Red Sox: American League East – the old ballparks
By Rick McNair
YANKEE STADIUM
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.
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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.