Note: This is in response to an article I just stumbled across, tripped over, and then kicked angrily at, called "Citi Field Will Look A Little Different", by Adam Rubin, which can be found at ESPNNewYork.com. Mr. Rubin wrote a fine article. I have no bone to pick with him. But he said some of the fans were rubbed the wrong way about the Jackie Robinson Rotunda. This, in turn, rubbed ME the wrong way. Hence, my response.
So the Jackie Robinson Rotunda rubbed some of you the wrong way? So the management lowered the height of the centerfield fence because the Mets couldn't hit home runs?
GEEESH!
To those of you fans who liked the Rotunda, bless you.
To the rest of you...
HEY! MET FAN! Jackie Robinson was a DODGER? REALLY? I hate to shake your already crumbling world... but I got news... or rather, old history for you. GIL HODGES was a Dodger! So was his pitching coach, Rube Walker. Yep! Walker was behind the plate when Bobby Thomson won the pennant, won the pennant, won the pennant (Russ Hodges... NYGiant announcer... no relation to Gil). So was Casey Stengel! So was Duke Snider (who was also a Met). Yogi was, is, and always will be a Yankee, even though he won 25% of your pennants and owns a Mets World Series ring!
Look at your ball cap! Not the black one, the real one... the one the Mets wore when they were born, and when they won the World Series in 1969. LOOK AT IT! Do you know how that cap was designed? The NY was a tip of the cap to the old NYGiants! And the blue? BROOKLYN DODGER BLUE! That's right! And if you don't believe it, as that venerable Dodger-Giant-Yankee-Met Casey Stengel would say, you can look it up!
You changed the name of the Ebbets Club to the Champions Club? Uh, why? Listen, the Brooklyn Dodgers were in the World Series during the fifties (1952,3,5,6) as often as You've been in your entire existence (1969,73,86,00...Oh-oh! How'd that last one turn out?)
Your Hall of Fame is in mothballs? So is your world series victory dance! I know your HOF has 21 players. Look at your outfield fence! I've never seen it, so you tell me! Are there 21 retired numbers out there? Who! Tom Terrific, okay. He was. Who else?
I'll tell you who else! Three Dodgers and your old ballpark, that's who else!
I bet if you squint hard enough, you will see a number 42 out there somewhere. See it? Yeah, there it is! That number was retired by all of baseball. I saw the ceremony on TV. I believe Rachel Robinson was there. So was Bud Selig... one of the things he got right. And I believe they did that celebration on the Shea Stadium turf... on April 15, 1997...not at Dodger Stadium in LA! And as I remember it, I had tears, wishing Jackie could see this, and hoping that somewhere, he could.
That, my friends, was the single greatest night in Shea history. Better even than Willie Sey Hey saying goodbye to America, tipping his look-like-NYGiant cap... like the one he was wearing when he made The Catch (though it flew off when he made The Throw)! Better even than the two World Championship victory celebrations.
So some of you are out off by the entrance being dedicated to a Dodger? Grow up. The world is a little bigger, and a whole lot better, because of number 42. And in case you weren't paying attention on April 15, 1997, Jackie no longer belongs just to the Dodgers. He belongs to all of us. You don't want that big number 42, just ship it on over to the Bronx. We'll keep it, and when Mo Rivera finally retires and takes his rightful place among baseball immortals, we'll have two 42's in our outfield, to go along with our two number 8's and our number 37...and so on...and so on!
Oh. I almost forgot. I just took another look at that wall. Below the 37, and 14 and 41 and 42 and SHEA... there;s another number... 364. THREE-SIX-FOUR!
You need to lower the height of your outfield fence? What in the name of Campy Campanella is going on here? What is this, tee-ball? You don't need to mess with the fences! You need to hire some hitters!
GEEEEESH!
Mets Fans! I hate to be the bearer of old news. Shea Stadium was a yawner... one of the cookie cutter stadiums that everybody woke up and realized had screwed up baseball... just like Three Rivers in Pittsburgh, The Vet in Philly, Riverfront in Cincy, Busch 2 in STL, and on and on. When they built Camden Yards, the reason everybody went gaga over it was because it looked like a ballpark again! It was a smash hit, and soon everybody wanted one. And everybody got one! Busch 3 has all the character of Sportsmans Park/Busch 1, PNC Park in Pittsburgh is gorgeous... the one in SF (can't remember the name because it changes annually) is beautiful... and Citi Field, fro what I have seen is great. Don't know about the sight lines, the creature comforts, the food... that's what makes a ballpark great or lousy. But your owner got it right. Baseball is unique among American sport; how it honors its history and its heroes. I also read that you guys got an overhanging grandstand in right field inspired by the old Tiger Stadium! I sat in Tiger Stadium the final year of its existence... 107 years of baseball was played there! I sat in that upper deck in right, where you could snatch a home run before the waiting right fielder could (we did it to Albert Belle that day)! That's fun! That's baseball!
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