Apr 3, 2017; Boston, MA, USA; A general view of Fenway Park during the fifth inning of the game between the Boston Red Sox and the Pittsburgh Pirates at Fenway Park. Mandatory Credit: Greg M. Cooper-USA TODAY Sports
The Boston Red Sox still have Fenway Park, but most of their American League East rivals have new stadiums. What did they have before?
Apr 2, 2017; St. Petersburg, FL, USA; A gener view of Tropicana Field on opening day between the Tampa Bay Rays and New York Yankees. Mandatory Credit: Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports /
In a recent article, I wandered through the ballparks in the American League East with a critique of each home of the division rivals for the Boston Red Sox.
The parks have a common thread in that they are new ballparks of varying degrees of ascetics. In New York, you have trying to recreate the past, but to modernize it – nice try. Baltimore offers up the prototype of the retro ballpark with Camden Yards – now a surprising 25-years-old.
The East also offers up two domes that present the right and wrong way to build a domed field. In Tampa/St. Petersburg is Tropicana Field that is difficult to explain – best to experience it, but I have found few fans who say it gets style points. Rogers Center in Toronto is the opposite since it has a real plus advantage with a retractable roof.
What was there in Baltimore, New York, and Toronto before they had new ballparks? Each city had a park and each park had its own unique identity – an identity that reflecting back was simply forgettable. Tropicana – of course – has been the only home for the Rays so there is no forgotten stadium to be viewed.
My vision has been tainted by the ability to construct parks that meld the best of the old with the best of the new. Sometimes with the old, it is a finding the best that would try the abilities of Sherlock Holmes. Now for a look at the past as I experienced it.
How did I ever find Memorial Stadium? Somehow I always managed to get to this monstrosity and that is exactly what it was. A decaying circular stadium used for baseball and football. Just look at the Oakland Coliseum to see an example of what use to proliferate in baseball.
The field itself was horseshoe-shaped and the design of the exterior was a quite common one used for the first half of the 20th century – Greco-Roman style that one can still see today in places such as the Los Angeles Coliseum and even Harvard Stadium. The Memorial Stadium I remember also having a second deck that I understand was a later addition to the park and eventually extended. The seating capacity for baseball had to easily exceed 50,000.
The stadium was bland and the playing field did little to compensate for that. The dimensions were the typical boring equidistant, but even with that flaw was the intriguing short distances to right and left field (309’) for a shot down the line. The power alley’s checked it at 376’ with a fence listed at 14’ – a challenge, but not insurmountable.
My first visit to Memorial was in the late 1960s in the middle of summer. I soon discovered that my box seat was worthless unless I had a strange desire to be roasted like a pig on a grill spit. The interior was also typical of what was happening to many older parks and that was making cosmetic changes that simply hid the multitude of flaws.
Ah – Yankee Stadium! But which one? The old one or the older one? I’ll start with the original (older) that simply would overwhelm you. The seating capacity easily exceeded 70,000 and I actually attended a few games where the place was filled.
New York City was a monthly trip for my father for business and my mother would take me to Yankee Stadium, The Polo Ground and my favorite all-time ballpark – Ebbets Field. Yankee Stadium had the historic factor, meaning all that baseball history that seems to gnaw at any Red Sox or baseball fan.
The park itself had the nasty pole situation that is present with the construction techniques of the era. Sit in the wrong place and strain your neck – a huge drawback at Fenway Park. Yankee Stadium had three tiers and if you sat in just the right place the view was amazing. My favorite was in the first few rows in right field.
The field was unbalanced with a short right field and a long left field. The power alleys were over 400’ and I always remember 461’ to center field. Center field had the monuments that are now part of Monument Park and not part of the playing surface as they once were. I had been told by “old Timers” that center field was once close to 500’. The façade was a nice touch and a target for the home run derby types in batting practice.
What I remember is the entrance being like a visit to the Pentagon with the same huge exterior that had no color to it. Rather a depressing sight that was changed when New York decided to renovate the park (old stadium). That was a two-year project that reconfigured the playing field and decreased seating capacity.
As a Red Sox fan, you would have your temper tested at Yankee Stadium as the gloating factor was certainly in place. That is now long gone thanks to 2004 and so is Yankee Stadium unless like many Yankee fans you consider the current edition a sacrilege.
This was a quirky construction project as it had been tinkered with to get baseball. Toronto almost had the San Francisco Giants until the Coty by the Bay stepped in. The park could seat 45,000 and the cobble together aspect made this place worthy of a wrecking ball. The seats may have been added, but the interior facilities were woefully neglected – both restrooms and food became endurance options.
The issue was this was a football stadium being used for football and Canadian football uses a larger field. What stood out was left field that went well beyond what one would normally expect – great for football, but lousy for baseball. The same also applied to right field, but not as pronounced. The area behind right and center field could probably house another field.
There was also no upper deck so the further back you were in the grandstand the more your view was hampered. Very similar to Fenway Park before they started to add a limited second deck. You could be a long way from the field in a sold out contest.
This was not a fun place. I paid one visit and then a second only because of my business connections managed to comp me tickets, but they always seemed to be seats that were closer to the Arctic Circle than home plate.
