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A few weeks back, I was thinking about what to do with my vacation days this summer. I already have a week booked in Louisiana, to do an Ignatian Retreat. At some point, I'll want to drive up to Northern Michigan for a couple of days to enjoy the lakes with the Zipster. And that leaves me not having any other funds to do any major travel. Last summer, I spent a week in Lake Tahoe, staying at my brother's house there, with some friends from both Arizona and Wales. That was a blast, but it's not in the cards for this summer.
Poverty is restricting me this year, but that doesn't mean I could abide sitting here in South Bend doing nothing, and so I have decided to do little day trips. My very first idea was to go to a baseball game and see my team, the Detroit Tigers play. And then, I had the brilliant idea that, in fact, I am closer to Chicago than to Detroit and since the Tigers are in the same division as the Chicago White Sox, it would make more sense to find out when the Tiges are playing in Chicago and attend a game there instead. So that is exactly what I did. I found that the Tigers were playing an afternoon game against the Sox. That worked for me--it meant I could take the whole day off from work and spend it at the ballpark. Not a bad idea.
My niece lives in Chicago, and so I texted her, asking her if she wanted to join me. She made up some excuse about work, but suggested I invite her parents along and then we could have dinner afterwards. My brother decided to go with me, but his wife thought that maybe she didn't want to take a vacation day and spend it at a baseball game. Go figure. For me, the thought of spending a few hours at the ballpark, eating hotdogs and popcorn, drinking beer and, hopefully, watching my team beat the Sox was something I was really looking forward to.
Baseball is, in fact, the all American sport. It is probably true that more Americans watch and enjoy football over baseball. I love football, but, in the end, when one thinks of a sport that represents this country and that holds onto deep tradition, one has to choose baseball. It is true that, when watching football, most of us, if watching our team, do not want to miss a minute, whereas with baseball, the pace is slow and leisurely It's totally acceptable if our thoughts wander, and we can engage in occasional conversations, or miss a few plays because we're up getting a beer and a dog. This is all as much a part of the game and the experience as watching your guy hit a home run. That's what I love about it. I imagine the English feel much that way about cricket where, unbelievably,a match can go on for days and the players actually break for tea. I confess to trying to figure that sport out, but to no avail.
I have been to several ballparks. My first visit to a professional game was years back, pre-high school. I remember the anticipation and excitement about going. Seeing the outside of Tiger Stadium from the parking lot was a thrill--it was enormous and overwhelming, especially to a youngster. I couldn't wait to get inside, and then, going through the gate, and seeing through the opening that first glimpse of incredibly green grass and a pristinely manicured ball field, I was overcome with a feeling that is indescribable. Tiger Stadium held the ghosts of great players such as Ty Cobb, Hank Greenberg, Hal Newhouser, George Kell and Al Kaline (apologies to Al, who is still alive and probably doesn't have a ghost wandering around). This is where they played! This is where part of the 1968 World Series was played-- by Kaline, Cash, Lolich, Stanley and McLain. It was the ballpark on the corner of Michigan and Trumbull, but if you just referred to it as "The Corner" any true fan knew what you were talking about. It was previously called Briggs Stadium and Navin Field before that, and then, finally given the name it kept until the end, until it was sinfully bulldozed: Tiger Stadium.
The old ballparks represented what baseball was, and what it still should be. They were not only shrines to great players and great teams, but also to history--to the history of the times and to the cities of which they were so much a part. Tiger Stadium, for example, became a unifier at the end of the 1960s. Horrific race riots had broken out in Detroit during that time. However, in 1968, the Detroit Tigers went on to magically win the World Series, bringing some small sense of pacification and unity to a very divided people and a terribly fractured city. It wasn't the cure-all, but folks found that they suddenly had a common denominator--rooting for their home team, the underdog Detroit Tigers who then went on to beat the mighty St. Louis Cardinals. That the Tigers did exactly that was something that many of those players attributed in part to the fans of the day, who came together and bolstered them up throughout that unbelievable season.
