Great spot right in the heart of Cooperstown to grab lunch or dinner. We went with our team to compete at Cooperstown Dreamspark and went to the Hall of Fame as a team. While walking around, we came across Hardball Cafe. Parking is limited but luckily we parked in a lot and was walking around most of the day. As expected, service was a little slow to start but again, you need to be patient as it's right in the heart of a busy area. We sat right outside near the sidewalk, so got to people watch while we ate. Some may not be comfortable with that but I actually enjoy it. Lol Ultimately, service was excellent and everyone was very accommodating. To start, we got the pretzel with cheese dipping sauce and spicy mustard. Always a hit wherever we go and Hardball did not disappoint. Pretzel was soft and the dips were very good. For lunch, I got the Bambino Burger. Quality was excellent. Came with "local cheddar", lettuce, tomato, onions and fries on the side. Burger was juicy and cooked to order. If you're in the Cooperstown area or there for one of the big baseball tournaments, this is a solid option to go to. read more

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40 minutes for 2 sandwiches to come from the kitchen is the first signal. Next is the quality. Clearly lacking as fries and onion rings are soggy in grease. Asked for a grilled chicken sandwich listed on the menu with lettuce, onion, and tomato and then have the waitress tell me after the sandwich was brought out that its only on the sandwich if specifically ordered to come with it. What??? It states on the menu. Don't argue. Poor food. Poor service. Won't come back. read more

I would not recommend this place to anyone!! The food took almost an hour to bring out. Got a grilled chicken sandwich that was supposed to come with lettuce, tomato, onion as it says on the menu. It came with none of them, it only had chicken and cheese. It didn't even taste good and the sweet potato fries I got were drenched in grease. read more

Terrible food and super slow service with a half empty restaurant. We were told the kitchen was backed up and would be a 30 minute wait, food came out well over an hour after the "30 minute wait." Avoid this place like a stray foul ball. read more

The prices are outrageous and the wait time is ridiculous. Nice spot and server was nice. Salad took an hour and I had to ask about it. Paid 99.00 for a chef salad with extra chicken, Diet Coke and two Prosecco's. Couple next to us ordered two sandwiches and we're still waiting when we left. read more

Cute spot on Main Street, super busy. Good for large groups. Menu had a good variety of food. Had the Thanksgiving sandwich which had turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce on toasted white bread, i liked it. A bit messy but thats fine. Service is ok, just too busy in there to have someone able to give you more attention. read more

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Drinks were cold, location / atmosphere was excellent, food was awful. Big box store frozen apps heated up. Pretzels were good, spinach and artichoke dip served hot in a small plastic condiment container (similar to what you would measure liquid medicine in). Best guess is we got 25 MLs of artichoke dip. Wish I took a picture. Ok if you don't have any other options, we won't be back. read more

Son and I were hungry after a long drive into Cooperstown and we saw this place so decided to try it. Once we saw their prices, we decided to just order an appetizer and eat somewhere else. Not only are their prices outrageous, but they have two different prices depending if you use a card or pay cash. I mean wouldn't it be easier to have one price somewhere in the middle? First time I've seen this outside of a gas station. Chicken tenders were good, and my son was "impressed" with the hostesses and waitress, but I told him my ratings are based on the food, not who he thinks is good looking. read more

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Be prepared to wait a long time. Waited an hour for food, and there was just two of us. And my order wasn't even correct. Then we waited awhile for our check. Over priced and small portions. read more

The plus - there is an outdoor area which is always nice on a sunny day. The waitress who served us was pleasant, although new, was very friendly and efficient. Minus - this is clearly a tourist restaurant, it's dirty, well use with cheap everything, chairs, plates, silverware etc. They definitely don't care about repeat business, our food, typical American restaurant, was bland, cold and poorly served. In a busy weekend they were the least crowded which what lead us there but that should have kept us away !!! read more

Great spot to get a drink. We had to hide out from a rain storm and it was the ideal place. Great bartenders and service. It was pricey for two cocktails tho. read more

It was very crowded everywhere for Hall of Fame weekend and I wanted to grab an early dinner before the evening parade. I was happy that the restaurant could serve me in time. read more

I guess my husband and I should've read the reviews before we ATTEMPTED to dine at this poor excuse of a restaurant. We're visiting the area for a week. We decided to just go check things out so we went for a walk downtown Cooperstown with our three dogs. We decided we were hungry after walking around a bit so we decided on Hardball Cafe. First I waited about 5 minutes at the hostess desk. Nobody acknowledged me so I decided to walk further into the restaurant near the bar and spoke with a server. I asked if it was ok for us to dine there with our dogs. She said she needed ask. I waited for her just for a few minutes (her attitude towards the situation was not good) before I decided to ask the bartender the same question. He said he needed to ask as well. Right away he asked and came back with the answer that yes we could as long as we sat on the front side of the restaurant on the sidewalk in the very corner. No problem for us because that's the spot we actually preferred. We sat ourselves after getting the ok. The table wasn't clean from the previous party. Ok, I get that especially because we sat ourselves. There were three other tables very near to our table. The server (different than the previous server I spoke with) must've come to the table closest to us sixish times. Never once did she acknowledge us. After about 30 minutes of no acknowledgment we decided to leave. We do plan to go back to the cute little town of Cooperstown. We definitely WON'T be dining at Hardball Cafe. read more

