The defending champion Chicago Cubs open with a week on the road this year. They won’t play in Wrigley Field until April 10, and it looks like the construction crew is gonna need every bit of that extra week in order to get the stadium playable.
As part of their five-year project to essentially rebuild Wrigley without drastically altering it, this offseason’s work has included gutting the seating behind home plate to build an exclusive club called the American Airlines 1914 Club.
Here’s how it looked earlier this offseason:
Each flight over Wrigley is more startling than the last: Gaping hole where home plate seating once was. pic.twitter.com/r56eQGowIS
— Wrigley Aerials (@WrigleyAerials) November 30, 2016
Now, here’s how it looked on Sunday night:
Action under the sheets at Wrigley. pic.twitter.com/yC3EDCDeeq
— Wrigley Aerials (@WrigleyAerials) March 5, 2017
Progress, but that’s not game ready. They’ve got five weeks, so surely it’ll be fine, but it is a bit jarring to see where things stand with the season right around the corner.
Also, the building outside the left-field line that will house the Cubs’ offices and the plaza (with a videoboard where fans can watch the game) looks pretty good:
Cubs new offices on Clark, video board up, almost ready to go. pic.twitter.com/0SJ9aTHQNN
— Wrigley Aerials (@WrigleyAerials) March 1, 2017
The other major undergoing this offseason was the removal of the bullpens from down the foul lines and moving them under the bleachers. So that leaves AT&T Park as the only one in the bigs with the bullpens in play in foul territory.