The stadium that saved TCU’s baseball program from elimination now needs upgrades

As TCU plays in its sixth College World Series, all since 2010, none of these current players would have a clue that their team was close to death shortly before their respective mothers gave birth.

TCU leaders once contemplating putting down its near-dead football program has been documented, and it was about 1999-ish the same discussion was had for its baseball team.

Not long after TCU hired Eric Hyman as athletic director in 1998, and effectively cleaned out the entire department staff, leadership evaluated every program.

Playing in a home stadium that was on par with 4A high schools, the state of the TCU baseball program was just a tick or two above the football team.

Football would stay. Baseball ...

“Baseball was at a cross roads; it was one of those, ‘Are we in, or are we out?” said former TCU player and baseball coach, Texas congressman and TCU board of trustees member, Roger Williams. “I think it was an area they thought they could cut.”

Said former TCU baseball coach Jim Schlossnagle, “There was no way they could move on. They were only paying one assistant coach; the old field (TCU Diamond) was way behind the WAC standards, much less the Big 12. They had to do something.”

Williams, along with former TCU board member Malcolm Louden and a few others, led the efforts to raise $7 million for a new stadium, which effectively saved a program that has become a top college baseball brand.

“When I was fund raising my line was, ‘You better invest in baseball because we have a much better chance to win a national championship in baseball than we ever will in football,’” Williams said.

About that ...

Today, the facility that served as the starting point for the rebirth of a program is now in need of an udpate.

TCU’s Lupton Stadium needs improvements

The fire marshal was probably out of town when TCU hosted Indiana State at the NCAA baseball super regional.

About 9,000 fans attended TCU’s NCAA super regional series-clinching win on June 10; the image of so many people packed in Lupton Stadium makes for a great photograph, but a sardine would have been uncomfortable.

You know it’s a problem when the line for the restroom stretches out the door, and 20 deep into an already-crammed concourse. The men’s restroom.

In big-time college athletics’ eternal toy race, TCU’s baseball stadium will soon need millions (and millions) worth of improvements.

In terms of seating, Lupton Stadium doesn’t need another one; the current capacity of 4,500 is fine. On those few occasions when 4,500 seats isn’t fine, Lupton Stadium looks like a fire hazard.

The awning over the upper deck could use an extension. Williams said there have been discussions to potentially add a third deck.

There is room over the left center field fence to potentially increase the popular grass seating area.

Selling beer along with more merchandise and food options has created traffic jams throughout a concourse that is now tight.

The stadium will soon “need” a player’s-lounge, because those toys are now necessities in college sports. Most likely a pitcher’s-specific training area, too.

Throw in a club area for fans, another suite as well as a larger press area to accommodate the reality that every game is televised and you get the idea.

For fans, and coaches, “We need more” lists are always fun, and endless. Completing them requires aggressive fund raising, but not the level that Williams and others had to do when they set out to rebuild a baseball program.

Starting TCU’s baseball team over

When people such as Williams, donor Malcolm Louden as well as TCU alum Reid Ryan and his father, Nolan, started to raise money to build a new stadium there were obvious obstacles.

The team wasn’t good. Why are we doing this? It’s college baseball, in the WAC.

Then there were less obvious obstacles. There was considerable push back from neighbors in the community who wanted no part of the lights necessary for night games.

There was also a push for TCU to use LaGrave Field with the Fort Worth Cats minor league team. The Cats were coming back for the 2002 season, and at the time it was common for a college team to share a facility with a minor league baseball franchise.

TCU resisted any pressure to use LaGrave Field, which is a 15-minute drive from its campus. The Cats folded in 2014, and the stadium effectively suffered a slow, sad, death.

As is the case with so many of these sorts of projects, the objections from the neighbors faded. Or they were ignored.

It effectively concluded when donor Kit Moncrief pushed the fund raising efforts to the necessary number, provided the name of facility was her mother’s side of the family - Lupton.

The facility opened in the spring of 2003, the last season for head coach Lance Brown. Brown was replaced that fall by Schossnagle, and the program slowly ascended to its current state.

It took about $7 million in 2000 to re-start TCU’s baseball program; $7 million in 2000 is about $13 million in 2023.

To maintain TCU baseball’s facility at a desired level will require more than $7 million. Or $13 million.

If TCU found some money to save a program it contemplated dropping in 2000, it should have less of a problem to find the necessary funds to help a team that has become one of the best in the nation.