Philadelphia: Citizens Bank Park
Who rocks the party?
I delivered hoagies and beer for a Philly-inspired sandwich shop in Bowling Green, Ohio while I was in college (and for a few years after, don’t ask why.) The owner was a Philadelphia native and made sure that everything from the bread to the shredded lettuce was as authentic as could be, short of shipping in water from the Schuylkill River.1 The dining room was decorated with faded pictures of Philly landmarks: the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, City Hall and the William Penn statue atop it, the “Rocky” steps at the Museum of Art. Passing these photos day in and day out as I bounded out the front door of the store with an armful of greasy paper bags or stacks of Natty Light cases, the idea of Philadelphia became very familiar to me, despite having never been there.
Years later, rock band stuff took me to the city for the first time. Only being in town for a night at a time before heading off to our next gig, we did some of the touristy things like the South Street Shuffle and getting Pat’s and Geno’s steaks late at night to decide whose was the best.2 Despite having been there multiple times before this baseball visit, I had never actually seen Philadelphia in the daytime or got a sense of how the locals live. I was eager to change that, and a Phillies day game was the perfect opportunity.
My buddy Romain, formerly of the band New Tooth in Columbus, moved out to Philly several years ago and has been one of my biggest cheerleaders on this sabbatical adventure. He’s become a big Phillies fan since moving to the city — rooting for the Phils, Eagles, Sixers and Flyers an intoxicating, enrapturing and inescapable part of the city’s culture — so we scored a bargain on a pair of field level tickets on SeatGeek and put the date in ink in our calendars.
A couple weeks later, Romain texts me:
New development for your Philly trip: Les Savy Fav just announced that they are playing here on June 29. I really wanna go and it would work out schedule-wise. Would you want to join me for the show as well?
Yes. Yes yes yes. YES.
I’ve been infatuated with that band since I first heard them in the fall of 1999, right before their second album, The Cat and the Cobra, was released. They played a show in Bowling Green that our college radio station booked and within minutes of them taking the stage, I decided that Les Savy Fav is the bar against which all other bands’ live performances should be judged. To date, I’ve seen them probably 10 times in cities all over the eastern U.S. and each show seemed like it was better than the last.
But hey, more on that later. I promise.
I got to Romain’s house in Fishtown around 12:30 after spending the previous night at a Motel 6 in Carlisle, PA to break up the long drive from Columbus. We caught up over some Primo hoagies — a classic Italian and a Big “T” with turkey, ham and American cheese — before heading down to the ballpark.
Citizens Bank Park, as well as Lincoln Financial Field and the Wells Fargo center make up the South Philadelphia Sports Complex, which is exactly what the name implies and somehow seems like a missed opportunity for another bank to claim naming rights. All of the Philly’s beloved teams play in this former industrial area separated from the rest of the city, despite repeated attempts to build new facilities in Center City. As such, most people drive to the games, spend ridiculous amounts of money to park in the huge lots surrounding all of the venues and maximize the investment by tailgating before the games.
Romain drove us down, showing me his secret free parking hack that I have taken a blood oath to never reveal. We walked up about 10 minutes before gates opened, so we took a lap around the outside of the park, and then made our way in the center field entrance. We immediately found the Herr’s tent where they were giving out sample bags of the chips in their current Philadelphia flavor contest: pierogi, ravioli and stromboli. You might be able to guess which one I liked the most, but you’ll never guess which one I liked the least.
After another lap around the lower and upper concourses, we settled into our seats in section 138, right along the left field line in the lower bowl.3 Our seats were close enough to the fence that we could extend an arm out over the field to snag a ball in play if either of us were stupid enough to do that. We were also just past the end of the protective netting, so we had to stay on high alert for foul balls rocketing into our section.
By the way, everything you’ve ever heard about Philly fans is true. Right in front of us was a group of about a dozen friends getting lit up on ready-to-drink cocktails and Michelob Ultras absolutely giving all the shit to any player within earshot, regardless of their uniform. Even Hannah, the ball girl protecting the left field line, got a little bit of razzing, mostly from drunken adults upset that she was only giving used baseballs to the kids who crowd around her station.
The worst was reserved for Miami Marlins left fielder Nick Gordon, who dutifully trotted out to left field for nine innings as the Philly faithful let him have it. Gordon would get his revenge early, blasting a solo homer in the top of the second inning and taking a slow, measured turn around third base, a subtle, if deserved, “fuck you” to the jeering fans in our section.
Miami would not score again until the top of the seventh, taking a 3-2 lead that they would hold for the remainder of the day. The Phillies offense looked lost without sluggers Bryce Harper, Kyle Schwarber and J.T. Realmuto, all of whom have fallen to injury in June. With more performances like this, the comfortable lead Philly has put up in the National League East standings may be in peril.
We made our way north for some pre-show libations and dinner at Love City Brewing. Really great beers there and a fun food truck: I ordered salchipapas, which is french fries topped with sliced chorizo, parmesan cheese, ketchup and mayo and I am somehow still alive and better for the experience.
It was here that I had my first “small world” moment of the trip as my buddy Jason and his wife Sarah were sitting across the bar from us. They had been on vacation in Europe and instead of flying straight back to Columbus, they stopped off in Philadelphia for the night to go to the Les Savy Fav show. Not the first time this has happened either: we ran into each other a few years ago in Washington D.C. at a Jawbox reunion show. Maybe we should hang out in Columbus more? But would it make these happenstance meetups out of town less special?
I don’t have the words to describe how great Les Savy Fav was. I already thought they were the best live band in the world, and now I’m sure of it. Their singer, Tim Harrington, immediately demolished the perceived boundary between band and audience, taking the mic down to the floor with an absurdly long cable that let him span the 150 or so feet to the very back of the room. He spent most of the evening strutting through the crowd, stripping off pieces of his attire one by one until he was dressed only in a Green Man suit. Meanwhile, the band just plowed through a set of high-energy post-punk, sampling from their entire catalog dating all the way back to 1997.
After the show, we were too adrenaline wired to call it a night yet, so we hit up The 700 and Johnny Brenda’s for a couple of nightcaps and some conversation. I gotta say, Romain is some kind of celebrity in Philly. Every place we went, he knew somebody on one side of the bar or the other. It made me wish that I had that, but I’m too guarded and too introverted to just dive into making those kinds of friendships. It really is true that it gets harder to make new friends the older you get, but it seems really difficult for me in particular. But I can give it a go: I have found myself talking to more strangers while out on the road, and just going that far is something that seemed impossible to me just a year ago.
I woke up the next morning to Romain making coffee and cooking breakfast — pork roll, egg and cheese sandwiches — an ideal way to cap an amazing day in the city of brotherly love. I made a mandated stop at the local Wawa for snacks and a no-fee ATM, then pointed the car south for Baltimore.
That’s pronounced “wooder,” by the way.
Trick question: it’s Jim’s Steaks, but I got a hot tip about Angelo’s that I’ll have to investigate next time I roll through.
Listen, this blog is called Bleachers and ‘Bleeds, but sitting at field level close to the action fucking rules. I probably wouldn’t have chosen these seats if I were paying full price, but I saved close to 40% off face value by using SeatGeek. Normally I’m skeptical of secondary market ticket sales, since you’re basically just supporting the scalping industry. But for baseball, you can often find a season ticket holder who can’t attend one of the games in their package just looking to offload the seats for whatever they can get, especially closer to first pitch for a game that’s not in danger of selling out. I am not being compensated for this testimonial, but I will absolutely be taking advantage of these deals whenever the price is right.