Washington, D.C.: Nationals Park (2024)

When the architects who designed Nationals Park drew up their plans, they intended for fans in the ballpark to be able to see the U.S. Capitol building — located about a mile away — beyond the left field wall. They also intended there to be open sightlines into the park from nearby buildings, which would inspire development in the area and drive up property values. Because they succeeded at the latter, they ended up failing the former: since opening in 2008, the Navy Yard neighborhood where the ballpark is located has exploded with new construction, blocking any view of the iconic buildings and monuments that Washington is known for.

I recently came across the term “mallpark” in reference to “new” Yankee Stadium, the modern venue built to replace the original Yankee Stadium — “the house that Ruth built” — that has been open since 2009. Sure, these newer ballparks incorporate nods and tributes to a city’s history of baseball, but reverence to the game is far from pure in these facilities. Every tiny detail is designed to generate as much money as possible, either by direct extraction from ticket holders for the brief duration of their visits or by maximizing sponsorship income and cobranding activations. Yes, baseball has been a business for more than 150 years, but never has the sport seemed so commodified.

What better place to dig into this than our nation’s capital, where powerful, monied interests determine how much life, liberty and pursuit of happiness we are allowed to have before it impacts their bottom lines.

The morning of the game was picture perfect1 in Alexandria, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from the District of Columbia. I set up camp on my friend Randy’s back porch to write up my visit to Philadelphia a few days before and then took a walk around his neighborhood while he was on a Zoom call for work.

I’ve been to D.C. many times over the years as I’ve worked on the periphery of politics for most of my adult life. Having a day to just chill and not feel forced to be a tourist or find the best X in Y City was a welcome feeling. I’ve never been one to abide prolonged down time, but I can enjoy a crust day with the best of them.

Sometime between my morning constitutional and lunch at the Copperwood Tavern in Shirlington, news came down that the Supreme Court had ruled that presidents are above the law and immune from prosecution in perpetuity for “official acts” taken while in office. My heart sank from knowing that no president can ever be held accountable again, that the full force of the executive branch can be used to impose the president’s will on the nation,2 and that a bought-and-paid-for court made the office of president too powerful to ever entrust it to any single person.

Once his buddy Chip arrived, Randy drove us all to Nationals Park to take advantage of his secret parking hack. If you don’t have one of these in D.C., I encourage you to take the Metro train to the ballgame. The city has one of the best public transit networks in the country and Metro service is consistent and reliable.

We got to the center field gate on N St. about an hour before first pitch and discovered that the team was passing out free T-shirts to welcome top prospect James Wood to The Show. We did a lap around the main concourse before heading up to the terrace bar under the scoreboard for some $5 Bud Light cans, which I guess is a “deal” in this place, and only available until first pitch.

I’ve been to Nationals Park once before, in 2017, and was pretty disappointed in the beer selections at the time. All that seemed to be available were Anheuser Busch/InBev brands: Bud/Bud Light, Michelob, Stella Artois, Goose Island, Cutwater and a few others curated to give the illusion of choice. Sadly, little has changed in 2024, as finding a local beer made by an independently-owned brewery was extremely difficult, though not impossible.3

A friend of Randy’s, who until recently worked for the team, scored us some really great seats in section 117, a few rows behind the visiting New York Mets dugout. It being a Monday night, the stands were not as packed with home fans as they would be for a weekend contest.4 Affluent New York fans have historically traveled to Washington in large numbers to cheer on their nine. Unsurprisingly, the majority of people surrounding us were New Yorkers, which made for some fun back and forth between Nats and Mets fans throughout the game.5

Starting pitching performances were on display for both sides: Mets starter David Peterson wiggled his way out of early trouble, giving up just two runs over six and two-thirds innings, while his Nats counterpart Mackenzie Gore struck out eight batters in five and two-thirds innings. Ballyhooed rookie James Wood got his first major league hit in his first at-bat, a hard hit ground ball past Mets third baseman Mark Vientos.

Gore was lifted from the game in line for the win until reliever Derek Law coughed up the lead in the top of the sixth. The Nats would tie the score at three in the bottom of the eighth on a Joey Meneses double that trickled under the glove of Mets right fielder Tyrone Taylor. Still tied at the end of nine innings, the floodgates opened with the Mets scoring six runs in the top of the tenth, followed by a Nationals rally in the bottom of the frame that would come up just short. Final score: Mets 9, Nationals 7.6

As I wandered the concourses in search of chili dogs and beer, I couldn’t help but notice the food stands that had express lanes for premium customers. Like an amusem*nt park pass that allows you to upgrade your ticket and skip long lines, the team and concessionaires found yet another way to lighten fans’ wallets in the name of convenience. I fully expect a restroom fast pass to be instituted any time now, allowing you to push past the plebeian classes for your priority piss, all for the low, low price of $29.99 per game.

And yet, for all the myriad, novel ways team owners have Six Sigma-ed every commercial opportunity in the ballpark, the Nationals take a massive “L” in one very crucial department. I’ve been buying a lapel pin at every park I’ve visited, and most of the time I wait until after the game is over — I’m there to watch the games, you know — to see if there’s a pin that relates to the game or my experience at the park. At the conclusion of this 10-inning thriller, Randy, Chip and I made our way out to the Nats team store near the center field gate, only to find it closed.

Of the previous nine team stores I’ve visited, all nine of them were open for some time after the conclusion of the game, usually for an hour or so. Think about it: you’ve been pounding $16 Bud Light tallboys for two or three hours, and the last thing you see on your way out of the ballpark is an opportunity to spend money on something you’ll see the next morning and say, “oh sh*t, I don’t remember buying that.” OF COURSE you’re going to go in there and plop a foam finger or a game-worn jersey down in front of a cashier making minimum wage. You probably don’t even flinch at the price.

It’s the tabloid rack next to the checkout, the server who upsells you dessert when you’re already full, an options package that pushes the price of the car well past base MSRP. Nats ownership is just leaving that money on the table. Mark Lerner must have enough boats, I guess. I’d think he’d at least want a few extra bucks to pay Stephen Strasburg $185 million to not pitch for him ever again.

I rode the Metro from Falls Church to the ballpark and back the next day just to get my pin. It essentially doubled the cost of my souvenir, but at least the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority got an extra $10 they weren’t counting on.

This may have ended up being the most expensive ballpark visit I’ve made so far, and I didn’t even pay for my ticket. Next time you hear a billionaire owner pleading poverty to get taxpayers to buy him a new stadium, think about how efficiently he’s been picking your pockets all this time. Then look up which political candidates get campaign contributions from him.7 Then remember how it feels to pee your pants in public because a bunch of other rich assholes paid to skip the restroom line.

NEXT GAME: Houston Astros at Toronto Blue Jays, Wednesday, July 3, 7:07 p.m., Rogers Centre