Safe At Home.

           My Yankee Stadium story is post-Mantle, pre-refurbishment, and all Horace Clarke.

     Chuck, my brother-in-law, brought me there, and I remember picking up his brother Doug in Connecticut on the way. 

     It seems to me that we got a motel room in White Plains, too, but I'm not sure if that was before I talked to Babe Ruth on those old Stadium promo-phones or after.

     I know the Yanks played the Chicago White Sox that night, and I know the Sox had a guy--Walt Williams--who was known as "No Neck".

     Doug grabbed a foul ball hit in the stands, too, and I remember the green stamp on it.

     The American League balls were made by "Reach" at the time; the National League's by "Rawlings".

     It mattered to me then.

     But with Yankee Stadium, it's that façade; a ring of elegance wrapped around the most perfect game in the world, April through October if it was a good year.

     Next year they'll be across the street--in a Disneyfied Yankee Stadium--at least until the first bench-clearing brawl.

     That's tomorrow, though, and today is here.

     Yankee Stadium is closing, and can you imagine being there?

     Can you imagine being one of the legions whose family has handed down season's tickets since The Babe?

     Barring a couple of other A.L. teams' kidnapping, this is the end.

     I'll be watching; it's baseball, it's history, and I'm a sucker for baseball's sense of historical sentimentality.

     And Chuck?

     It's a lifetime down the road, but thanks again for takin' me out to the ballgame. 

Here are some Yankee Stadium stories if you're interested:        

         

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/sports/baseball/21crystal.html?ref=sports

or:

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-yankees-2008sep21,0,2804129.story