Baseball season for some is the highlight of spring. It all starts with spring training in the sunnier and southern states of the US, and rolls into the full game season with hours of cheering, then yelling at players, and umpires, and all the highs and lows that go along with wins and losses of all teams.
We closely follow our home team, The Toronto Blue Jays, and often recall the epic 2015 game when Jose Batista did the historic “Bat Flip” in the game against the Texas Rangers. Although moments like that are once in a lifetime, we pay particular attention to games where our Jays play against the Rangers, and have another reason to watch sports coverage of games happening in Texas.
As one of the newest stadiums in baseball, the Global Life Field in Arlington, Texas, it is home to not only a modern and state-of-the-art stadium, but also a truly unique water feature that Greenscape Pump Services built in collaboration with us at Crystal Fountains.
This stadium packs-out at 40,000 fans, and honours a baseball great with an interactive water feature at the stadium entrance. It’s uniqueness is the circular 60 feet 6 inch diameter feature because it’s the same distance from the pitching mound to home plate on a regular size baseball diamond. In addition, the design cleverly has a centerpiece of 34 nozzles to honour number 34, Nolan Ryan. The former Major League Baseball pitcher and sports executive, nicknamed “The Ryan Express” spent years on and off the field within the Texas Rangers organization.
This project shone for Crystal because collaborating is what we love to do best. Matching the desired vision in drawing attention to Ryan and the Texas “T” design in the centre of the circle finished off the project beautifully. The nozzles and misting jets are lit with our RGBW LED ring lights and programmed with WATERlab Control to create a dynamic display of water and colour that are synchronized with popular songs such as Pat Green’s “I like Texas”.
In order to attract Texas Rangers fans, Crystal specifically used white, red and blue colors to add a splash of patriotism, and each light nozzle has the Texas Rangers logo engraved on its surface. A small touch that added a valuable wow factor for the fans.
This was a fantastic project to be a part of, and it was our honour to work with Greenscapes in creating a dynamic interactive display and experience for fans, of both water and colour.