With the Padres in Cincinnati this weekend, this was another city and ballpark I haven’t been to so I decided to do a quick trip over the weekend to see the Padres play on the road and see the next ballpark in my quest to see all 30 (the A’s and Rays will be interesting by the time I get to them).

As I arrived at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG), I actually didn’t realize that the airport is located in Kentucky as I had assumed it was in Cincinnati. Granted the Ohio River literally separates Ohio and Kentucky so it’s still right there and ended up only being a 20-minute drive, even with some traffic due to road closures in downtown Cincinnati. I stayed at the AC Hotel, which is right across the street on the side of the ballpark where the Reds Hall of Fame & Musuem is located and I was able to get a room that had a balcony out to the street:

I like how they’ve turned this area right across the street into what they call a DORA and closed off the road so people can eat and drink before and after games, basically a small ballpark district next to Great American Ball Park (GABP):

From street level, you can see Paycor Stadium in the background as it’s four blocks down the street:

The way the ball park is built with the Reds Hall of Fame & Museum on the west side, the Ohio River on the south side (along with an underground parking garage), the Heritage Bank Center arena on the east side, and another ballpark building on the north side, GABP blends into its environment where you could easily not even notice the ballpark when driving by.

This may have been done on purpose since a ballpark or stadium is a large structure but it doesn’t provide the artistic look you see of other ballparks that blend into their environment like how PNC Park really blends into its location. I still remember seeing PNC as my Uber was pulling up and being in awe of how great it looked.

Once in the ballpark, on the Terrace level, which is the level you enter the ballpark on and gives you you access to the 100 seating sections, you don’t really have a view of much in the ballpark’s background being that it’s on the Ohio River and since Covington across the river doesn’t really have a skyline of tall buildings.

I entered the ballpark from Gate A and went left, so I was going up the third base side and wrapping around clockwise to see the sights and sounds of the entire ballpark. The concourse on the third base side felt pretty large and easy to get around even with it being crowded since there was a Big Red Machine 50th Anniversary Cap giveaway:

And like a lot of the ballparks built in the early 2000s, many parts of the Terrace Level allow you to see the field as you walk the concourse and the sections that allow you to see the field have standing room only areas in the back of the section which I like since it gives all fans access to see a great view if they want to walk around and stand.

But like many of these other ballparks, the sections around home plate have suites so you can’t see the field from the concourse. At GABP there are the World Series Suites behind sections 113-118, a gap to enter at section 119 and then the Founders Suites from 120-123. So besides not seeing the field you also have to enter around to go down to the seats in those sections.

As you walk towards center field, the walkway goes behind the batter’s eye but then after passing the batter’s eye, you get a nice standing room mist area (especially needed this weekend where it was low 90s at game time) underneath the smoke stacks:

And then from there it goes behind the right field seats which don’t give you a view of the field. They do have a cutout near section 140/141 where you can see the visiting team’s bullpen which was pretty cool:

Once I got to the foul pole and was heading back towards home plate on the first base side, I noticed that there were stairs (along with an accessible ramp) to continue:

The picture above is someone walking down the first base side and then reaching right field and wanting to continue so they would go down the stairs. In my case, since I was going from right field over to first base (walking clockwise around the ballpark), I had to go up the stairs.

I know people complain about Petco and how it can feel like a maze since you can’t just walk all the way around the ballpark without going up stairs or ramps so these stairs at GABP felt weird since you’re able to make it around the Terrace level smoothly without going up and down except for this part.

The other thing I noticed is once I walked down the first base side towards home plate, the concourse there was extremely crowded and hard to walk around. I contribute that to more people sitting on the first base side since for day games the sun hits the third base side pretty hard (the first base side has shade) and the fact that they put additional carts and stands on both sides of the concourse, making the walkway even smaller. I’ve seen this to be an issue at Petco as well with all the carts they’ve added over the years.

Food wise I noticed they had food stands for local food places like Skyline Chili, LaRosa Pizzeria, Montgomery Inn, Wings and Rings and Graeter’s Ice Cream along with Chick-fil-a.

I tried the Frybox that’s known as a GABP specialty, going with the Ballpark Favorite Frybox that had fries, chili and cheese. This one was pretty good and I would recommend trying Frybox as they have a variety of different Fryboxes including building your own. It’s located right where the stairs I mentioned before that go to right field,

In terms of views of the action, the seats have a good view of the action like most modern ballparks:

And if yo down the line in left field near the foul pole, you can see the Roebling Suspension Bridge:

As I walked around the ballpark, what I noticed is GABP tends to be more no-frills. They have the local Cincinnati food, some different alcohol options but you don’t see a lot of different group and social areas or a bunch of other attractions (or some might say distractions) around the ballpark. There is the Fioptics District on the 400 level near the left field foul pole but it’s easy to miss unless you specifically go up there like I did and walk around the entire ballpark:

People tend to look at these other amenities on the main level (in this case GABP’s Terrace level) since this is where most people enter a ballpark. The Reds have the great Hall of Fame & Museum but it is an additional cost and it’s located on its own right outside the ballpark. As well, the main team store is attached to the Hall of Fame & Museum outside (there are smaller stores and stands in the ballpark) so even going to the team store you would do that before or after the game.

So when you’re inside the ballpark, you’re really just looking to get food and drink and head to your seats to watch. There isn’t a lot to do as you can see with other ballparks whether it’s kids’ areas with rides/games, social/group areas to hang out, other attractions, etc.

Some may prefer to just watch a game but for others, all these different things that make up the ballpark and its experience play a part in how people rank their ballparks and why I can see people not ranking GABP as high. If you’re just looking to come watch a game and get some good local Cincy food, then GABP has you covered.

If you’re looking for everything the way some of these other ballparks offer (all the extra amenities, the view, many things to do in the area, etc) or there’s something really sticks out in a ballpark (like the view in PNC) then I can see why you wouldn’t rank GABP as high. I fall in the latter crowd, so I consider and value all the additional things when ranking ballparks and would put GABP in my middle tier when comparing it to other ballparks.