Joe O’Brien Field

Entrance to Joe O’Brien Field, Jul-2003.

There’s no cover here unless you're in one of the press boxes.

The distant outfield fence doubles its height in dead center field.

Chronological Tour: Stop 242

• Location: Mill Street at Holly Lane, Elizabethton, Tenn. (map it using Google Maps)
• Opened: 1974 as Riverside Park (renovated: 1996)
• Additional names: Joe O’Brien Field (1980)
• Home team: Elizabethton Twins, Appalachian League (1974-2019)
• Capacity: 1,500

Rating: 2 baseballs

The ballpark is surrounded by a wooden fence, much like parks of old. In center field (414 feet away), the height of the wall doubles to 16 feet for a stretch – not that many Appalachian League players will put one out to straightaway center.

In 1996, significant upgrades were made to the ballpark, including new locker rooms and a new reserved seat section behind the plate – the only comfortable seating in the ballpark. Everything else is aluminum bleachers or, in a few spots in the main grandstand along first base, bare concrete. The dual press boxes flank the reserved section on the first and third base sides.

On the scoreboard (an Electro-Mech model appearing to date to 1974), the visiting team error total no longer worked, so they kept the home team error total on zero. (Each team made four errors in the game I saw, in July 2003.) In addition, the number of the player at bat was frozen. The board had been replaced by a functioning Varsity Scoreboards model by my 2017 visit.

Also in 2017, the City of Elizabethton announced that they were going to help fund renovations to the ballpark, including new clubhouses for both teams that would bring the facility up to Minor League Baseball standards. Additional improvements may, or may not, take place to upgrade the bleachers, depending on how much money is left over. The work took place during the 2018-19 offseason.

With the Appalachian League transforming from a rookie professional league to an MLB-sponsored college summer league for 2021, the club here will sport a name other than that of a major league affiliate for the first time. Elizabethton’s team is now known as the River Riders, a quite appropriate name with the occasionally rushing river running behind the ballpark.