Lindquist Field celebrates 10 years
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By Roy Burton
Standard-Examiner staff
Next decade may include baseball stadium's expansion, improvements
OGDEN -- Ten years ago this week, so many fans showed up for the first Ogden Raptors game at Lindquist Field that spectators had to be seated in the outfield.
As the baseball team enters its 11th season, a proposed stadium-expansion project could determine Lindquist Field's future for the next 10 years and beyond.
The franchise had been in town for three years, playing at a ballpark named Serge B. Simmons Field, next to a landfill at Fort Buenaventura.
There were no stadium seats, let alone a stadium -- only a team operating out of trailers and using tents as concessions stands.
Lindquist Field brought professional baseball into downtown Ogden -- and into the present.
The $4.8 million stadium (in 1997 dollars) also preserved its future, said Raptors president and co-owner Dave Baggott.
"Serge Simmons was a farm road out in the middle of nowhere. Lindquist Field is a major highway," Baggott said.
Professional baseball in Ogden was a dead end without the downtown stadium.
"I couldn't even fathom whether or not the franchise would have moved altogether or (whether) it would have dissolved," Baggott said. "If Lindquist Field wasn't built, there would be no team here."
Three seasons at Simmons Field was two too many, Baggott said, though he's grateful for the people who put in the hard work to make it playable and that the team was established as an entity in Ogden by the time the move was made to Lindquist Field.
"People knew the Raptors as a household name" because of Simmons Field, Baggott said, and the fans who attended there had an upclose, intimate view of the game and took pride in supporting the team in its temporary home.
Ogden businessman John E. Lindquist and wife Suzanne solidified the stadium project's standing with a donation of stock that sold for just more than $1 million. Lindquist, also a co-owner of the Raptors, was given naming rights in recognition of the gift.
The Raptors lost the first game to the Idaho Falls Braves by a score of 5-1 on June 24, 1997, at the stadium bearing the Lindquist name.
The franchise is now working with city planners to present a proposal to the Ogden
City Council for a $3 million expansion that would add 2,400 chairback seats down both foul lines to replace the current bleachers and add a standing-room-only spectator deck above the left-field wall, along with other renovations.
"All we're trying to do is complete what the initial plans for the ballpark were," Baggott said.
The stadium was designed as a three-phase project that remained in the first phase for budget reasons. With the original bonding debt repaid, the time is right to finish the second and third phases, Baggott says.
Details of the plan and the funding are still being finalized, he said, but the team and the city would share costs.
Mayor Matthew Godfrey has said he supports the idea of the stadium expansion, and Baggott feels the council's reaction in a work session was favorable.
The council has not had an official vote on the proposal.
"I'm not an engineer or an architect, so my timelines are different than others," Baggott said. "It's been a slow process that's been ongoing. We're nearing the end, and hopefully, we will have something public to announce very, very soon."
Over the years, Raptors management and fans have forged traditions that make Lindquist Field a unique experience. Like playing the ominous "Imperial March" music from the "Star Wars" movies as the umpires take the field and playing the "Jurassic Park" movie theme when a Raptors' hitter knocks a home run.
And any time there's a 2-2 count and two outs, John E. Lindquist calls out "Deuces!" from the press box -- and is reminded by fans if he misses a chance.
Dragging the field has a different meaning at Lindquist Field. Fans actually volunteer to rake the infield dirt in the fifth inning while wearing drag queen-style dresses and wigs as the music and lyrics of "(Dude) Looks Like a Lady" or "I Feel Pretty" play over the loudspeakers.
Baggott, a member of minor league baseball's board of trustees, also believes the Raptors were the first baseball team to introduce theme nights and jerseys, such as Grateful Dead Night with tie-dyed uniforms or camouflage shirts for Military Night.
A foul ball that ends up in the hands of an adult draws chants of "Give it to a kid!" often led by Baggott from the press box.
The nightly singing of the "SpongeBob SquarePants" theme song is also a Raptors' ritual, to be accompanied this year with a full-size SpongeBob character.
Along with baseball and the off-field entertainment, Lindquist Field patrons have come to expect these and the crazy promotions that epitomize minor league baseball's tradition of creative marketing.
This season, the Raptors will host "Bassackwards Night," featuring, among other things, reverse-printed jerseys, the game beginning in the ninth and working toward the first and fans rising at the conclusion/beginning of the game for the playing of the national anthem.
It's all in the name of making the ballpark a social event as much as a sporting competition.
Baggott estimates, of all the spectators who make Lindquist Field a consistent leader of the Pioneer League in attendance, only 10 percent are die-hard baseball fans.
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