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Baseball

The New Yankee Stadium: Championship Shell, No Creamy Nougat Center

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yankeestadium.jpgI recently watched House of Steinbrenner, one of ESPN’s 30 for 30 documentaries directed by Barbara Kopple. It wasn’t remotely as powerful as Kopple’s Harlan County U.S.A., which is a bit of an unfair comparison, since the latter is a chronicle of a bloody clash between Kentucky mine workers wanting to unionize and Big Coal’s hired thugs, and one of the most gut-wrenching docs you’ll ever see. And yet, I was surprised by how affected I was by House of Steinbrenner.* Early in the film, you see fans walking around Yankee Stadium during its last game, knowing this will be their last trip there, tears in their eyes. I was moved by it, and not just in an empathic way. I was surprised by how much of Yankee Stadium, as seen in the movie, was familiar to me.

* I was also baffled by why Kopple seemed to be given a hard time by the Yankees brass in the film, particularly Hal Steinbrenner, even though her movie was basically a love letter to the team and the stadium. Perhaps because, despite being a devoted Yankees fan, she dared to admit that Hal’s dad drove the team into a ditch in the 80s.

I don’t talk about it too much, but my mom became a Jehovah’s Witness when I was a kid. Aside from making you go to “Kingdom Hall” three times a week, there are also two small, local conventions a year that take up a weekend, and another ginormous convention once a year. For many years, this ginormous convention was held at Yankee Stadium. In the summer. This stems from the Biblical precept that being even slightly comfortable is sinful.

Somehow, we always managed to snag seats in the shady mezzanine. Pity the poor folks stuck with upper deck seats for three days of biblical reenactments and two-hour speeches on what the prophet Ezekiel means for us today. At the time, my favorite book was The Sporting News’ Take Me Out to the Ballpark, a collection of the history of various stadiums past and present, each one preceded by a detailed illustration of the park and its notable heroes. So rather than take notes on the sermons, as I was supposed to do, I’d sketch the outfield wall of Yankee Stadium. All of its ads for French’s Mustard and Utz potato chips, the scoreboard, and even the 4 train as it zipped past the gap between the right field stands and the bleachers.

At lunchtime, we’d wade through the sweltering stadium corridors to get chicken sandwiches and juice, the food tables smashed against shuttered concession stands and dusty ads for un-Christ-like products like Budweiser and the New York Lottery. Then we’d stroll the local streets, browse through the sports shops on 161st Street (a real treat for a budding baseball nerd), and get some ice from one of the Bronx’s ubiquitous Coco Helado carts.

So as I watched House of Steinbrenner, and saw fans filing through the royal blue hallways, a melancholy feeling washed over me. Seeing the goopy, pitted paint, those cramped, low-ceilinged corridors behind the stands, those slatted metal windows, and knowing they weren’t there anymore–the absence really hit me.

I saw this just before visiting the new Yankee Stadium. I went there expecting to have one of two reactions: either to be turned off by its ostentation and the team’s huge monuments to themselves, or to be grudgingly impressed. I didn’t expect the reaction I wound up having, which was basically: Oh, this again?
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Baseball

Scientists Warn of Steinbrenner Monument’s Effects on the Earth’s Orbit

steinmonument.jpgNEW YORK–Scientists cautioned that the new monument dedicated to George Steinbrenner, unveiled at Yankee Stadium Monday night, may have negative effects on several of the Earth’s astronomical functions. Despite warnings from the scientific community at large, the UN, and several prominent clergymen, construction of the monument–which used 92 percent of the earth’s available deposits of granite–continued unabated for the past year.

“It will definitely influence the earth’s gravitational pull,” said Dr. Henrik Lundegaard, professor of geophysics at Princeton University. “It will probably also have some consequences for the planet’s revolution around the sun.” Lundegaard estimated that, due the monument’s colossal size, “the calendar year will probably lengthen a full day by the year 2031, and exponentially more each year thereafter, which will have untold consequences for life as we know it.”

The Yankees were unfazed by such revelations. “I think it’s a fitting tribute to The Boss,” said shortstop Derek Jeter. “All he wanted to do was win, and what bigger victory is there than beating the tilt of the Earth’s axis?”

“We all loved Mr. Steinbrenner,” said pitcher Andy Pettite, “and I think it’s only appropriate that his monument should have its own climate.” This separate ecosystem, reportedly a temperate zone, may explain the appearance of several tornadoes on the Grand Concourse within the last week.

A spokesman for the Yankees confirmed that the team will unveil a monument to the Steinbrenner monument during the 2012 season. “It will take that long for us to locate and mold an appropriate amount of adamantium,” the spokesman said.

Baseball, The Funny

Get Metsmerized! with Tom Scharpling and Patton Oswalt

metsmerized.jpgAfter yesterday’s screed about the sorry state of the Mets and their desire to kill their idols, I thought some levity was in order. So please enjoy this clip from The Best Show on WFMU from August 18, 2009, in which host Tom Scharpling and famous comedienne Patton Oswalt listen to and riff on the only thing worse than the current Walter Reed ‘controversy’: “Get Metsmerized!”

“Get Metsmerized!” was the brainchild of George Foster, the Mets’ first big free agent signing (and first big free agent bust). Like many of his teammates, eve before the 1986 season began, he figured the team would have a great year. (Even as a Mets fan, I’d say Tom’s description of the ’86 Mets as “sociopaths who could hit baseballs” is pretty accurate.) So what better way to capitalize on a great year than a hastily produced rap song? The Chicago Bears had such a big hit with the “Super Bowl Shuffle” the year before, so surely this would be a big hit, too!

It was not, for the eight billion reasons you’ll hear in this clip. Hip-hop was still in its relative infancy, and in most people’s minds, rap was something that anyone could just do. “It’s just talkin over music! A kid could do that!” Foster and his chosen teammates (Darryl Strawberry, Doc Gooden, Lenny Dykstra, Rafael Santana, Howard Johnson, Kevin Mitchell, Rick Aguilera, and Tim Teufel (!)) proved this wrong once and for all.

As Patton points out, “They even yell off-key.” He also notes that roping poor Santana–who could barely speak English, let along rap–into this mess borders on “a hate crime,” and it’s hard to argue otherwise. Run DMC, this is not.

In an effort to make up for “Get Metsmerized,” later in the 1986 season, the entire team collaborated on a song/video (“Let’s Go Mets!”) that actually wound up being a local hit. While it is also cheesy and 80s-rific, it sounds like “Good Vibrations” compared to this atrocity.

Many, many thanks to @arfortiyef for supplying the clip you’re about to enjoy. You guys should probably follow him on the Twitter and read his site, too.