Yankee Stadium

I have few regrets in life. For the most part I have made good decisions and been able to avoid disasters that bad choices can sometimes produce. I try to look at past decisions that maybe were not the smartest and use them as examples to learn for the future. Mark Hoppus sang "The past is only the future with the lights on," and I think that if I look at past mistakes as stepping stones for the knowledge I have today, then it's easy to not have any regrets.

With all of this however, I do have a regret. After living in New York City I never went to a game at Yankee Stadium. Now I know what you are thinking, "How can a Braves fan even think about stepping foot in such a terrible place?" Well, if you know me you've learned that I am a sucker for the hometown team. Think about it. All of my favorite teams are from places I lived. While living in NYC I met the craziest, die hard fans I have ever met. I loved it. So, I had to pick a team and my choices were either the Yankees or the Mets. While the Yankees have given the Braves problems in recent World Series, I could never lower my standards and become a fan of the Mets who are a division rival.

So I went and did this:

It was tough at first and I think I actually suffered some brain damage and hair loss as a result, but I bought a Yankees cap (not hat, I learned the hard way). Look at me, I look confused and scared, maybe even a little cold, but it wasn't because I was in a busy Times Square at night. Luckily, over time I got used to wearing the NY on my head and believe I have made a full recovery.

Now that I had this new cap and a new team to cheer for, I figured I better go to a game, and what's better than seeing the Yankees game at historic Yankee Stadium? So, I began to petition the idea of a "Day at the Ballpark" with those I knew. No one bit.

I know baseball is not the most exciting form of entertainment known to man. And believe me I would choose to go to a football or basketball game over baseball any day. But come on! This is Yankee Stadium. This is like visiting a national monument! Only this national monument is being torn down at the end of this season to make way for the "New Yankee Stadium." No one would go with me, they just hated baseball more than they wanted hot dogs on a July afternoon at the park. I should have manned up and just went by myself, but I never did, and now most likely never will get the chance.

Is it worth a trip to New York this summer? I'm not sure. Chances are it's not happening. So I figured I could write a little bit about the history of Yankee Stadium. And maybe, just maybe, I can learn from this past mistake and seize any opportunity that grand next time it comes around.

History Lesson: Yankee Stadium

In 1900, plans were made to add another team to New York City, but the existing National League New York Giants wouldn't let it happen. Western League President Ban Johnson decided to form a team, placed it in Baltimore, named them the Orioles, and began play in Baltimore's Oriole Park. Soon after learning of the newly founded team not far down the road, the Giants began to steal players from the Orioles. After a lot of tension, a "peace conference" was held (although their relationship stayed pretty nasty) and Oriole owners Frank Farrell and William Devery moved the team to New York as originally planned.

The Yankees joined the American League and moved to their new home, Hilltop Park (because it was built on the highest point of Manhattan), not far from the Giants' stadium, Polo Grounds. The Orioles were renamed the Highlanders, a reference to their park's location. The Highlanders had a home of their own until 1911, when Polo Grounds burned down. The Highlanders allowed the Giants to share Hilltop during the reconstruction of Polo Grounds.

In 1913 the new Polo Grounds was completed along the Harlem River, and since the relationship between the two teams had grown better, they shared the bigger and better facility. As a result of the move, the nickname 'Higlanders' no longer applied and the team became known as the 'Yankees.' Farrell and Devery both were in need of money, and decided to sell the team to Colonel Jacob Ruppert and Captain Tillinghast L. Hommedieu Huston. Ruppert had inherited a brewery fortune and thus had the money to support the Yankees with big time funds. This led to the Yankees being able to buy Babe Ruth from the Red Sox for $100,000 in 1920.

The acquisition of Babe Ruth enabled the Yankees to develop plans for their own stadium and avoid a possible eviction from Polo Grounds at the hands of the now less-popular Giants. Plans were made for a $2.5 million stadium, a huge financial risk for the owners. The stadium design called for 60,000 seats, nearly double the average of other stadiums at the time. Doubters speculated that New York City could not support a stadium that size due to the fact that the city had 2 other teams (Brooklyn Dodgers and the Giants).

Many locations were scouted including 137th Street and Amsterdam Ave. in Manhattan, West Side Manhattan, and Queens. The owners settled on a 10 acre lumberyard not far from Coogan's Bluff in the Bronx and purchased it for $600,000. Construction began on May 5, 1922 and finished less than a year later. So, after several years of playing home games at Oriole Park, Hilltop Park, and Polo Grounds, the Yankees finally had a permanent home. The first game played at Yankee Stadium was an April 18, 1923 defeat of the rival Red Sox 4-1, with Babe Ruth hitting the stadium's first ever home run. The Yankees also went on to win the World Series in the stadium's inaugural season (The first of 26).

Baseball stadiums at the time were all known as parks, fields, or grounds. Due to the massive size of the Yankees new park, it was called a "stadium." The term "stadium" referred to the Ancient Greece measurement of a footrace, thus Stadiums were the buildings that housed these footraces. Yankee Stadium was the first "three tiered" sports facility in America and housed the first ever electronic scoreboard. The original capacity was 58,000. Nonetheless, the opening game somehow managed to fit 74,217 with over 25,000 turned away. It wasn't rare for attendance to exceed 80,000.

Renovations in the mid 30's replaced wood with concrete. The second and third decks were extended around the foul poles, and the green colored exterior was painted white. During the 70's another massive renovation occurred. The 118 columns supporting the upper decks were removed, new lights were installed, the famous copper frieze (fans call it the facade) was extended around the entire stadium, a new upper concourse was constructed, the press box was expanded, the dimensions were narrowed (now allowing monument park to be out of the field of play), and several other attributes were added or modified.


All in all, this is the Yankee Stadium we see today. But the new stadium will be finished by next season and this landmark will be torn down. Although most of the new stadium will look exactly the same, and elements of the old stadium will be physically transferred, it won't quite be the same.

New Yankee Stadium