Land and water tend to do two different things when it comes to heat – the land retains it, while water repels it. The land’s retention of heat gives way by the afternoon, causing the rising heat to create a vacuum, which sucks in cooler air sitting on the surface of the ocean. Cool air rushes into the coasts by mid to late afternoon.
Petco Park is less than one mile from the Pacific Ocean, making it susceptible to these afternoon sea-breeze gusts, which tend to pick up in the spring time and fade in the summer. Fortunately, the ballpark is situated east of Coronado Island [1], which helps to buffer the would-be stronger sea breezes that might affect fly balls. The spring time gusts, the Coronado Island buffer, and the “effect” on fly balls are all hearsay. We’ll look closer at each of these, starting with the sea breezes at the ballpark.
The Wind Matters
Let’s take a closer look at how the wind affects fly balls at Petco Park. Not that the common word of the good people of San Diego can’t be trusted; it’s just a matter of science. Below is a graph of every home run hit at Petco Park over the last two years and the approximate wind speed while the home run was hit. It seems like there’s no correlation between wind speed and distance of home runs.