Rogers Centre seats getting a makeover for Blue Jays games
The Rogers Centre will be looking a little different this season once the Toronto Blue Jays get things going in the coming weeks.
Opening Day is just 10 days away, though the Blue Jays get a little extra leeway with their first three series of the year coming on the road.
The Rogers Centre has unveiled a series of new changes to the ballpark this season: a series of standing-room-only social spaces, elevated bullpens, and new field dimensions. But one of the most striking changes will be approximately one-third of the Rogers Centre seats, which will be replaced before the season begins.
It’s beginning to look a lot like baseball #TBJLive pic.twitter.com/FGWTIC8ybM
— TBJ Live (@TBJLive) March 15, 2023
The renovation began on October 14, just days after the Jays’ crushing loss to the Seattle Mariners in the American League Wild Card Series, where the PCL construction team began by tearing out 17,000 seats from the 500 level of the stadium.
Here are some photos up close of the new seats from a press event in January, when the seats were revealed to a wider audience.
Jack Landau/blogTO
Jack Landau/blogTO
Adam Laskaris/Daily Hive
The newer seats are in darker blue, with the older seats offered as a comparison during the demonstration.
While they’ll remain the same for the rest of the 2023 seasons, the seats in the 200 and 100 levels are expected to be replaced over the next two offseasons.
The new seats aren’t the only change — there will actually be fewer of them, with the capacity this season dropping to around 46,000 from a previous number of 49,286.
There are no immediate plans to sell off the old seats, though that could happen sometime down the line, per the construction team.
Toronto’s home opener is Tuesday, April 11, when they take on the Detroit Tigers.
It’s just 22 days until the Jays play their first home game inside the newly renovated stadium. Batter up!
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