The experience of going to a baseball park traditionally involves a series of intense emotional responses to things you see, things you’ve seen before, things you never get tired of, things that have become a vital part of what you think you are.
Part of the difficulty of adapting to the novelty of a new baseball stadium is that the visual cues that led directly to your emotions are no longer there. Your spirit is looking for them and your mind has to tell your spirit that they’re not there any more and it needs to look at the new things. The problem is that your spirit was formed by the old things. This doesn’t mean that the spirit can’t learn to love the new things, but it does mean that while it is getting used to the new things, it is also looking for traces of what is gone. It is looking for a connection to what it loved. It is looking for itself.
So as I am driving to the new baseball stadium of the New York Mets I remember how I have felt, for 45 years, as I approached what I once called the “blue bowl wrapped in its web of highways.” It was originally sand-colored, it was always immense and it always seemed to me to dominate the highways that ran towards it and spun out from it. Nothing was like the excitement I felt as a kid coming from New Jersey, coming down off the Triboro, and somewhere around La Guardia seeing the great God Shea, tall, lordly, and lovely, between the heads of my parents, just under the rear view mirror. As a teenager and a young man, I would approach Shea on the “7” train that snaked through Queens. Finally it WAS THERE as the train rattled into the station along the parking lot. In the past two decades, I have approached Shea from the north. On the Whitestone Expressway, it almost looked as if you could drive right into it. Seen from the north, it was an enormous embracing presence welcoming me. As soon as I saw it, I was filled with joy. I never felt anything else. The joy was immediate, the path was direct. I saw Shea and I was happy.
I hope I will someday feel this way about Citi Field. But there is the problem that it is much smaller, and from all directions it looks far less imposing. And coming down from the north, you approach its ad-encrusted backside. It’s lovely as you approach it from the train station, but that’s not the way I’ll be coming in. So the first of my visual cues was missing. I wasn’t lifted to the skies by seeing Citi Field from a distance. This may have been why it was so important to me to find my family’s brick for the first time. I didn’t see what I’ve always known and loved. But in the bricks in front of the entrance to the new, unfamiliar place, I found something of myself.
Then I entered the rotunda. And this experience is the hardest to sort through. Jackie Robinson is one of the greatest sports heroes of all time and he was a New York National League sports hero. By opening a closed door, he prepared the way for the opening of many doors that had been closed in our society for so long. It’s wonderful to commemorate him in the new Mets stadium, although I am more than a little struck by the irony of commemorating Robinson so dramatically in the first Mets stadium that contains extensive areas that are completely off-limits to fans who have not paid an exorbitant amount for their ticket.
The rotunda is the most impressive space in the entire stadium. Yet it cannot be denied that the memorial to Robinson that takes up the entire space pushes the Mets aside exactly where they should be at the center stage. The fact that the stadium reproduces Ebbets Field and memorializes Robinson is in many respects laudable. Ebbets Field was distinguished and Robinson was great. There is even something touching about an owner of a baseball team memorializing the baseball memories of his childhood. But the problem is that the Mets have always had a problem with being treated as if they were secondary. One of the strongest things that binds Mets fans together is our ironic, affectionate sense of our secondariness. We love something that is not the obvious thing to love. The Yankees are the primary New York baseball team. We love the other team. The Mets came because the Dodgers (and the Giants) left. But we love them for themselves, not because they’re the successors to the Brooklyn Dodgers. We make the secondary into the primary with the force of our love. It may therefore be too much to ask that, when we enter our own stadium, we think first of the Dodgers and not of ourselves. Citi Field, in its current form, is too much of a reminder that for many old Dodger fans, the Mets are a consolation prize, a lesser team that could never replace the Boys of Summer just as they can never be the flagship team of New York.
