Bring your glove!

St. Louis Cardinals relief pitcher Seth Maness holds his glove as San Diego Padres' Will Venable rounds the bases with a three run homer in the Padres' eight run seventh inning in a baseball game in San Diego.

St. Louis Cardinals relief pitcher Seth Maness holds his glove as San Diego Padres' Will Venable rounds the bases with a three run homer in the Padres' eight run seventh inning in a baseball game in San Diego.

Published Aug 18, 2014

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Chicago - The Chicago Cubs fan found the ideal seat at Wrigley Field almost by accident, sitting in the sunniest of spots along the left-field line and finding a friendly vendor to bring some nachos for his buddy. He even caught a foul ball that day.

Of course, that fan was Ferris Bueller and just part of his amazing day after ditching school in the 1986 classic Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.

Now the casual fan can find that sort of ideal seat at a major league park — with no principal chasing behind, either.

Joel Carben and two of his sports tech-savvy buddies created IdealSeat, a fan engagement platform that uses heat maps to chart the most likely sections to snare a souvenir foul ball. The site also collects weather information and ranks top concession spots.

So far, their research teams have logged the landing places of 10,000 game balls since its inception three years ago. The company is currently in six parks — AT&T Park in San Francisco, Camden Yards in Baltimore, Citi Field in New York, PNC Park in Pittsburgh, Safeco Field in Seattle, and Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg, Florida — with plans to expand.

Soon, their data gathering may include places such as Yankee Stadium, Fenway Park, and, yes, Wrigley Field — an ode to Bueller, their foul ball-catching hero.

“That was the genius of Ferris: He was always in the ideal seat. His whole day was ideal — and he didn’t even need an iPhone,” said Carben, who has had more than 11 000 users visit both the website and mobile application. “Today, everyone is using an iPhone to create an ideal experience to choose their own adventure.”

Carben’s crew came up with the concept innocuously enough as they watched a fan catch a foul ball at a Mariners game.

Good fortune for that fan or good planning?

“Our brains went off: How can we use statistics to find seats with highest probability to find a foul ball?” Carben said.

Carben discovered that the Mariners — or any major league team, really — didn’t actively track where foul balls were landing.

So they began creating a mobile system to track baseballs. The sections shaded in red on the app mean have your glove ready. The blue? Probably no need to bring out your mitt.

There’s also a link to a site selling seats, just to see if those best spots are available.

To broaden the fan experience, the company is now looking at stadium food (like where to get those garlic fries at Safeco Field) and weather (the intensity of the sun at a particular seat).

What’s more, they’re examining factors outside the gates of the park, such as the best hotels, hippest bars, and greatest tourist attractions. They want to become a TripAdvisor for the baseball fan.

“This is still evolving,” said Carben, who co-founded the company with Luis Carlos Hillon and Zain Khan. “We’re looking at the role of technology to understand and give the fans a great experience.”

At Wrigley Field the other day, a 65-year-old man sitting in the left-field bleachers made an unbelievable catch that has gone viral on video. Carben happened to see the catch and envisions that being one of his users.

“Exactly the place we want our fans to be,” Carben said. “Right place at the right time — and being prepared.” - Sapa-AP

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