The recent Auld Lang Syne observances in honor of our two departing baseball teams are a big business in NYC lately. Last week, we had the Yankees depart amidst a parade of saccharine nostalgia and commercialized praise; this week, it’s the Mets (not to be outdone; but, as always, ultimately outdone) departing amidst a similar display of pretentiousness. Both teams moving to the greener pastures of brand new stadiums: the Yankees new stadium, located practically across the street; the new Shea stadium, arising in the old stadium’s parking lot. Needless to say, the teams’ final games in their respective stadiums were sold out beyond the infinite; each stadium now relegated to a giant yard sale where everything will soon be going at the going rate or to the highest bidder.
“The Mets report that Shea seats [literally] are selling briskly at $869 a pop (’86 and ‘69—get it?) [the years that they won the World Series], while the Yanks’ seat sale is on hold as the team haggles with the city over how much of a cut it will get for acting as salesperson, and how much taxpayers—who actually own both stadiums, seats and all—will get out of the deal. The Mets, meanwhile, have already announced a “zero-tolerance policy” for fans who attempt to make off with bits of Shea before the official dismantling.”
“‘It’s like squeezing the last little toothpaste out of the tube,’” says John Pastier, stadium historian and author of the book Historic Ballparks. ‘Whenever a team is seeking public funds for a new ballpark, they decry the one they have—’it’s outmoded,’ ‘it’s an economic albatross,’ ‘it’s not good for the fans.’ But once it’s time to leave the old joint, they’ll play the final season nostalgia card and try to cash in on that.’” (Source: The Village Voice)
I remember when Shea Stadium was a new, state of the art construction, further complemented by the futuristic efforts of the nearby and newly-opened World’s Fair in Flushing, Queens. I was 10, and this was probably the first time, while visiting the Fair, that I became aware of the Mets: formed in 1959 as a expansion team to fill in the league-gap left in NYC baseball by the departure of the NY Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers. The team had played in the Polo Grounds in Brooklyn (the Giants’ former stadium) before moving into Shea Stadium in 1964, where the team played on but the fans failed to arrive in considerable numbers. The old Yankee Stadium, while old and antiquated, always seemed as permanent as granite next to Shea Stadium’s modern yet flimsy-looking architecture.
Despite promotional campaigns and ticket giveaways, the Mets never quite caught on with the public, except with that sizable minority of New Yorkers frustrated or bored with the team’s rivals in the Bronx. From their humble beginning down to the present day, the Mets played in the shadows of the Yankees’ indomitable hype and sensationalism. The Yankees were THE TEAM and no team could have ever existed before them, beside them or after them; their legendary omnipotence commercially ingrained in the hearts and souls of most New Yorkers. The Mets victories in the 1969 and 1986 World Series, while dramatic, only served to steal the spotlight away from the Yankees until the next season. Insofar as they were underdogs, I preferred the Mets over the Yankees by a huge margin…and this holds true today, when I’m no longer interested in baseball but find it ingrained in my thoughts.
“Saying goodbye isn’t so hard to do when all you’re doing is walking across the street,” writes Tim Dahlberg in USA Today. Baseball revels in its rich traditions, but that hasn’t stopped the wholesale replacement of stadiums since Camden Yards ushered in the retro concept when it opened in Baltimore in 1992. The two New York stadiums are merely the latest examples of this trend….”
The Yankees and the Mets will be here next season but not their respective stadiums; these were, shall I say, traded for a more lucrative contract…the whimsical free agent deals of ballplayers are now that of ballparks as well. Memories and legends, the sustenance of baseball stadiums, will have to be formed anew within the nooks and crevices of new structures and with the contentious hope that future generations will find them equally profitable for their own memorabilia investments.
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