Tiger Stadium’s final days are inevitably here
By JR Hoeft | Sunday, July 6th, 2008 | Catch-AllAs fans get ready to celebrate the All-Star game at Yankee Stadium in its final year, the end of a nine-year march to the wrecking ball gets underway in Detroit as the Tiger Stadium succombs to the realities of time and economics. Despite efforts to save the ballpark at Michigan and Trumball, as expected, the historic Michigan landmark is being dismantled.
The place that most exemplifies the summers of my youth is about to evaporate. But, like the former Comiskey Park in Chicago, Ebbets Field and the Polo Grounds in New York, and other shrines to “America’s past-time”, baseball will go on and new memories will be forged.
Only a couple of you who read this blog might know what the heck I’m writing about and why I’m a bit depressed today. But if you do, or if you’re interested, check out Mitch Albom’s column in the Detroit Free Press. He sums it up, as he often does, nicely.
Tiger Stadium was mine and it was yours and it was anyone’s who lived in this area over the last century. It belonged to your grandfather and your barber and your neighbor’s aunt. It belonged to Cobb and Greenberg and Al Kaline and Kirk Gibson and Sparky Anderson and Frank Navin and the Briggs family and Tom Monaghan and Mike Ilitch.
It belonged to the earth it sat upon.
And soon, that is where it will return.
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Conservative to the core; liberal with his opinion! J.R. has been involved in politics for over a decade and has worked on several campaigns in Hampton Roads. He has served on the Executive Committee of the Republican Party of Chesapeake and the Central Committee of the Republican Party of Virginia. He is also the director of “Blogs United” in Virginia. E-mail J.R.. Follow J.R. on Twitter.
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4 Responses to "Tiger Stadium’s final days are inevitably here"
Yup, and Busch Stadium in St Louis (where I personally got to see superstar Bob Gibson, a pitcher no less, hit a home run) is now now more. Busch Stadium from my youth, often described by Harry Caray as “Beautiful Busch Stadium” isn’t even a pile of rubble. Even the rubble has been carted away.
I also have many fond and happy memories of trips to “the Corner.”
Now, just as it appears the “Tiggies” were climbing back into the division race, serious slippage in Minneapolis and Seattle. We need to get healthy for a post All Star game run.
I’m just glad to have the many memories I do of Tigers games shared with my father and grandfather at the corner.
Tiger Stadium was one of the great ball parks. Who can forget Reggie Jackson launching a HR in the All-Star game that hit the light standard in right center field? And as a Twins fan I love to recall the time Harmon Killebrew hit a ball OVER the left field roof. He was the only one to do it.
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