished its broadcast run in other markets.

photo by Dave French

Conclusion
This post does not include the photo I ultimately chose for the holiday card. To see that one, I guess you’ll have to hope I got your address right.


Rush Olson has spent two decades directing creative efforts for sports teams and broadcasters. He currently creates ad campaigns, television programs, and related creative projects for sports entities through Rush Olson Creative & Sports and FourNine Productions.



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Linkedin.com/company/rush-olson-creative-&-sports
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Do These Globe Life Park Features Ring a Bell?

This post originally appeared at the Fort Worth Weekly's website. To view it there :  http://www.fwweekly.com/2016/10/05/sports-rush-do-these-globe-life-park-features-ring-a-bell/


In a about a month, a plurality of voting-age Arlingtonians will likely decide whether or not to set an end date for Globe Life Park in Arlington’s tenure as a baseball venue. Many believe it should still have decades of life ahead of it as a viable baseball facility. Others think its days numbered because it lacks air conditioning or a 75202 zip code. 

Some opponents of the new stadium subsidy oppose it in part because the Rangers have done a good job of servicing the facility Arlington taxpayers built for them in 1994. In fact, the franchise has done more than maintain it. They have consistently made changes and tried new features aimed at keeping the facility productive as it has aged. So the ballpark a successful Vote Yes campaign phases out wouldn’t necessarily be a static 90s relic. Some memorable additions/deletions include, in no apparent order :

Name
Since beginning in Washington, D.C. in 1961, the franchise has played in four ballyards. Those stadia have had a total of nine names. They went from Griffith Stadium and D.C. Stadium/Robert F. Kennedy Stadium to Turnpike/Arlington Stadium. Then their current home started as The Ballpark in Arlington and has morphed into Ameriquest Field in Arlington, Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, and Globe Life Park in Arlington. In all cases, the bases have remained 90 feet apart and the pitcher’s mound has stayed 60 feet, 6 inches from home plate.

The Bell
My enduring memory of the team’s first naming rights deal is a promotion I did while I was with the team called The Ameriquest Mortgage Company Spotlight on Youth Baseball and Softball. Everyone else thinks of the bell. The big faux metal construction in left field rang electronically for various Rangers on-field accomplishments. The team had removed seats to add the contraption. Luckily they hadn’t gotten rid of them and the maintenance department could reinstall them once the naming rights deal ended in 2007.

The South Side
When the place opened, it had a sports art gallery, a museum, a ticket office, and some retail shops along its south-facing facade. It still has a ticket office and spots to buy stuff. When the team expected to close Randol Mill as part of the ill-fated Glorypark development, it moved the primary ticket office near the home plate gate. It has since kinda moved back.
The Museum’s demise crushed me. Part of it was personal because I had put a lot of work into trying to update its video exhibits with no budget. Part of the angst came because, as a baseball fan, it was hard to conceive of a scenario where a team possessed artifacts owned by the likes of Babe Ruth and loaned by the Baseball Hall of Fame and couldn’t figure out a way to take advantage of them. They just sent them all back to Cooperstown. The current Rangers Hall of Fame in that space offers a lot more room for hospitality events, but it lacks priceless artifacts and an effective means to educate schoolchildren about the history of the national pastime. Plus they used to host a fun Halloween event called Batty at The Ballpark like the one in the photo that my now-teenaged niece will be so excited I used.

Vandergriff Plaza
The area beyond center field has seen lots of changes. Toby Mendez-sculpted statues of Nolan Ryan and Tom Vandergriff were added in 1997. The Coca-Cola Sports Park offered kids a chance to hit wiffle balls and enjoy other basebally activities. The Budweiser Bowtie concession area now occupies that space and the kids area has moved into the old gift shop and some of the former KRLD studio space next to the center field gate. The Captain Morgan Club takes up the rest of the old studio and the Hyundai Club has replaced the former brick batter’s eye.

Fox Set in Left Field
Fox Sports Southwest used to host its pre- and postgame shows from a set in the left field vomitorium. They moved into the Captain Morgan Club in 2012.

Statuary
In 2012, the Rangers honored fan Shannon Stone, who fell to his death at a game, with a statue in front of the Home Plate Gate. Bruce Greene of Clifton sculpted the piece.

The All-You-Can-Eat-Seats
They originally had these in left field, but when the Friday’s Front Row restaurant and its Rawlings-named successor proved unviable, that space became the hub for non-dieting baseball fans seated in the Upper Home Run Porch.

The Helipad
Tom Hicks installed it when he bought the team and it was removed not too long after his bankruptcy-fueled divestiture. Admit it, you never used it, did you? Me either.

Video Boards
 The team has gradually updated the quality (and size) of its video offerings. A 2003 update made the original board a little nicer and 2011’s massive HD upgrade took it up another level. This past season, left field ad signage went away to make room for another big TV. An electronic board also replaced the old manual out-of-town scoreboard in 2009.

Foul Poles
The Rangers had brought the old foul poles from Arlington Stadium when they moved, but swapped them out this season for new ones.

The Suit Sign
When the ballpark opened, it copied Brooklyn’s legendary Ebbets Field by displaying a Hit It Here and Win a Free Suit sign in an unhittable location in right field. Ad signage eventually replaced it and the west corner of the main video board currently occupies that space.

The Home Clubhouse
The average fan might not see it, except on a tour, but the Rangers did a big renovation to their players’ dressing area during the Buck Showalter era.

The Siemens Lot
This used to be a parking lot, then Arlington offered Siemens incentives to put in a facility, and then offered further incentives to Triumph Aerostructures to move in once Siemens left.

Jet Stream
There used to be a wind that supposedly blew home runs out to right field, abetted by the 2000 addition of what is now the Capital One Club behind home plate. Recent modifications seem to have reduced its effect.

Foul Territory
There used to be more of it. Expanded seats adjacent to the dugouts moved fans into the spots formerly occupied by infielders camping under a popup.

Concourse Space
When the park opened, it boasted wide-open concourses. New concession stands and promotional kiosks have reduced the walk space but added more ways to acquire beer.

The Boomstick
The hot dog named after Nelson Cruz wasn’t actually a permanent ballpark feature, it just seemed as big as one. I mention it to point out the team’s frequent changes to its concession configuration. Remember when they had a Starbucks on the first base side? Team employees flocked there during day games. The loss of the club-level Dublin Up pub that served Guinness on tap was a blow to me.

 Oil Derrick
In 2011, the Rangers installed an old-school derrick to try to tap into some fossil fuel deposits underneath the ballpark soil. Team President Nolan Ryan also had them plant a pecan tree in the upper deck and brought in a herd of longhorns to graze the outfield grass. At least, that’s what happened according to series of commercials I created.

Globe Life Park’s David Schwarz-designed stylings look more or less the same as they did when the facility opened. The exterior reliefs, the brick, and the arches give it much the same feel as it had on April 11, 1994. Will it retain that feel if it transitions into a shopping center? It’s handled transitions before.


Rush Olson has spent two decades directing creative efforts for sports teams and broadcasters. He currently creates ad campaigns, television programs, and related creative projects for sports entities through Rush Olson Creative & Sports and FourNine Productions.

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