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Friday, July 11, 2008
JamesEarlJonesification of Yankee Stadium
Bill James has given the floor to five new writers, one of which is Scott Ham, where he talks about Yankee Stadium, goes on about all things Yankees, and says (sub required):
I love Yankee Stadium because it’s the only place where I can feel close to the history of a team that has always been a part of my consciousness. As long as I can remember, I have been a Yankee fan. I can’t remember a summer where I wasn’t completely engrossed. And while so much of my life has come and gone, the only things that have remained constant are my family and the Yankees.
The “constant” thing reminded me of Jones’ speech. I responded:
Les Canadiens have as storied a history as the Yankees. You could replace “Yankee Stadium” with “Le Forum de Montreal”, replace “Mickey” with “Rocket”, and replace “Reggie” with “Lafleur”, and you’d have everyone in Montreal on board, when they were saying their goodbyes to the Forum. And yet, 10 years later, no one talks about the loss of the Forum.
I suspect it’s a desire to want to have a tie to something physical, but in reality, you just want to be surrounded by like-minded fans, and you can do that in a new ballpark and new arena just the same. The ties are still bound.
This entire romanticization of baseball really gets to me (and not in a good way). I love baseball, and I don’t see the buildings as some monuments to be preserved and revered. The game can be revered all by itself. And the players’ accomplishments (not the players themselves) can also be held up high. Idolizing players (who are no better as people than you and me) and revering some building that has not even stood the test of time is bunk to me.
I have been a little annoyed by all the Yankee Stadium nostalgia, which is about to go into overdrive for the A-S game. Beyond the overwrought nature of this type of thing in general, what has bugged me about is that Yankee Stadium was pretty thoroughly renovated/rebuilt in the mid-70s. While I am not a stadium expert like a Phil Lowry by any means, it seems to me as if YANKEE STADIUM, home of Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio, and Mantle was retired then.
There has certainly been some significant history made there in the last 30 years, but it pales in comparison to what came before. If the rebuilt stadium is still considered the same place, why not the new stadium right next door?