The food was less than appetizing. Chicken tenders(fingers), (pinkies) were dry, tasteless, cold. Should have known when they came out in 3 minutes. The turkey club was another story. Teeny tiny wheat bread, 1 slice of unwrapped yellow market cheese, an 8th of a teaspoon of mayo and 2 pieces of dry bacon. The whole sandwich was cut in 2. Wish I took a picture. And the 5 fries they included as the side were not worth fighting over so I ordered another order thinking they might be fresh. Silly me. They were worse than the OGs. Never again. And sad because the concept is good but this would be a travesty for me to recommend this place to anyone. read more

Terrible! I ordered a spinach salad and paid an extra $9.80 to add chicken and got a few thin dried up squares of chicken. It was terrible and terribly overpriced. Others in our party also had similar disappointing meals. Don't go! read more

A group of young women attempting to bartend and serve. Joking, not attentive to customer, inserting into customers conversations, not noticing wanting the bill, not noticing that there are no utensils, no water. Avoid. There is better in town. read more

Worth checking out if you're looking for a place for lunch or a very casual place for dinner. The menu is pretty good but the service is a little rough around the edges... If you're lucky you can sit outside and enjoy some people watching on Main Street however there is some really loud seating areas as well. The menu is very basic again if you're coming from multiple beers you may have to beg your server or tip them in advance to get more attention as me and my friend were forgotten about... I hope to return soon but for now I will check out some other places! read more

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I'd give this a negative five stars if I could. First if all, the service was awful. We saw our server twice the entire TWO hours we were there. Once to take our order, the second to bring our food. We had to waive down someone else to bring us our check. When we FINALLY got our food. Our $13 queso was cold congealed cheese whiz, in a TINY cup! I ordered a hot dog and fries, my "all beef dog" was smaller than a piece of breakfast sausage. The fries, FROZEN! My husband got the French dip ($19) which was luke warm at best. And his side of fries (and additional $4) were frozen to. We couldn't even complain to our server since, again, we never saw her. The worst part is, they can't even blame it on being busy as there were empty tables all around--now we know why! Overall we spent nearly $60 for the worst meal of my life! Definitely disappointed we didn't wait in the line at Sal's the pizzeria across the street. This experience definitely put us in a bitter mood and ruined the day. Stay far far away! read more

Hardball Cafe - I'm sorry, did I just get this from concession stand? - Cafes Near Me - Cooperstown, New York

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Food was okay. Not very much portions for the very very high price. Got the chicken tenders and they were 18$ for 6 small (very) small ones. Someone else got the chicken sandwich, it's was almost like they cut a chicken breast in half and put it on the bread and it was very dry. Service was also okay. Do not come here, not worth the price. read more

We came here because we were in town for the Cooperstown baseball tournament. This place is not worth it. Save your money. Terrible service, terrible food and we waited for a box for our food for 20 minutes. Very disappointing for tourists who are in town. read more

Went last week, service was good but food wasn't great. You would think the food being somewhat pricy you would get quality food. Nope, the food was plain, fries were hard and small portioned. I did like that they had charging stations and the bathrooms were clean. Over all I wouldn't recommend eating here. read more

Horrible service and food, didn't get my food for over an hour, the waitresses had a bad attitude in the atmosphere was loud with a lot of bees.tenders came with ketchup all over them read more

Hardball Cafe - Cafes Near Me - Cooperstown, New York

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Hard pass!!! Highly disappointed I did not read reviews before going here! Started by ordering the mojito special to go along with their hot pretzel appetizer. The mojito was by far the worst drink I've ever tasted. No flavor at all and tasted like straight club soda with a few sprigs of mint in it. The pretzel with a beer/cheese dip and mustard dip was mediocre at best. I tried the steak and cheese sandwich with au jus, but was very disappointed in it. Steak was tough and I had a big chunk of barely melted cheese in the middle of the bun. The waitress did her best in a tough situation. She had to know that the food was awful but had to sell it anyway. read more

Hardball Cafe - A steak and cheese sandwich with a clump of unmelted cheese in the middle. Two thumbs down - Cafes Near Me - Cooperstown, New York

I thought about this place for the first time in a few years even though I've been to Cooperstown over 20 times. The reviews make me think not much has changed. Dining outdoors in the summer can be nice and you can do that here. Pleasant staff. Extremely slow service. I ordered ribs. I think they had to kill the cow first; it took that long. The ribs were OK but the prices were quite high. A couple of hours after I ate, I had a reaction to the sauce that was, um, not pleasant. I didn't end up at Bassett Medical Center but it was close. The Doubleday Cafe is much better. Sadly, the Back Alley Grille closed but Cooley's is still here. High prices, slow service, mediocre food. Great location but I've eaten there for the last time. read more