The old stadiums were, for the most part, named after either the team, or the one-time owner. Tiger Stadium, Yankee Stadium, Wrigley Field (home of Babe Ruth's "called shot") and Fenway Park, the oldest still standing in baseball. Back in those days, ballparks weren't named after companies and corporations. That would have been laughable and confusing. However, in this day and age, where corporate money has intervened in what was once the innocent world of baseball, Tiger Stadium has fallen to Comerica Park. Comiskey has been knocked down and the White Sox now play in US Cellular Field. I can't believe they tore down the old Yankee Stadium, but at least they hung on to some sense of tradition and now call their new stadium Yankee Stadium. Chase Field is the home of the Arizona Diamondbacks. But, as they are a newer team, I don't expect them to have much of a sense of baseball history there anyways. They haven't been around long enough to have a tradition.
Of course I loved Tiger Stadium. There had been a ballpark on the corner of Michigan and Trumbull since 1896, until it was finally knocked down around 1999 amidst much protest. It has been said that Tiger Stadium had the closest seats in baseball. The right field upper deck overhang was a home run hitter's dream at about 305 feet, and if you were lucky enough to have a seat there, you were literally sitting out over the field, almost if you were a part of the game. It was much the same behind home plate near the visitor on deck circle, and fans could literally spit on the top of the head of an opposing player as he was awaiting his turn at bat. At the old stadium, there was a sense of intimacy. You could yell at the ballplayer, and the ballplayer could actually hear you. The stadium had true dugouts--down into the ground. Nowadays, you'd be hard pressed to find one like that anywhere. They shouldn't even rightly be called dugouts anymore. The fields were all different, making it a challenge for hitters and fielders alike. In the old Tiger Stadium, lower deck seats actually dangerously stuck out near the right field foul pole. Hall of Famer Al Kaline, chasing down fly balls, oft times smashed into that low wall and tumbled into the seats and onto the laps of fans. The field was amended in order to make it safer, and forever after, that area was called "Kaline's Corner." To attend a game at Tiger Stadium was to get a glimpse of what baseball was like in the early 1900s. Fans can still have much the same experience at Wrigley Field and Fenway Park, the only two remaining testaments to old time baseball.
The new fields, with one or two exceptions, are sterile odes to commercialism. Typically, all fields are now about 330 feet down the right and left field lines and 400 feet to dead center. There are no longer walk down dugouts, the bullpens are far removed and protected from the fans, so you can barely see who's warming up, and the spectator seats are so far away from the field that it is easy to not be or feel a part of the game, or even take much interest in it. Imagine my surprise during my first trip to the "BOB" (Bank One Ballpark, whose name has now been changed to "Chase Field") in Phoenix to see a swimming pool (!!!) just over the home run fence in center field. Corporations (and individuals with money) can rent that area for a game, and spend the time paddling about. Funny, but when I go to a game, I actually want to watch it. I want to yell at opposing players. I want to be able to actually see that the pitch was clearly in the strike zone, call the ump a bum and have him hear me when I do it. In the new parks, everything is overly pristine and, seemingly, cut out of a cookie cutter mold. You won't find anything quirky anymore, like the Green Monster at Fenway, the ivy covered walls at Wrigley, or the overhanging right field porch at Tiger Stadium.
So, this brings me back to my day at US Cellular Ballpark--"The Cell", in the heart of the South Side of Chicago, and home to the Southsider Chicago White Sox. I felt very far removed from the game. Most of the people around me weren't overly involved in what was happening on the field either, despite the huge cost of tickets and parking. Sitting behind me was a whole row 20 something year old girls who were more interested in screaming at high decibels, gossiping and buying margaritas (MARGARITAS? What happened to the beer guy?????) Yes the park was big and overwhelming and the grass was green and beautiful, but here, there were no ghosts of great players. Shoeless Joe Jackson never roamed this park.. Virgil Trucks never pitched there, and Manager Al Lopez never spit in that dugout. Even that annoying Hawk Harrelson never played on this field. It's a new field, and baseball is not a sport that should be about what's new, modern or innovative. Rather, it is a game that should be connected to and harken back to the great spirits of baseball that carved out a place in history and lore. I just can't see Babe Ruth coming to bat at a place called US Cellular Field, pointing to the center field stands and hitting a home run. It simply doesn't jive.
Ballparks should have been treated as if they were museums. In fact, they were museums and when they were demolished, a certain spirit died in that destruction. Baseball now moves with the times, but, frankly, I don't believe it was ever meant to.
(NOTE: The above photos are from my day at US Cellular Park in Chicago. I used the "zoom" on my camera so that it looks closer)
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