Who cleans up the mess after a Mariners game?

Imagine having to clean up after a frat party, with everything from empty beer bottles to half-eaten food and other garbage all over.

That’s pretty much what Joe Myhra does for a living. But as the Mariners Vice President of Ballpark Operations, he has to oversee the cleanup 81 times a year.

“The garlic fries in the stadium, fans love them but they’re difficult to clean up,” Myhra said. “I could probably give you a list, but I don’t want to gross out the fans too much. It’s tough to clean up after a large party like that.”

Luckily, he has plenty of help. It starts after all the fans have cleared out. Upwards of 140 crew members scramble around the stadium, picking up all the stuff left behind.

Once everything is bagged up, they bring in the heavy equipment.

“The majority of the effort is pressure washing,” Myhra said. “We have anywhere from 10 to 24 pressure washers, depending on attendance.”

They even have a special peanut vacuum to get all the shells off the warning track.

While fans leave plenty of mess behind, Myhra says the players actually make the biggest mess.

“I’d say the bullpens are the worst,” Myhra said. “Pitchers have a lot of time on their hands &#8212 seeds, chewing tobacco, bubble gum &#8212 it’s probably the worst area of the building.”

Myhra says it takes all night to clean the stadium after a game.

“Most games are between the six to eight hours range,” Myhra said. “But there are times that we’re still cleaning the facility at around 10 or 11 a.m. for a 7:10 p.m. game.”

But just because the stadium is clean, there’s still plenty of work to be done.

“Every fan generates about 2.4 pounds of waste at a game,” Myhra said. “That’s everything from any kind of giveaway items, to concessions to merchandise, and all the packaging.”

Most of it used to go to the landfill, but not anymore.

“We actually have seven streams of waste now, only one of which goes to the landfill,” Myhra said. “All the other streams are recycling material, compost, styrofoam, construction debris, plastic bottles, aluminum cans. Everything that you can possibly recycle, we do.”

The Mariners have always been at the forefront of environmental efforts, whether it was early adoption of composting or putting in low-energy LED lights.

“There’s a lot of opportunity,” Myhra said. “Changing the mindset of this is not just someone else’s problem to it’s our problem. We’ve made a decision to figure out how to do it more efficiently and what’s better for the environment.”

It’s also good for the bottom line. It turns out all the composting and recycling cuts down on costs. Myhra says the team is always looking for new ways to do even more.

But the one thing they’ll never be able to do is get us to make less of a mess. And if the party ends up at his house, don’t expect Myhra to clean up.

“Do you do the vacuuming at home?”

“Sometimes,” Myhra said. “I do pitch in a little bit, but nothing compared to what our employees do here.”