Vitals:
- Location:
- Philadelphia,PA
- Street Address:
-
3501 Broad Street
Philadelphia, PA 19148-5201
- Facillities Provided:
- Sports Arena for Baseball, American Football
- Current Tennants:
- Philadelphia Phillies
Philadelphia Eagles
Temple University Football
- Capacity:
- 62,382 for baseball
65,356 for football
89 Luxury Suites
- Opened on:
- April 4, 1971
- Demolished on:
- March 21, 2004
- Architect:
- Hugh Stubbins & Associates
- Facility Owners:
- City of Philadelphia
- Original Cost of Construction:
- $50 Million
- Surface:
- NeXturf
The Vet was a multipurpose stadium that is described by some Philadelphians as a house of worship... Yeah... right. Most people think of the Vet as the sports world's toilet. It was voted by the athletes of both Major League Baseball and the National Football League as the worst facility in their respective sports. The stadium was similar in appearance to Cincinnati's Riverfront Stadium and Pittsburgh's Three Rivers Stadium.
The Vet's food concessions were known for having the smallest hot dogs in the league, serving $5.00 12oz beer that were up to 30% head. The more unusual snacks available included scrapple, cheesesteaks, and italian water-ice.
The Vet was known for being a very "rugged" building. This statement is true in several ways:
- The Vet had some of the loudest, rudest, most opinionated fans in the country.
- The Vet had a very firm and non-forgiving surface that has destroyed several athletes' careers, usually via their knee ligaments. The former surface, Astroturf, was very thin and many players referred to it as simply a "carpet".
- The Vet didn't have a glamorous architecture like other facilities in use today.
Some of the events that have been held at the Vet include:
- Phillies baseball, from 1971 to 2003
- Eagles football, from 1971 to 2003
- Major League Baseball All Star games in 1976 and 1996
- World Series hosts in 1980, 1983 and 1993
- Home to the USFL Stars 1983 and 1984
- Many of the Army/Navy college football games throughout the stadium's lifetime
Some of the more "infamous" events that have occurred at the Vet include:
- Phillies opening day ball deliveries to home plate. The ball has been delivered by kite, helicopter, parachute, and cannon just to name a few.
- The Bounty Bowl... a football game in which the Eagles were supposedly paid to injure the other team's (Dallas Cowboys) players.
- The body-bag game... a football game (on Monday Night Football) in which the Eagles injured all three quarterbacks from the Washington Redskins.
- An incident on national television during an Army/Navy game where students leaning on a rail fell almost 20 feet onto the surface after the rail (held together by Duct Tape) snapped under their weight.
- Battery/snowball throwing incidents (at the athletes) too numerous to count.
- More antics can be found under Philly Fan.
On March 21, 2004, the stadium was imploded to make room for new parking in the Philadelphia Sports Complex. The parking lot will feature granite markers where the bases were for the original baseball diamond, and an outline of the field will be painted on the lot.
No word on when the first wiffle-ball or kickball tournament will be held.