Citi Field vs Citizens Bank Park

The Phillies pitching has been atrocious at home and away this season, and park factors have shown that CBP is hitter friendly overall, very home run friendly, but suppresses doubles and triples. Mix in the quality power hitters that the Phillies have and you get some skewed early season numbers.

Not necessarily saying that it won’t play out that way in the long run for Citi Field. It very well might.

We’ll see how it plays as the season wears on.

I’ll take the wait and see approach to, but:

1. How does Citi compare to Shea through April? I would have thought that Citi would yield a few more homers early in the season due to the outfield stands and scoreboard blocking the north wind.

2. I’ve been of the mind set that when the wind shifts to the south/south west in the summer it would lead to more homers. (More so than Shea because home plate is angled differently) But now I’m thinking that the Rotunda, and the fact the the area behind home plate is solid, might block the south winds and suppress home runs.

via this broken link

In contrast to hulking Veterans Stadium, winds pour through Citizens Bank Park like water through a flow-through tea bag. Balls that get airborne are lifted up, up and away.

The most obvious suspects are the prevailing southwest and south winds of summer, which blow straight out to center and right-center fields. Those winds increase with height. Other factors might also be at work.

[…]

[Phillies president Dave] Montgomery believes that the structural mass of Veterans Stadium – totally enclosed save for the exit-ramp openings – had a blocking effect on the movement of air. Jim Eberwine, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Mount Holly, says Montgomery is on sound scientific footing. A massive building would affect air currents the way an island distorts approaching waves.

[…]

In the new park, a wind blowing toward center outside the park blows toward center inside, too.

An important difference between the two stadiums is how Citizens Bank Park uses prevailing winds to benefit hitters.

Well after the park was designed, the Phillies retained a Canadian engineering firm to study air-flow patterns at the site. Using Weather Service data, RWDI Inc. determined that the prevailing winds on summer nights were from the south, averaging about 12 m.p.h.

So, yeah, it’s not just the dimensions. Also, with a comparison between Citi and CBP somewhere Whole Camels is turning in his proverbial grave.

Allegedly the engineers performed the wind tests at the new ballpark before the behemoth Veterans Stadium had been imploded. I’d imagine a massive structure like that literally across the street could have some effect on wind currents.