|
|
 |
|
Vivid memories haunt the Mets,Yankees ball parks
of TheColumnists.com
Babe Ruth hit a
home run when Yankee Stadium opened in 1923. Why not? He was
the Bambino.
Casey Stengel bragged about the 55 bathrooms when Shea Stadium
opened in 1964. Why not? He was Casey Stengel.
Now it is nostalgia time as the Yankees and Mets opened their
penultimate seasons in 2007 at the historic ball park in the
Bronx and the romantic stadium in Queens.
The Yankees will play in Yankee Stadium this year and next and
then move across the street to the House That Steinbrenner Paid
For in 2009. Farewell, Babe; farewell, Lou. Goodbye to Joe DiMaggio
and Mickey Mantle and Yogi and Whitey and Scooter Rizzuto.
The Mets will play this year and next in Shea stadium, named
for the lawyer Bill Shea who bulldozed the city of New York into
building the park in 1964, with threats to form new leagues and
escape town.
Goodbye to Hot Rod Kanehl, Marv Throneberry, Richie Ashburn,
120 losses in one hilarious Polo Grounds season of 1962. Goodbye
to Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, Ron Swoboda, Tug McGraw and all
the miracle makers of 1969 who won a championship and thrilled
the universe.
“If man could walk on the moon,” Seaver said, “Why
can’t we win a title?”
Man walked on the moon in 1969 and kids stole grass and bases
from Shea when the Mets defeated the Baltimore Orioles in the
World Series.
After the Yankees escaped the home of the New York Giants at
the Polo Grounds with their own home ball park more than 80 years
ago, they soon became the Bronx Bombers. They watched the Babe
hit sixty homers in 1927 and they watched the gasping Pittsburgh
Pirates go down to defeat in four straight even before the first
pitch was thrown.
Lou Gehrig moved a crowd on July 4, 1939 when he called himself,
“The luckiest man on the face of the earth,” less than
two years before his death and DiMaggio thrilled some 70,000
when he accepted honors on his day in 1949 as baby brother Dom
DiMaggio, in his Boston Red Sox uniform, looked on.
Mantle hit massive home runs and Yogi Berra slapped the Brooklyn
Dodgers around in World Series play and Billy Martin made miracle
catches, got winning hits and managed immaculately.
The Pope filled the Stadium and the old New York Giants played
football there and Joe Louis knocked out Billy Conn there.
Some long haired kids called the Beatles filled new Shea Stadium
in the 1960s and another long-haired kid named Joe Namath electrified
a crowd.
The ball park across the street from the present site will still
be called Yankee Stadium and the familiar façade will
tower over the top.
The name of Shea will be lost forever--few know who he is anyway--as
modern commercial baseball takes over this new field called Citi
Field for a company putting up the big bucks. The team bosses
resisted pressures to name it for Jackie Robinson, who never
played there (he retired in 1956 and died in 1972) but will concede
to the town’s history with a style much like Brooklyn’s
old Ebbets Field and a rotunda in center court named after Robinson.
Memories flooded back as I walked through both stadiums in early
April, memories of games past, people I admired, situations I
would love to see repeated in this same lifetime.
I was there in the Bronx when Roger Maris hit that 61st homer
in 1961, withstanding the greatest pressure any player, save
for Robinson in his integrating year of 1947, ever experienced.
I was there often when Mickey Mantle crushed baseballs into the
furthest reaches of the third deck. I was there when DiMaggio
and Mantle walked on the field together as Mantle’s number
7 was retired . I was there when DiMaggio ducked a Bobby Kennedy
handshake after some ugly rumors involving former wife Marilyn
Monroe. I was there when Billy Martin came back to lead the team
after a brutal firing.
I was at Shea when Cleon Jones cradled the final out off the
bat of future Mets manager Davey Johnson in the 1969 Series and
I was there when Mookie Wilson hit a ground ball in 1986 that
slithered through the wide open legs of Billy Buckner and only
Ralph Branca could understand the pain.
I was at both stadiums in the year 2000 when the New York Yankees
and the New York Mets met for the first time in a World Series
that could not end until Mike Piazza
slugged a 400 foot fly ball to Bernie Williams for the final
out. The Yankees have not won a Series since.
The days dwindle down to a precious few in the historic lore
of Yankee Stadium, hard by the Harlem River, and the Shea stadium
edifice of National League baseball in Queens.
There may be victories for both teams in 2007 and 2008, maybe
even another October classic enjoyed by subway riders, in the
cool fall breezes. No matter.
The memories of the Yankee years from 1923 on at the Stadium
and from 1964 on for Shea will last forever in computer images
and aging brains.
Then new Yankee Stadium and new Citi Field will create new legends
starting in 2009. Nothing is forever.
One last ball park thought. Fenway Park in Boston opened in 1912.
Wrigley Field in Chicago opened in 1916. Both still going strong.
How about that?
©2007 by Maury Allen. The Maury Allen caricature is ©2001
by Jim Hummel. The photo of Yankee Stadium is courtesy of The
New York Yankees, the photo of Shea Stadium courtesy of The New
York Mets. This column first posted April 9, 2007.
You
can comment on this column online. Please address your message
to either "The Editors" or Maury Allen. To send an
email, click here and don't forget to mention Maury's name: talkback@thecolumnists.com
|
|
|
Archives |
|
|