Detroit What?

The past weekend, I took another weekend mini-trip with a few of the guys, this time driving out to Detroit. Tony hooked us up with tickets to 2 of the White Sox-Tigers games, so of course we couldn't pass that up. And I figured it's always nice to check out other places besides Chicago, so off we went.

As a whole, I found Detroit to be a pretty crappy place. No offense to anyone who lives there, but the city is not very nice at all, with a few exceptions (more on that shortly). From what I was told, most of the "regular" people don't actually live in Detroit but in the suburbs, which would make a lot of sense. Downtown Detroit seemed to be mostly a mix of empty lots, deserted buildings, and random ghettos sprinkled throughout.

The one downtown area that was a bit nicer was near the 2 stadiums, Ford Field and Comerica Park. We found a good mix of restaurants/sports bars around there, and it was pretty cool to just chill around there before and after the games. Also, a 10 minute walk from there got us to the new MGM Grand Hotel/Casino (apparently it's a new unspoken requirement for us to check off whenever me and the boys go on one of these trips). This was one of the nicer casinos I've been to outside of Vegas, although maybe it's only in nice condition because it's still fairly new. I don't know.

We did spend part of the weekend at one of the malls in the suburbs. It's a fairly new mall, and very large (it's actually built on both sides of the road connected by a walkway).

Apparently the locals are really proud of this place, and I have to admit that I was impressed by the variety of stores there. Still, I don't think it compares favorably to Woodfield (and I'm not even that huge of a fan of Woodfield). On a Saturday afternoon, the entire mall was surprisingly empty and just lacked any sort of energy or excitement.

As for the main reason we were there, the games were a blast to attend. Comerica Park is a really nice place inside, very fan friendly and well designed. We got to enjoy one of the games from the Chevy skybox on the 1st base side. It was a nice view, but even better was the free food inside. All you could eat in hot dogs, chili, nachos, pizza, and even sushi rolls. I can't ever turn that down!

Also, I was pretty impressed with the home fans. The park was very full of mostly Tigers colors, and I did not see a lot of invading Sox jerseys like ourselves. At least Detroit people are loyal to their city, which I have to give them credit for.

One last observation I had about Detroit is how integrated the auto industry is with the culture there. The big 3 auto companies all have a very noticeable presence that could be felt almost everywhere we went. Whether it was the old Chevy displays at the mall, the billboards on the side of the road, or the countless sponsorships of just about everything that could be sponsored, there was no denying that this place was indeed the "Motor City".