MSU Has the Most Unique Baseball Field in the Country
It's the only stadium with a hill in right field, giving the home team an advantage
East Lansing — One of the most beautiful aspects of baseball is that each field is unique. The infield dimensions are all the same, but the outfield can be whatever you want. You can put a flagpole in the middle of center field. You can put a huge green wall in left field.
Or you can put a steep hill in right field.
That’s what they did more than a century ago at Michigan State University. The baseball field backed up to a natural slope on the banks of the Red Cedar River, so they incorporated the slope into the field during construction in 1902.
The result was a 30-degree hill that starts in dead centerfield and goes all the way to the right field pole. If the centerfielder or rightfielder is tracking a ball that’s heading for the fence, they need to run uphill to catch it.
The outfield hill is the only one like it in the country and gives MSU’s McLane Baseball Stadium the distinction of being the most unique college baseball field in the U.S. There are other fields with wacky outfield dimensions or mountains in the background, but Michigan State has the only field with a hill.
The Houston Astros used to have a well-known slope in centerfield called “Tal’s Hill,” named for general manager Tal Smith when Minute Maid Park opened in 2000. It made for some memorable catches (and drops) for the Astros and their opponents, but Tal’s Hill was removed in 2016 when the park was renovated.
That left MSU’s hill—which doesn’t have a nickname but should—as the only outfield slope in the country.
The hill gives the Spartans a bit of a home-field advantage. Whenever a fly ball is hit out there or a ball is ripped into the corner, the MSU players know exactly how to play it. The visitors have to figure it out on the fly (literally).
Among the Spartan outfielders who have dealt with the hill through the decades is Detroit Tigers legend Kirk Gibson, who was primarily a football player at MSU but spent a season playing baseball in East Lansing. Gibson also holds the record for the longest home run hit over the hill (and fence) in right, a blast in April 1978 that went 550 feet in a game against Albion College.
Steve Garvey, another MSU star who played against Gibson’s Tigers in the 1984 World Series as a member of the San Diego Padres, also blasted a few home runs over that fence—including in his very first at-bat as a Spartan. It was a grand slam that landed in the Red Cedar River.
“My first game as a freshman, the opposing pitcher walked the first three guys in the bottom of the first,” Garvey recalled in a 2010 interview. “When I got up there, I was thinking he’s gotta get this ball over the plate, so I looked for a fastball—and I hit it over the rightfield fence for a grand slam. I mean, where do you go from there?”
Even aside from the unique nature of the outfield hill, McLane Baseball Stadium is a beautiful place to watch a game. In addition to being the home of the Spartans, it also hosts the MHSAA baseball tournament every year, both the semifinal and final games. The trees and the Red Cedar River in the background make for a spectacular setting.
The stadium itself is also a showpiece, but that wasn’t always the case. As recently as the 1990s, it was considered one of the most dilapidated and run-down stadiums in the country. It was renovated and renamed in 2008 thanks to a donation from Drayton McLane Jr., a Michigan State grad who owned the Houston Astros at the time.
The stadium is relatively quiet now, but come next spring, the Spartans will be roaming the outfield hill once again. Do yourself a favor and catch a game at the most unique stadium in the country.