We have been here for almost fifty years. There are millions of us. The Mets have provided some of the greatest moments of the past half century of baseball history. Even some of their not so great moments are as primary to those who cherish them as anything the Brooklyn Dodgers or the New York Yankees have ever accomplished. As baseball sentimentalists, the Wilpons should understand this. Fred Wilpon should honor his own baseball memories and he has the responsibility to honor ours as well. Owning a baseball team is a sacred public trust, and for the most part the Wilpons seem to recognize this. They recognized that they had to get us a better bullpen and they got us one. Now they have to make it so that when Mets fans enter our own stadium, they recognize themselves. Our Mets emotions need to be turned on, and it would probably be wisest to turn them on with the quirky, tacky, goofy, urbane, improvised, self-consciously silly things that have always turned them on. Mr. Met is still here so is our dear sweet familiar old Home Run Apple. Now that we no longer have Shea, and the memories it would immediately bring back for us, we also need a place to take our kids to teach them and show them images and information about all that has come before. Even more than we need a boutique selling the carefully crafted and inspired designs of Alyssa Milano, we need perhaps just a little stall (a storage closet?!) selling some of the excellent books that exist about Mets history and culture, just in case anyone wants to explore the Mets past in some actual detail (sorry to be a broken record about this but it really rankles me). I am glad that above the Left Field entrance there are a few close-up, slightly confusing posters of great Mets. There are also some banners of Mets moments that you can see if you’re walking at the right angle along the left field exterior wall of the stadium. This is a start. But much more is needed. I don’t think the Mets intended to erase the past from the face of the new stadium. If they felt that way about their past, they wouldn’t have offered us the beautiful final ceremonies they had at Shea. Perhaps they were distracted by all that is involved in opening up a new stadium. There is an opportunity now to make amends, to put out a few of the old momentos, to start making the new place feel like our home.
And shouldn’t we, as part of this, have some blue and orange? What was wrong with blue and orange? Why don’t we see it in the new stadium? Some on the radio have criticized the triviality of Mets fans’ concern with “colors.” But the absence of blue and orange gets to the very heart of the matter. It may be nothing more than a color combination, but this is exactly the kind of visual cue our spirit keeps looking for. Ask any Mets fan why they love the Mets and weirdly enough they will often mention the blue and orange. These are our colors. We have cathected them completely. As has often been observed, these are the colors of our blood.
Citi Field has an awful lot going for it but it needs our blood. And I’m not sure it will have our sound until it has our blood. The future of the Mets cannot involve a break with the past. What is baseball fandom if it is not a continuous chain of memory, of inherited affections through generations? Sure there have been a lot of disappointments in that past. But our disappointments are part of what we are. They are in our blood, and they have always seasoned our triumphs. Our future must grow out of our past. If Citi Field is to become our home, it is going to have to connect us with what used to make us so happy to go to Shea, for all of its shortcomings. A winning team will not be enough to make us happy to be Mets fans. Winning teams are always great. But they are never enough. We need more. We need the mysterious intangibles. We need our secret signals. We need what we used to feel when we carried banners along the walkways in front of the stands. We need the loud raucous Mets love that we shared as we bounced down the outer ramps at the end of a winning game. Our walkways are gone, our ramps are gone. Big ugly ads have swallowed up most of the scoreboard. The stupidly expensive and exclusive club area has grown like an evil cancer to push the Mets fans to the heights and periphery of the stadium, where they don’t necessarily see the field very well. Sweet Caroline has come back like a poltergeist. But we still have our team and we still have each other.
We are still the New Breed, the fans of the New York Mets, the illogical, articulate, dedicated fools of legend. Like a resourceful endangered species, we will make Citi Field our own. We will start by convincing the Mets to make it more of a home for us. The recession may even force the opening of more of the stadium to us! We will move down, as we always have, into the seats that no one showed up for. We will storm the club level with our torches, carrying Cow-Bell Man on our shoulders. We will stuff our faces with their artisanal comfort food. We are here. We will not go away. We will cheer champions. We will make new memories. And our blood will be blue and orange until our hearts can no longer pump it.
We may not have Shea to stir our Mets soul, but at least we have your words. Your take on our new stadium is completely on the money. You put into words a big part of what was missing for me during my first game at the new park, the visual cues. I always looked to the blue walls, the filled and vast stands, and the “hump” in the field level that connected it with the loge. These were the things that reminded me that I was watching my favorite team in the world, and got me pumped-up to be there. I guess I’ll have to find new nooks at Citi to conjure up similar emotions.
This is not the stadium in which any of us saw how green the grass is for the first time, therefore none of us have really bonded with this place yet. I can only hope that once we have, the magic will come back.
