Today is the home opener for the New York Yankees and thus the "official" opening of the new Yankee Stadium in New York (the two exhibition games against the Cubs don't really count, I guess). Having spent a good deal of time at the old Yankee Stadium (the real one ... before renovation in the 70's) and then having been at the first game (April, 1976) and the last game (September 2008) at the "middle" Yankee Stadium, I've been thinking a lot about what I'm hearing about this new stadium. I'm glad to see that they've gone back to the look and feel, in many ways, of the original (exterior look, the distinctive frieze around the top of the stadium), but, boy, how things have changed.
$2500 for one seat for one game ... when Dad first started playing with the Yankees, his total salary for the first couple of years was only twice that (the league minimum at the time). I'm sure the Stadium is great ... and I really look forward to my first time there ... but it's just hard to get my head around how much things have changed, not just in the game itself, but also in all the "trappings" around it.
I've got a picture right above my desk of me leaning back against a stack of bats in the Yankee club house in October of 1960. It may be my favorite picture from those years Dad was with the Yankees. Concrete block wall, scuffed wooden platform the bats were on, the metal mesh of one of the original lockers showing in the background ... that's the Stadium I remember fondly.