Cactus League Opening Day 2024
This will be a post about attending the Opening Day of the 2024 Cactus League season at the Peoria Sports Complex in Peoria, AZ. The game was played between the San Diego Padres and the Los Angeles Dodgers.
I will have to spend some time on planning out this and all subsequent posts about the Cactus League games that I attended.
Meanwhile, you can read my previous post about the Cactus League at the following link. Think of this post as more of an introduction about the Cactus League.
The Peoria Sports Complex
In my previous post about the Cactus League, I created a map depicting the locations of the various Cactus League stadiums around Maricopa County, AZ. Since I currently live in the Sun City-Peoria, AZ area, the closest Cactus League stadium to me is the Peoria Sports Complex. The Peoria Sports Complex is located at 16101 N 83rd Ave, Peoria, AZ 85382. The stadium is close to boundary line Peoria shares with nearby Glendale, AZ. Based on the information that I found during my research, the Peoria Sports Complex opened in 1994. The architects who designed the Peoria Sports Complex were architecture firm Populous.
A Quick Word about Populous
Haven't heard of the architecure firm Populous? Until I started writing this post, neither have I. It turns out that Populous have designed quite a few famous buildings in their corporate history. The architecture firm seems to have made a specialty of designing sports stadiums and concert arenas. As a former Baltimore area resident for six years, I did not know that Populous designed BOTH Oriole Park at Camden Yards and M and T Bank Stadium for the Baltimore Ravens. Due to the critical acclaim received from designing Oriole Park at Camden Yards, Populous also designed the new Yankee Stadium in New York City, Nationals Park in Washington, D.C.,, PETCO Park in San Diego, CA, and Oracle Park in San Francisco, CA, among various other completed sports stadiums. Recent projects of note designed by Populous include the ultra-modern Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in London and the iconic Sphere performance venue in Las Vegas, NV.
Incidentally, Populous has designed other Cactus League stadiums in Maricopa County.
UPDATE: For whatever reason, I seem to have hit a bad case of writer's block for this post. I will have to re-read and decide on how to repair this post.