Right on, Dana. Right on. I was at the Blogger All-Star meeting yesterday (I think your invite got lost in the mail…ha! No seriously it was impromptu) but Greg Prince mentioned that it felt like Social Studies class going through the rotunda. I think, like you, it’s a great gesture, Jackie Robinson was a helluva sports man and opened doors in society that had previously been closed. However, how much can we possibly get out of this after the first few seasons? I think the novelty of everyone walking in through the grand rotunda will be – meh? Don’t get me wrong – Jackie is an important sports figure, period. He doesn’t belong to the Mets. He belongs to ALL of baseball. The irony of the club escalator was not lost on any of us writers either, Dana. And where (besides the “left field wall numbers”) is the references to Bill Shea? Without him, no Mets, period.
It is also a bit anticlimactic seeing the field for the first time but my philosophy on that is that we haven’t had our emotional attachment yet. That will come in time. Shea was different it was special b/c we MADE it our home. I may not be attached to Citifield, there seem to be things I’d change too but…the attachment will come in time.
Great post Dana. I had to laugh because I know so well that feeling of seeing the stadium as you round that corner on the Grand Central. If I was alone or with people I didn’t feel embarassed in front of, I would actually break into song! I also find myself seeing something not Mets-related that is blue and orange, and automatically liking it because it is blue and orange. Colors do matter and any phychologist will tell you that.
The Sweet Caroline thing is another example of not really understanding Metsiness. That’s a Red Sox thing. It may have expanded, but it’s not Mets. In my little cocoon of mets fans in the upper rows of the promenade yesterday, we all started booing when Sweet Caroline came on. Do you think they could hear us in the Acela Club??
One other thought, at the Phillies stadium, the entire back of the scorboard, which, as you point out, is what you see as you approach the stadium from one direction, is a giant picture of the Phillies Phanatic. Now, i’m not fan of the Phillies Phanatic, but can you imagine if, instead of the huge ads, they had a huge pictrue of Mr. Met welcoming you on the back of that scoreboard? It might actually make you want to break into song!
Don’t forget to stomp your feet and sing at the top of your lungs when Lazy Mary comes on. It’s crazy, it’s kitschy, it silly, and it’s US. Although it wasn’t around in the ’80s, it still takes me back to that quirky, spirited time to be a Mets fan.
Woof (it’s a little stronger than “wow”). You’re right on the money. Again! I was reading your piece on the visual cues thinking of so many rides coming off the Triboro bridge seeing the big blue stadium in the background just past the airport (both for games and driving back to Hofstra so many times). That was hard when I did it 2 weeks ago for the Boston game. You were right on the money with that. Every year that I’ve been out to the US Open, I’ve gone high up to take pictures of the other side of the tracks at Shea (I should post some of them on my blog).
You captured it all great. Though I dare you to try to explain your irony of the Rotunda to Fred Wilpon. I think somewhere, subconsciously, I saw all this coming, and that made it so much more important to pay the money for my physical pieces of Shea. It makes me so eternally thankful that I got to be at Shea for the ‘Santana game’ (and in the bleachers with the group from Gary Keith and Ron too).
And Theresa, Lazy Mary is the one song that makes me think of good times at Shea more than any other, and I remember thinking ‘what the hell is this’ somewhere around 1993 or so when it was introduced to the 7th inning stretch. It wouldn’t be the same without it.
Thanks dyhrd. Theresa’s comment made me wonder when Lazy Mary was introduced. I don’t remember. It just appeared at some point as far as I could tell and it seemed as if it had been there forever. And it had, in a way. Because Lazy Mary, as you’re all pointing out, is the musical expression of the crazy, festive, New Yorky ethnic happiness that has always been the soul of the Mets. It is what Shea became, what we made Shea into. I don’t know if Citi Field can handle it.
I don’t believe “Lazy Mary” was institutionalized at Shea until the late ’90s, maybe even 1999. There was a game in early September that year when Lou Bega’s “Mambo No. 5″ followed behind “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” and it didn’t seem like anything was particularly awry. But I never heard it in the Seventh Inning Stretch again. Other than a couple of innocent pre-2006 playings of “Sweet Caroline” (Jewish Heritage Day 2004, because Neil Diamond is a Nice Jewish Boy), “Lazy Mary” seems to have been in place permanently in its slot since 2000. It was definitely around before ‘99, just not, to my recollection, cemented in place the way it has been this decade.
