It’s America’s Favorite Pastime 2.0. The Colorado Rockies are providing a peek at baseball’s digitally enhanced future, after its home ballpark recently overhauled its technology network to deliver a winning gameday experience for sports fans.
Starting in the 2021 season, fans attending games at Coors Field will enjoy expanded access to digital amenities, including mobile ticketing, mobile food ordering, and cashless payments. The upgrades are especially important as the league continues to adapt its gameday experience throughout the COVID-19 recovery, said Michael Bush, Colorado Rockies senior director of information systems.
“Our mission is to create an unparalleled gameday experience, and success for me is when people don’t notice us; the internet is running, the phones are working and the ballpark app is functioning properly,” he added. “This is of utmost importance during COVID times — we never want to endanger the health and safety of fans and staff. Everything centers around fan experience.”
The move follows many Major League Baseball stadiums’ attempts to ride the wave of digital transformation, as fans demand more avenues to interact with fellow sports aficionados, connect on social media, and consume sports content via their mobile devices.
At least 83% of adults check their phones during a live sporting event, according to a study from Zoomph, a sponsorship analytics platform for sports, entertainment & esports brands and properties. That’s a lot of fans tapping into a WiFi connection, considering the Rockies typically drew up to 50,000 fans to the stadium during pre-COVID games.
But the technology goes far beyond fans’ changing expectations, Bush said. On the fan side, technology is behind everything from scanning tickets, buying merchandise and mobile food ordering, to enabling stadium security, running the jumbotron, and cameras to capture live sports coverage. On the baseball side, there’s tech to measure pitch speed, route efficiency and home run distance, sports analytics software, and other player development tools, like film and field analysis. Then there is back office support.
“We don’t mail [fans] anything now,” Bush explains. “Our ticket agents have the ability to go into the CRM and market the right message, to the right person, at the right time. Everything except what’s going on in the field has a digital footprint.”
The increasing level of connectivity needed in-stadium was just one of the reasons the Rockies flagged the need for an overhaul. After experiencing outages and juggling multiple carriers, the team evaluated its options and selected Comcast Business as its technology partner.
Comcast worked with the team to implement dual Gbps Ethernet Dedicated Internet connections and Comcast Business’ advanced ActiveCore SD-WAN service to provide reliability, increased bandwidth and power back office communications across the Rockies’ multiple locations, from its home diamond at Coors Field, to its Dugout Stores, as well as the team’s spring training facility -- Salt River Fields, in Arizona.
“Modern sports venues are constantly challenged to provide the technology infrastructure to keep up with digital innovations that not only enhance the fan experience but also provide seamless connectivity and network management across an organization’s entire footprint,” said Robert Thompson, vice president of the Comcast Business for the Mountain West Region. “Our partnership with the Colorado Rockies is representative of how Comcast Business can redefine how fans enjoy a day at the park.”
For Bush, having the ability to get ahead of any tech trouble has been a game changer, something that was made possible by Comcast Business’ end-to-end network management tools, such as its daily analytics platform, which allows employees to make real-time network adjustments.
“We didn’t have insight into early detection or notifications before,” Bush adds. “The proactive ability to identify those problems and report them up to your management — rather than it coming down to me – is a big thing. It becomes a win-win for everybody.”
In the past, Bush said he often found himself trying to get in touch with a technology partner only to be met with crickets. Since working with Comcast, the responsiveness of the team has helped the Rockies ramp up their operations as well as keep a pulse on their network since Opening Day.
“It just really feels like we are hand in hand and adding to each other’s success,” Bush said. “Getting that type of investment from our communications partner is a real win for us.”