I don't typically like leaving poor reviews because you can always try a new spot out on a bad day, amiright?? But, I cannot in good foodie conscience recommend anyone go to hardball. It was unfortunately just really bad. My friend and I both ordered the chicken tender wrap and it instead should have been labeled "cold tortilla salad wrap with one tiny piece of chicken." Seriously neither of us had more than two bites of chicken throughout the whole wrap. My friend's husband's sliders looked like they were unwrapped from a frozen box before being microwaved and sent out, and my children's kids pizza was some kind of thick gross undercooked dough with literally what tasted like straight tomato sauce from a can topped with cheese. It's WAY overpriced (I was charged about $90 for those 4 awful dishes plus two drinks) and the service was not good. I will say we had a very large party so I think they were just doing their best and do not fault the servers but you could tell they were overwhelmed and it was pure chaos. Please just save your money if you're in Cooperstown and get a decent meal elsewhere. read more

We stopped here for lunch the other day. Took like 10 minutes before we were greeted with our waitress. Almost walked out. Food was horrible. Chicken sandwich was dry, the bun to chicken ratio was bad. My dad ordered a French dip and the meat smelled funny. Sister ordered tacos and they were pathetic, mom ordered sliders and it was like a hockey puck. Definitely avoid this place, it's a tourist trap, food sucks, it's run bad, pricey food, and only outdoors. Go somewhere else. read more

Hardball Cafe - Grilled chicken sandwich - Cafes Near Me - Cooperstown, New York

Great spot for lunch! Staff is friendly and kind. Even though they were busy we were well taken care of. Food was great.

Don't waste your time. Takes 20 minutes until they even acknowledge you. Worst service horrible food

Great little outside restaurant in the heart of Cooperstown. Nice atmosphere nice dinner menu. Well made drinks. The ribs were quite nice. Servers were friendly and attentive. read more

Hardball Cafe - Cafes Near Me - Cooperstown, New York

Horrible food. Not worth your money, even if your starving. Fries cold. Nachos weird? Will never come back. If I was a waitress or waiter I would not represent this restaurant, you are losing tips even though it's not your fault the food stinks! read more

Great food! The staff was extremely friendly! We showed up with a team of 14 baseball players, four coaches, and several parents. They were extremely friendly and patient. The food was brought out quickly and tasted amazing! Highly recommend this place for a family or group dining experience. read more

The food was overpriced and below mid, took a while to get a server once we got seated. Our servers were very nice and respectful but weren't really on top of everything. The outside seating felt like it was heated in the middle of summer which isn't ideal while eating hot food. Id save your time and hit another restaurant on the strip, not worth it read more

If you can eat anywhere else I suggest you do. Started off waiting to be seated by a guy drinking his water. No biggie right? We had to wait while he sipped it 3 times, then tapped the plastics cup to get ice out. Once seated no server for 8-10 minutes. Finally said something sent someone right over. After waiting over 42 minutes for 2 sandwiches the order wasn't even right and going up to the bar and refilling MY OWN DRINKS!!!!. Then went to say something to manager and got brushed off. Would take sandwich off but you paid. We had a large party that delayed everything. As a retired restaurant manager I was disgusted. Yes sweetie you can refund my dried out chicken sandwich even if I ALREADY PAID. And lastly a PAYING customer doesn't need to hear any excuses. Paid 70$ for an awful experience and food! If the owners know this is how people get treated they should be ashamed. If the owners are not aware.....here's your wake up call! read more

This place was terrible the food took us 20 minutes to get which is not that bad but the waiter gave us the food and never came back until we called for one to bring our check which took 1 hour and then they were just walking around like they were lost. Super disappointed. Don't come here. read more

Food was subpar. Server was not very attentive. Looked like they had a 10 year old girl cleaning off tables, definitely not legal. Also found it VERY shady that they charge two different prices for cash or credit on the menu depending on how your paying & don't let you know that until you've received a menu. 100% do not recommend! read more

Tourist trap, burgers and dogs at high prices. Food was ok and people were nice. Casual atmosphere

1.4, very small portions, Rueben I could fit in my hand for $20. Fries were soggy, the thousand island was bland, way too much cheese. Charlie's sliders were dry. And they were out of lemonade. read more

Burger and chicken tenders were not edible. Waitresses were nice. Half of our table took over an hour to get their food and were only getting BLTs. Go to Cooleys read more

Food was lousy and overpriced. Ambience was nice and our server was nice but I wouldn't come back here or recommend it to anyone.

We took a party of five here for lunch at 12:30 on a Monday afternoon. The hostess said it would be a half hour wait for a table for a party of five, even though there was clearly a table big enough to accommodate 5 right in front of us. We suggested pulling up an extra stool to this table and sat down. To expedite, as we had pulled our son out of Dreams Park so he could get a good meal between games before team visit to Hall of Fame, we ordered our drinks, appetizers, and meals all at once. About 30 minutes later, the appetizers came out, followed quickly by three of five orders. The fries on each order were cold and the little scraps from the bottom of the bin. About 10 minutes later, the 4th sandwich came out. We never received our fifth order. read more