1) I’ve been wondering how CitiField would strike me if it wasn’t the Mets playing in it– because even watching it on TV feels weird to me so far, as if the Mets have no home, now. They never play in a place that feels like home to me, even when I see it on TV– what’s with those outfield walls? I think if I were on a Mets roadtrip, and CitiField was in another city, I might think it was a perfectly nice place to watch a ballgame. With great food, of course. Subie, ever since you mentioned that clam chowder, I’ve had a terrible clam chowder jones.
I’ve also been reflecting that Shea was a terrible place in a lot of ways, but we made it ours. When the stadium was designed, they probably didn’t say “Let’s have all this walkways because they will foster community and self-expression.” WE did that. Remember how We took what we found and made it ours. We will do it again, of course– probably our kids will. But right now, I miss what I miss.
2) Re: Lazy Mary. Every so often the Mets management would come up with something (and that includes the baseball team) that is right on the money for the Mets fan, brings us closer together, and brings us closer to the team itself. For me, the golden age of that will always be the ’80s. I remember initially hating the Diamond Vision screen, but then there came The Curly Shuffle, and dammit, that was perfect. The fans loved it. The players loved it. You could look into the dugout (I always sit on the 3rd base line), and see the players enjoying it like we did. Anyone remember “Name the Year”, that silly pop music trivia game? I remember one game when the answer went up on the board, and I saw Ron Darling, Rick Aguilera and Howard Johnson all high-fiving. Awesome.
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PS The Mets have a pretty young starlet fan, too. SHE writes think pieces in the Wall Street Journal. So there, Alyssa Milano. Go back to LA.
Julia Stiles on the Mets and CitiField
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123992851955927591.html
Getting in the discussion late, but I recall the first night of “Lazy Mary” as Italian Night at Shea in 1999. Retrosheet says the date was August 11, 1999, a 9-3 win over San Diego. I remember the day because–I seem to remember crap like that–but it took me by such surprise that they would play it and I had been ranting throughout the game and hour-long rain delay that it was “Italian Night” and there was nothing about the game that was Italian outside the stuff they always had or did. “Lazy Mary” shut me up and they’ve played it somewhat regularly since.
Maybe I’m wrong and they did it sometime earlier when I wasn’t paying attention, but ‘99 was my last year living somewhat close to Shea and I probably went to 25 or so games that year before their magical postseason run. The International Week used to feature different countries during long August homestands–usually against West Coast teams–and it included Irish Night, Merenege Night, German Night, etc., with cheap tickets and some kitchy cultural tie-in. Don’t see that in the new digs.
Wow. Strike the stone and Matt Silverman pops up!
There’s some Mets nostalgia the Wilpons could easily bring back to make the fans happy – instead of Sweet Caroline in the 8th inning, BRING BACK THE CURLEY SHUFFLE!!!
Greg, “Sweet Caroline” started for Jewish Heritage Day?!! Forgive my ethnic pride, but my people gives the world Irving Berlin, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, George Gershwin, Richard Rodgers, etc. and Neil Diamond is what they want to play for Jewish Heritage Day?!!! Sheesh!!! Get rid of it!!
Thanks for the Stiles link, Theresa. Our starlet can write too!
And yes, everybody, you’re absolutely right. The Curley Shuffle was the best, and if things start going well this summer, they should bring it back, but only if they start playing really well, I think. Otherwise the contrast with 1986 will not feel right.
And Matt, this is the whole thing about Citi Field, the fact that,as you point out, you can’t even imagine all the ethnic nights in the new digs. If you have a New York stadium where you can’t imagine fun, nutty ethnic nights, what do you have?
For Lazy Mary, 1993 was just a guess. Even with 1999, all it means is that I’ve been a Mets fan for a long time (23rd season of my nearly 31 years). Howie Rose is our team’s historian, I think he would know.
Since we’re on the subject, I found this on YouTube from the final game at Shea.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjU_rI3MpsU
Before “LM” was a staple, I distinctly recall DiamondVision bringing us a girl in a Rusty Staub jersey (No. 10) dancing around in the control room. She was identified as “Mary,” if not necessarily Lazy.
I believe I read somewhere that “Lazy Mary” is traditionally sung at Sicilian weddings (it is sung at the wedding that opens the Godfather) and that the lyrics are faintly, at least, suggestive (Lazy Mary has difficulty getting out of bed because she was, well, up too late the night before). Is this true? Does it mean anything?