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Arlington Stadium has a history that deserves to be told. It is a bit unknown, but certainly worthy of telling. The story started in 1959 when residents of the Dallas-Fort Worth area voted to approve a bond for a small minor-league ballpark to be built in the centrally located suburb of Arlington, Texas. It was […]
From its beginning, as a plank in Ivan Allen’s campaign platform for mayor, to its end, hosting the Olympic baseball competition and a World Series in its final year of existence, Atlanta Stadium was a major part of the push to make Atlanta a world-class city.1 The stadium succeeded in attracting teams from major-league baseball, […]
Maple Leaf Stadium, circa 1929. (City of Toronto Archives) Toronto is a world-class city with a proud baseball history, but its ballparks have not always met a high standard. Exhibition Stadium, the American League Blue Jays’ home from 1977 to 1989, was a converted football stadium whose seating arrangements were not entirely suited to […]
From 1926 through 1976, a wooden stadium stood at the corner of King and Isenberg Streets in Honolulu, Hawaii. It was small, with capacity of only about 25,000.1 It lacked infrastructure. It was called “The Termite Palace” for its infestation. Yet, like so many ballparks of past eras, it had a simple charm. “The first […]
Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, home of the Orioles from 1954 to 1991 (DAVID STINSON) Memorial Stadium was located at 900 East 33rd Street in Baltimore, a mile northeast of Oriole Parks (I)-(V).1 Memorial Stadium was the home of the American League Baltimore Orioles from 1954 to 1991, and the National Football League Baltimore Colts […]
“Nobody has ever called Shea Stadium a cathedral,” wrote George Vecsey of the New York Times after the last major-league baseball game was played there on September 28, 2008.1 Even so, for many it inspired love and loyalty that its handsome but dull replacement, Citi Field, could not. When New York City Mayor Robert F. […]
Editor’s note: This article was selected as a winner of the 2014 McFarland-SABR Baseball Research Award. The Montreal Expos played 36 seasons (1969-2004). For the last 28, their home was Olympic Stadium – a cavernous concrete edifice built for the 1976 Summer Olympic Games. From the outset, “The Big O” was notorious: hailed as […]
Few multi-purpose stadiums in North American history can rival Toronto’s Exhibition Stadium for the number, variety and stature of events held there. Set in a vast fairgrounds complex on the shore of Lake Ontario, the municipal facility originally known as Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) Stadium served as the largest sports and entertainment venue in Canada’s […]
A forgettable year for the Minnesota Twins, 1981, stands out in that it was the final season of Metropolitan Stadium. Even a finale couldn’t be properly planned for the ballpark, which opened in 1956 and was used by the minor-league Minneapolis Millers until the Washington Senators moved to Minnesota. A game on June 11 drew […]
“Connie Mack Stadium is an old woman dancing nude at the Medicare Senior Prom. You know what she might once have been, but tonight she is an obscene accordion of yellowed flesh. … Connie Mack Stadium is the lengthened shadow of a man, sliding finally to rest. A small step for any other city, a […]
The Philadelphia Phillies’ modern, circular, multipurpose, Astroturfed playing field, Veterans Stadium, 19 years old in 1990, had at least one thing in common with Connie Mack Stadium, the more traditional grass and grandstand ballpark where they played from 1938 to 1970.1 Neither ballpark had ever seen a no-hitter by a Phillies pitcher. In fact, no […]
Wayne Twitchell was making his first start of the season since having knee surgery.1 His last start had been on September 18, 1973, versus the Chicago Cubs. Twitchell recalled his recovery: “It seems in memory, to be the shortest winter I ever spent. Two months went by, there were no high points, nothing to remember. […]
I wonder who will be higher, Wallenda or Carlton?” — Montreal Expos catcher Tim McCarver1 On a muggy August afternoon in 1972, Karl Wallenda and Steve Carlton performed during a doubleheader between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Montreal Expos at Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium. Carlton was 27 years old and entering the prime of his career. […]
The 2000 National League Division Series against the NL West champion San Francisco Giants and the wild-card New York Mets was the first postseason series played at Pacific Bell Park. The Bayfront stadium was opened in April of that year. The Giants finished with a 97-65 regular-season record, 11 games ahead of the Los Angeles […]
Fireworks shows on Independence Day are an American tradition and a fixture at ballparks across the country. On the Fourth of July 1972, a fireworks show between games of a Chicago Cubs-Atlanta Braves doubleheader might have cost the Cubs a victory and allowed the Braves to escape with a tie. Leo Durocher’s Cubs entered the […]
The Philadelphia Phillies planned to open the 1970 season at the new Veterans Stadium in South Philadelphia but site delays forced the club to open its home schedule at the oldest ballpark in the major leagues, 61-year-old Connie Mack Stadium, on April 6, 1970. A crowd of 15,918 attended the home opener between the Phillies […]
Heading into the 1993 season, the July 2 game between the Philadelphia Phillies and San Diego Padres at Veterans Stadium seemed like an unexciting item. The Phillies had finished last in the National League East Division in 1992, 26 games out; the Padres were third in the NL West, 16 games out. The Phillies promotions […]
“Tonight we must say goodbye. So long old friend. We will miss you.”1 With his voice breaking, legendary radio announcer Ernie Harwell uttered those somber words to mark the end of a storied era on Monday, September 27, 1999, as the Detroit Tigers played their final game at Tiger Stadium, the venerable 87-year-old ballpark at […]
Buried midway down the front page in most of the country’s sports sections was the fact that Chicago right fielder Billy Williams hit for the cycle, propelling the Cubs to a 7-2 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals in the second game of a Sunday doubleheader. The bigger news of the day involved Jim Ryun, […]
Outfielder Steve Salvato never played a day in the major leagues, but he once got three hits in a regular-season game at a big-league ballpark. Same thing with pitcher Henry Bunnell: He never appeared in the majors, but he once earned a win in a big-league park. These unusual events happened in June 1972, when […]
In football they talk about “statement” games, when Team A thrashes Team B, thus sending a message to the opponent and the world that Team A is damn good and don’t you forget it. There are too many games in a baseball season to pinpoint one match as a “statement” game. But the Montreal Expos […]
As the Detroit Tigers and the Minnesota Twins prepared to square off at Metropolitan Stadium on Sunday, June 20, 1976, neither team had particularly distinguished itself to that point in the season. The Tigers, at 26-33, were at least so far staying out of the American League East basement, where they had finished every year […]
On June 11, 1985, at Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium, the Phillies pounded the visiting New York Mets, 26-7, before 22,591 fans in a game lasting 3 hours and 21 minutes. The final result was two runs short of the National League record for the most runs scored by a team in a game. The 43 runs […]
In 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates rookie catcher Steve Nicosia watched the 6’1”, 220 lb. right-handed power hitter crowd the batter’s box and wondered, “How are we ever going to get a pitch by him?”1 Nicosia was hardly alone in these thoughts. For much of his 15-year major-league career Greg Luzinski – whose large bat appeared toothpick-like […]