Toyota Field

• 1. Introduction

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  Toyota Field sits in the former Longhorn Quarry on the northeast side of San Antonio, Texas, and it carries the unusual distinction of being a stadium built not primarily for sport, but to fund a theme park for children with disabilities. Gordon Hartman, a San Antonio philanthropist, founded a non-profit called S.O.A.R. Inc. and used it to own and operate a soccer stadium, directing all proceeds across the street to Morgan's Wonderland, the special-needs amusement park he had also created. When the facility opened on the 13th of April 2013, few soccer stadiums in North America could claim a charitable origin quite like that one. How did a philanthropist's community project grow into a city-owned venue hosting Liga MX clubs, the U.S. national team, and college championships? And what happened to the team that played its first match there on opening day, only to vanish from existence two years later?

• 2. A Philanthropist's Gamble

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  Gordon Hartman acquired the San Antonio Scorpions in 2010 through a deliberately philanthropic frame. He launched a campaign called Soccer For A Cause, describing it as a community-wide effort to bring professional soccer to San Antonio so the revenues could sustain Morgan's Wonderland. The Scorpions began play in the 2012 season, one year before their permanent home was finished, and used nearby Heroes Stadium as a temporary base during construction. S.O.A.R. Inc., the non-profit Hartman founded, owned and operated the stadium from the start, with every dollar of proceeds pointing toward the park across the street. That model made Toyota Field something genuinely rare: a sports venue whose financial purpose was social welfare rather than profit.

• 3. Building the Quarry

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  Construction ran from February 2012 through April 2013, and the architects at Pro Sports Developments, the sports entertainment division of Luna Architecture and Design, based in San Antonio, took their visual cues directly from the site's industrial past. The stadium's ribbed metal and perforated metal facades, its exposed structural elements, and its steel-forward aesthetic all reflect the heritage of the Longhorn Quarry the building now occupies. The permanent roof canopy on the west side extends over the suite balconies and stadium seating, and it serves a practical acoustic purpose: the metal surfaces amplify crowd noise. That same canopy, combined with lower-bowl seating that begins just 17 feet from the soccer touchlines, gives the venue an intimacy the designers say is a deliberate feature, one they planned to preserve through all three future expansion phases. The field itself was built by Texas Multi-Chem of Kerrville, using a TifSport hybrid Bermuda grass surface over an 8-inch layer of USGA sand and Dakota peat, with an internal drainage system to reduce weather cancellations.

• 4. The Scorpions' Brief Reign

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  The San Antonio Scorpions lost their opening match at Toyota Field on the 13th of April 2013, falling 0-2 to the Tampa Bay Rowdies in a North American Soccer League fixture. That defeat did not define the team's tenure. On the 21st of May 2013, the venue hosted its first Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup match, between the Scorpions and FC Tucson of the PDL. On the 6th of July that same year, it staged its first international friendly, with the Scorpions hosting Tigres UANL of Liga MX. The stadium's sharpest moment came in 2014, when it hosted Soccer Bowl, the NASL championship final, and the Scorpions defeated the Fort Lauderdale Strikers 2-1 to claim their first and only league title. The victory was also their last major achievement. Following the 2015 season, the Scorpions dissolved, leaving Toyota Field without its founding tenant.

• 5. The City Steps In

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  In November 2015, the City of San Antonio and Bexar County jointly purchased the stadium for $18 million. Spurs Sports and Entertainment, known as SS&E, paid an additional $3 million directly to Gordon Hartman, bringing the total acquisition cost to $21 million. SS&E received an initial 20-year lease to operate the facility with a new professional soccer team. The lease carried a significant financial incentive: penalty fees of up to $5 million applied if SS&E failed to bring a Major League Soccer franchise to the city within the first six years. San Antonio FC, the club SS&E launched as the new USL tenant, began play at Toyota Field in March 2016. The stadium's capacity of 8,296 seats for soccer matches, along with 16 private suites, 864 midfield club seats, a field-level beer garden for more than 200 fans positioned as close as 15 feet behind the south goal, and a suite-level observation terrace for more than 100 fans, carried over intact for the new occupant.

• 6. A Stage for International Football

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  Toyota Field's calendar of visiting clubs reads like a survey of North American and Mexican soccer. On the 13th of October 2013, Santos Laguna played Club Tijuana there, both clubs from Liga MX. On the 20th of January 2024, the United States men's national team hosted Slovenia in an international friendly and lost 1-0. The 25th of October 2024 brought the final of the NWSL x Liga MX Femenil Summer Cup, where Kansas City Current defeated NJ/NY Gotham FC 2-0. On the 26th of March 2023, CF Monterrey beat Atlas FC 2-0 in another Liga MX friendly. On the 31st of May 2025, UD Las Palmas, recently relegated from Spain's La Liga to the Segunda Division, visited San Antonio and won 1-0. The stadium's expandability to 18,500 seats across three phases, with the current Phase 1 design still in place, positions Toyota Field as a potential candidate for the larger audiences those ambitions would require. Toyota Motor Corporation currently holds the naming rights.