Qualcomm Stadium
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Qualcomm Stadium (a.k.a. "The Q"), formerly known as San Diego Stadium and Jack Murphy Stadium, is a multiple-use stadium in San Diego, California. It is the current home of the San Diego Chargers of the NFL, the San Diego State University Aztecs college football team and hosts the Pacific Life Holiday Bowl and the San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl college football games every December. Until 2003, it served as the home of the San Diego Padres in Major League Baseball. The stadium has hosted three Super Bowl games: Super Bowl XXII in 1988, Super Bowl XXXII in 1998, and Super Bowl XXXVII in 2003. It has also hosted the 1978 and 1992 Major League Baseball All-Star Games, the 1996 and 1998 National League Division Series, the 1984 and 1998 National League Championship Series, and the 1984 and 1998 World Series.
[edit] History
In the early 1960s, local sportswriter Jack Murphy, the brother of New York Mets broadcaster Bob Murphy, began to build up support for a multipurpose stadium for San Diego. In November 1965, a $27 million bond was passed allowing construction to begin on a stadium, which was designed in the Brutalist style. Construction on the stadium began one month later. When completed, the facility was named San Diego Stadium.
The Chargers played the first game ever at the stadium on August 20, 1967. San Diego Stadium had a capacity of around 50,000; the three-tier grandstand was in the shape of a horseshoe, with the east end open. The Chargers were the main tenant of the stadium until 1969, when the National League expanded to add the San Diego Padres. Another San Diego Padres team, this one in the AAA Pacific Coast League, played in the stadium during the 1968 season, following their move from the minor league sized Westgate Park.
After Jack Murphy's passing in 1981, San Diego Stadium was renamed San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium or simply Jack Murphy Stadium. The stadium remained basically the same until 1983. Over 9,000 bleachers were added to the lower deck on the open end of the stadium raising the capacity of San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium to 59,022. Sixteen years later, the most substantial addition was completed at the stadium. In 1997, the stadium was fully enclosed, with the exception of where the scoreboard is located. Nearly 11,000 seats were added in readiness for Super Bowl XXXII in 1998, bringing the capacity to over 71,000. Also in 1997, the facility was renamed Qualcomm Stadium after Qualcomm Corporation paid $18 million for the naming rights. The naming rights will belong to Qualcomm until 2017.
The stadium was the first of the "square circle" style, which was thought to be an improvement over the "cookie cutter" style of so many of the 1960s stadiums. The second (and last) of this style was the since-built and since-imploded Veterans Stadium. Despite the theoretical improvements of this style, most of the seats were still very far away from the action on the field.
[edit] The Padres
From their inception until their move to PETCO Park in the downtown area, the San Diego Padres called the stadium home. The baseball field dimensions had varied slightly over the years. In 1969, the distance from home plate to the left and right field wall was 330 feet, the distance to the left- and right-center field power alleys was 375 feet, and the distance from home plate to the center field was 420 feet. A 19-foot wall, whose top was the rim of the Plaza level, surrounded the outfield, making home runs difficult to hit. Later an eight-foot fence was erected, cutting the distances to 327, 368 and 405 feet, respectively. In 1996 a note of asymmetry was introduced when a 19-foot high scoreboard displaying out-of-town scores was erected along the right-field wall near the foul pole and deemed to be in play, and so the distances to right field and right-center field were 330 feet and 370 feet, respectively, while the remaining dimensions remained the same.
Rickey Henderson collected his 3000th major league base hit here on October 7, 2001 as a Padre, in what was also the last major league game for eight-time National League batting champion and "Mr. Padre" Tony Gwynn, who played his entire career here. Recent fans were treated to a recording of the song "Hell's Bells" by the heavy metal rock band AC/DC whenever ace reliever Trevor Hoffman arrived in a game in the 9th inning in a save situation. Victories by both the Padres and Chargers have been celebrated by the playing of the song "Gettin' Jiggy With It" recorded by singer and actor Will Smith.
[edit] The Home of the Chargers
The San Diego Chargers teams that played football here in the 1970's and 1980's featured a high-scoring offense led by quarterback Dan Fouts and featuring running back Chuck Muncie, tight end Kellen Winslow, receiver Charlie Joiner and place-kicker Rolf Benirschke; however, the first Chargers team to advance to the Super Bowl (in 1994, Super Bowl XXIX) featured a strong defense anchored by linebacker Junior Seau and an unspectacular but efficient offense led by quarterback Stan Humphries and running back Natrone Means.
[edit] The Aztecs and Bowl Games
Since its inception, the stadium, which is approximately five miles from campus, has been the home of the San Diego State University Aztecs. Prior to the building of the stadium, they had played their games between Balboa Stadium and their small, on-campus stadium, the Aztec Bowl (which is now the site of Cox Arena, the home of the basketball teams). Traditionally, the team, clad in all-black uniforms and red helmets, has played its home games at night, a tradition started during the days of former head coach Don Coryell before the stadium was even opened. There have been attempts in the past to change from "The Look," but all have led to poor play by the Aztecs and a reversion back to the traditional look.
Following the 1978 college football season, the stadium began hosting the Holiday Bowl, an annual bowl game held before New Year's Day. It originally hosted the Western Athletic Conference champion (at the time, the hometown Aztecs had just joined this conference) against a nationally ranked opponent. The game has traditionally been a high-scoring affair, and no team has ever managed to score less than thirteen points (which occured in the 1991 game, when the Ty Detmer-led BYU Cougars tied the Iowa Hawkeyes, 13-13, the bowl's only tie) and only 1/3 of the games have had a team even score less than twenty points. The 1984 game is well-known for it being the culmination of BYU's championship season, the last championship not won by a member of the current BCS alliance.
On December 22, 2005, a second bowl game came to San Diego, with the inaugural San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl was played at Qualcomm, with Navy beating Colorado State.
[edit] The Future
With the departure of the Padres following the 2004 season and even beforehand, there has been much talk of replacing the increasingly obsolete (by NFL standards) stadium with a more modern, football-only one. There have been many problems with this project, the most obvious one being the city's inability to fund such a stadium.[1] The team and city have both attempted to bring business partners in on the proposed $800 million project, which would be located in the parking lot of the current stadium and include upgrades to the area and infrastructure, but all efforts have failed so far. The Chargers have a clause in their contract saying that if they can pay off all debts to the city and county for the upgrades to the current stadium by 2007, then the team can pull out of its lease in 2008. As of the summer of 2006, the plan still remains in limbo, and the team's future remains uncertain.
[edit] External links
- Official website
- The Fans, Taxpayers and Business Alliance for NFL Football in San Diego (a group pushing for the new stadium)
[edit] Picture Gallery
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