By BOB BAUM
AP Sports Writer
SCOTTSDALE -- The Arizona Diamondbacks and Colorado Rockies have said adios to Tucson and are ready to move into a state-of-the-art spring training facility in Scottsdale.
Finishing touches are being made at Salt River Fields, a complex that features a stadium with 7,000 seats and capacity for another 4,000 on lawns beyond the fences in left and right field. In addition, the Diamondbacks and Rockies each have six practice fields. Arizona has one with the exact dimensions of Chase Field in Phoenix and Colorado has one that matches Coors Field in Denver.
Reporters were led Tuesday on a tour of the $130 million facility, built by the Salt River Pima-Maricopa Indian Community across a freeway from its recently completed Talking Stick resort and casino.
The Rockies expansive clubhouse and related training facilities stand in stark contrast to their crowded previous home at Tucson's quaint but antiquated Hi Corbett Field.
"It's going to be a different experience for us," team owner Dick Monfort said, "but I think we'll get used to it."
Monfort said that the move will eliminate the long bus rides to the Phoenix area for games and will expand the opposition for minor league teams, who in Tucson either played the Diamondbacks or themselves.
Diamondbacks general manager Kevin Towers said that the team can use the new facility as a free agent recruiting tool.
"It gives us a real advantage in signing players," he said. "It gives major league players an opportunity to really spend eight months at home. A lot of these guys have a wife and kids and it's pretty nice when you don" have to pack up and move even to go to spring training. You can live in the Phoenix metropolitan area and commute to work for eight months."
The stadium, with a vista of the nearby McDowell Mountains, includes a giant video screen and three "party" decks, sponsored by Miller Light, Coors and Pepsi, that give access to fans for $19 apiece.
The Rockies' clubhouse, offices and training facilities feature wood from Colorado trees that had been killed by a beetle infestation. The team has named its training room for the Keli S. McGregor Fitness Center in honor of the Colorado general manager who died last year at age 48.
The Diamondbacks had held spring training in Tucson since the franchise was born in 1998. But with the departure of the Chicago White Sox to the new facility they share with the Los Angeles Dodgers in Glendale, it was only a matter of time before the other two teams left Tucson.
