Cloud coverage is not enough to deter baseball fans from an eclipse-viewing opportunity.
According to Syracuse Mets General Manager Jason Smorol, close to 7,000 people were in attendance at the Syracuse Met’s “Total Eclipse of the Park” event. Fans were able to view the eclipse, attend a minor league baseball game, and enjoy the first-ever “Dollar Monday” at NBT Bank Stadium with one-dollar sodas and hotdogs. Smorol said he hopes people remember the event as the perfect place to experience the eclipse.
“Just that they made memories with their families and friends and remembered where they were and they always look back and fondly think of the Syracuse Mets as just part of their life,” Smorol said.
For Matt Fuller and his grandson Brendan, that vision rang true. They were able to share their first total eclipse experience together. Brendan said it was a day he’ll remember.
“It’s my first eclipse, there was one in 2017, I heard about it but I didn’t see it,” Brendan said. “But this is my first eclipse and I’m excited because it’s going to be total and we are right on the border of totality and we’re going to have a pretty good view.”
Fuller said the event was hard to beat.
“Baseball and family go together and now throw the eclipse for a little bit of science, it’s great,” Fuller said.
Kathleen Madzin drove up from Scranton, Pennsylvania. She said traffic held her group up a little, but Syracuse was the perfect destination.
“We figured, what a better place to go than baseball and an eclipse,” Madzin said.
During the eclipse, attendees saw a darkened stadium and the cloudy sky parted just enough to see the eclipse during totality. For Margo Janack, who traveled from Albany, the experience was almost indescribable.
“It was just kind of this tingly exciting feeling,” Janack said. “It’s hard to put a finger on it because it’s nothing that you’ve experienced ever before. It was, I guess, enlightening and you felt lighter and happier and just exciting because it’s an adventure.”
New Yorkers will have to wait another 55 years before the next total solar eclipse passes through the state.
