Venue Detail
Syracuse Chiefs
RSV Pro Facilities Report
February, 2016
Syracuse Chiefs
One Tex Simone Dr Syracuse, NY 13208 Phone: 315-474-7833 Fax: 315-474-2658 URL: www.syracusechiefs.com Owner: Community-Owned Baseball Club of Central NY, Inc. League: International League, North
Venue
Alliance Bank Stadium, One Tex Simone Dr, Syracuse, NY 13208 Owner: Onandago County Managed by: Team Built: 1997 Capacity: 9,981 Permanent concession stands: 7 Concessionaire: Ovations Food Services Suite caterer: Centerplate Soft drink: Coca Cola Beer: Multiple
Naming rights
Sold to: Alliance Bank Price: $2,800,000 Term: 20 years Expires: 2025
Ticket prices
Season tickets range from $350 to $575 Single tickets range from $8.00 to $20.00
Attendance
2013 average attendance: 5,150 2014 average attendance: 3,743
Suites
Quantity: 20 Term: 1 to 3 years Price: $15,000 to $20,000 Seats: 12 to 20 Includes: Tickets.
Financing
The $29.3 million facility was built by the county. The financing included a $16 million donation from the state of New York, $8.6 million in other gifts and donations and $4 million from the SkyChiefs.
Chiefs general manager Jason Smorol announced the team in 2016 will cover five upper deck sections in NBT Bank Stadium.
The move will eliminated 1,519 seats for baseball games, dropping the official number of hard seats in the park from 11,410 to 9,981. When adding fans who use the picnic area, suites and party deck, the ballpark's official capacity will be just over 11,000.
The tarps will remain in place all season and will not be removed even if it looks like the Chiefs could sell the covered seats.
Officials said the move was made to make the venue more intimate.
Syracuse averaged 3,803 fans per game in 2015, last in the 14-team International League. Smorol said the team drew just three gates that exceeded 8,000 in 2015, topped by 12,526 for the Fourth of July.
According to International League president Randy Mobley, the average size of parks in the IL is about 11,400 seats. The Pacific Coast League average was about 10,700.
The Chiefs will hope to raise revenue with the tarp move by selling advertising on the tarps.
The opened in 1997as P&C Stadium. The Chiefs, formerly the SkyChiefs, lease it from the county and keep all revenue. Naming rights were resold to Alliance in 2005 which later changed its name to NBT.
The stadium includes covered upper deck patios, a 300-seat stadium club and grass berms for additional seating and picnic areas. A manual scoreboard was added in 1999. The team makes lease payments of $266,667 per year.
Onondaga County has taken over management of the stadium for non-baseball events. The team had managed the facility for all events, but says it was losing money on non-baseball activities, mainly high school games. The county will now take over those duties and try to attract other events.
The team has a 15-year lease on the ballpark and collected $52,000 in rental fees for non-baseball events in the 1999 fiscal year. Expenses associated with those events totaled more than $100,000. The team must make payments on the $4 million it contributed to the ballpark's $29.3 million cost. The team must also pay the county 10 percent of profits up to $200,000 and a greater percentage for amounts over that. (Facilities, Baseball, Minor League, Professional Sports, Venue)