Date: Fri 28-Jun-1996

Publication: Bee

Author: KIMH

Quick Words:

Column-Yankee-Stadium

Full Text:

Yankee Stadium Awe

I'm not sure why I was astonished like I was. I knew where we were going . . .

down a narrow tunnel, past the little bathroom that has been the brunt of too

many fits of frustration, right up into the dugout. I knew where we were

headed, but the first moment I saw it at ground level I could do nothing but

gasp.

Yankee Stadium.

I saw it all.

. . . where Chris Chambliss hit the game-winning homer against Kansas City in

the playoffs.

. . . where George Brett slugged his pine tar homer.

. . . where Graig Nettles, against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World

Series, made everyone forget - at least for a little while - about Brooks

Robinson.

. . . where Thurman Munson used to hunker down and call the pitches.

. . . where Ron Guidry struck out 18 batters in a single game while going 25-3

for the season.

. . . where Goose Gossage, with Seattle Mariners on second and third and no

outs in the top of the ninth, struck out three batters on just 11 pitches.

. . . where Reggie Jackson hit three home runs in one World Series game.

It all came flooding back.

I think the memories started shuffling around when I was upstairs, taking the

10-cent tour of the Yankee offices, and seeing the field from George

Steinbrenner's office.

But it wasn't the same as standing on the field.

Feeling the dirt.

Touching the grass.

Seeing the empty stands and imagining 35,000 people cheering or clapping or

doing the wave as Paul O'Neill makes a leaping grab at the 314 sign at the

rightfield foul pole.

It was . . . awesome.

I didn't think it would be like that, though. I was on the field at Beehive

Stadium in New Britain and watched Rico Brogna play first for the London

Tigers and watched Jeff Bagwell play third for the Red Sox . . . just a week

or so before he was traded to the Houston Astros. I was on the field at McCoy

Stadium in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and watched Rico Brogna play first for the

Toledo Mudhens and watched Phil Plantier and Mo Vaughn and Nate Minchey play

for the Pawtucket Red Sox.

McCoy Stadium was nice, but it was no Yankee Stadium. It might be just a phone

call away, but the ride from Triple-A to the major leagues is a long one. The

Pawtucket Red Sox hang their helmets on their historic 23-inning game, the

longest in professional baseball history, but no one steps onto the field

thinking about the titanic home run Mo Vaughn hit into the fields behind the

rightfield fence after being sent back to the minors for the first - and last

- time.

But in the majors, everything seems to carve a place - a memory - in the

historic framework of the game.

It was just dirt and just grass that I stood on and walked across, but it was

a part of tradition. I don't think I would have felt the same way walking

across the floor at Madison Square Garden or across the artificial tundra at

Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands.

This was Yankee Stadium.

This was history.

This was awesome.