Angels recreate fans’ memories at The Big A from old photos

The Angels social media staff wanted to recreate fans’ favorite memories at Angel Stadium in Anaheim, and introduced a project over the weekend trying to replicate many of those moments now.

Fans sent in photos, and Angels social coordinator Lauren Pluim took it from there, going in and around the stadium to try to recreate each moment in the exact spot. The results are amazing, and in some cases quite touching.

With no fans in the stands this season, games won’t be the same. Piped-in crowd noise might help the ambience or the television broadcast. But it can’t truly replicate the feeling of a full stadium, in which so many of these memories were created.

Pluim told Halos Heaven the idea for this project was talked about back in March among the Angels social team of Danny Farris, Ricardo Zapata, Brooke Wakenhut, and Pluim, wanting to tie it in with “Opening Day at home” on March 26, the date of the originally planned season opener this year.

“We were just brainstorming and we knew we wanted to do something completely unique that brought a different level to fan engagement,” Pluim said. “Usually we would just ask fans to share photos or ask questions and then respond in the comments, but actually going out and taking the photos for this brought a whole different layer to it where fans would get something more tangible than just a reply from the team account.

“However, due to COVID restrictions we weren’t able to roam the park so the idea was put on hold. I wanted us to revisit this when we gained access to the ballpark again because I felt like even if not a lot of fans responded that it would still be really rewarding to execute and it would be a keepsake for the fans since they can’t be at the stadium this season.”

This project was a nice reminder of how fun and special it can be to watch baseball in person, especially when it’s with loved ones. Here are a few more examples:

“We were SHOCKED by the responses we received. I was talking to Danny the night we posted the call to action and we both thought we would get between 50-100 responses and that we would need to retweet in the morning to make sure it got decent engagement,” Pluim recalled. “When I woke up Sunday morning and saw that we had upwards of 600 responses I was blown away and thrilled that people received it so well (and also a little sad because I knew we wouldn’t be able to fulfill a large amount of the requests).”

By rough count, at least 36 pictures were recreated in and around the stadium. You can see them all in the Angels’ Twitter replies. It is a fun trip through memory lane, and a creative way to share with folks the fan experience at a time they can’t be at the ballpark.

It will be even more fun when fans can create more ballpark memories like these again, but in person.

Links

• Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register has more on how Anthony Rendon’s oblique has him questionable for Opening Day.
• Joe Maddon said Monday he hasn’t heard much from Mike Trout on concerns about COVID-19 recently, Rhett Bollinger of MLB.com writes.
• Fletcher also wrote about a now-healthy Griffin Canning, who threw six scoreless innings in Monday’s night’s exhibition in San Diego.
• The Angels’ starting rotation ranks 21st among 30 MLB teams on FanGraphs positional power rankings.
• Bill Shaikin of the Los Angeles Times wrote about in-game contests MLB plans to offer beginning Thursday, that could eventually lead to gambling if approved.