Hotter and Older Than Betty!

Happy Friday America. Hope you have had a great week.

My thanks once again to Artie Clear for allowing me the privilege of hanging with him for two hours yesterday out Philadelphia way. Never a dull moment and always with guests more than willing to talk sports. Old School meets The Wave of the Future...

There will be many a tribute paid this day to a ballpark that has withstood the test of time, tradition, and history. As I have been joking on Twitter and Facebook all morning for the first time since the passing of Lena Horne we are FINALLY talking about something older...and hotter...than Betty White (smile). Fenway Park is 100 years old today!

The term 'Bucket List' has been used often since the movie of the same name was released.  This museum of iconic proportion is something all fans of baseball should yearn to visit in their lifetime. Granted, I was lucky to visit the original Yankee Stadium 7/14/73 with Dad and friends. I remember just how huge and unique the park looked. It was a 4-2 loss to Steve Busby and the Royals. Subsequent trips to the renovated stadium looked great yet did not match the standard. 

Wrigley Field has been around longer as they opened their doors in 1910. My one visit there with Pops was 5/31/80.

A day that the wind blew out and I watched Mike Schmidt go deep twice as Steve Carlton threw a 7-0 shutout. That was a wonderful stadium to watch baseball. The Bleacher Bums began tailgating three hours before first pitch.

I have never been to Fenway Park. I am told getting a ticket is even tougher to obtain.  I do know my first recollection of a game I watched from Boston in May 1972. Twas a Saturday matinee game. The White Sox were the opponent on a nationally televised game on NBC. The announcers kept carping about 'the inviting Green Monster in left field' all of 315 feet away albeit 37 feet high. Dick Allen struck out swinging.

Summer 1974 I remember the Yankees were sitting in last place in July then caught fire under Bill Virdon. We had a hurler named Pat Dobson who was a 19 game winner and was the talk of trade rumors most of that summer. Bobby Murcer was having himself a season despite playing home games in Shea Stadium. I remember the Yankees lost their first 6 or 7 games in Boston that summer. Roger Moret and Bill Lee were murder on my boys.

I remember the way Yankee players bemoaned how hard it was to hit a blast to straightaway center. Red Sox players said the same about Death Valley in the Bronx. Try imagining the numbers Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio would have had if they played for the other team! The Yankees got hot as 1974 wound down. Baltimore was a bit better and we fell two games short of a playoff. The Orioles I recall threw 5 straight shutouts that September. Boston faded much like 1978.

The 1975 World Series captured my attention for drama and intrigue as it went a full seven and I was made aware of 'The Curse'. Watching the homers Bernie Carbo and Carlton Fisk hit in Game 6 still remain in the memory bank. Much as I resented how good Luis Tiant was I studied him closely!

More heartbreak in 1986 before the unfathomable happened in 2004 and 2007 erased all talk of Curses. Many players and managers have adorned the Beantown colors and done so with honor. I have often wondered what life would have been like had I grown up a Red Sox fan. They were always a team to hate albeit respect. Jim Rice and Freddy Lynn were always tough on the Bombers. Names like Reggie Cleveland and Jim Burton also come to mind that gave me fits as a fan!

The playoffs of 1999, 2003, 2004, and those constant nationally televised games I would watch religiously. Yes, the rivalry is the best in all of sports in my humble opinion. You're not supposed to give compliments to the perceived enemy yet I will this moment on this post.

Fenway Park: You have set a standard six days after the sinking of the Titanic on your coast. Thankfully unlike that ship of stature you have proudly remained a destination, an enigma, a connection to the youth of many, the fact of the Atlantic seaboard, and a temple for purists of the game when the American League was born in 1901. From Hugh Duffy to Babe Ruth to Ted Williams to Bobby Doerr to Frank Malzone to Rico Petrocelli to Dennis Eckersley to Bobby Sprowl to Darrell Evans to Wade Boggs to David Ortiz and onward. Many memories many games and many wild finishes. THANKS for the memories. 

May you live another century and longer. May you stad tall like so many of the steeples and churches we might see in London or Rome. May a law be passed that decrees that you are never torn down. A 9th wonder of the world. I didn't agree when the Yankees decided to build a corporate ballpark. There was outcry then. I can only imagine what outcry there will be when they decide to build a new ballpark in Boston.

The Yankees will be your opponent this night. The same team you met 100 years ago as the Hilltop Highlanders. It matters not what shall become of your team this season and onward. I'm thankful that i this day and age of stadium implosions after 20 years in the name of progress with no sense of preservation or remembrance you are spitting in the face of this wayward form of A.D.D. thinking. Thank You!

You are on my Bucket List. You are a destination. You will be introduced to me before my final breath. The desire to match an actual image with what the television has shown me all these years still enmeshes me. 

Enjoy the celebration Red Sox Nation. Sorry you're still struggling.

Make it a great day!

Over and out in Big D.

Mr. Will