About three weeks ago, there was a very special anniversary.  No, it wasn’t my wedding anniversary – ALL of those are special to me.  (Yeah, I do expect my wife to read this blog post!)  The anniversary that I’m talking about is one that whisked me back to my baseball-loving youth, to a time when baseball was still America’s game.  Indeed, it took me back to the time when big league baseball was still just a game and not the over-hyped, big business that it is today.  October 13th of this year was the 50th anniversary of Bill Mazeroski’s home run in the bottom of the ninth inning in Game 7 of the 1960 World Series at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh which gave the upstart Pittsburgh Pirates a stunning victory over the mighty New York Yankees.  There had never been a Game 7 walk-off homer in the Series prior to that day.  And there hasn’t been one since.

So where was I when this epic homer was hit?  Well I was a 7 year-old sitting in a second grade classroom in a small town in Western Pennsylvania, focusing little on class work but wondering a lot about how my beloved Bucs were doing in this crucial game.  I think what made me even more antsy was the fact that earlier in the afternoon our teacher took the class to the “all-purpose room” and let us watch the first few innings of the game on the school’s one TV set.  When she announced that we had to return to the classroom to resume our schoolwork,  I thought that she had to be kidding.  Didn’t she know how important this was to me?  After all, she was aware that my parents allowed me to skip school just a week earlier so that they could take me to Game 1 of the Series.  Did she really think that I would be able to concentrate on the three “R’s” while the rest of Game 7 went on without me?  But, since apparently it wasn’t all about me, back to the classroom we went.  And then shortly before our 4:00 dismissal, it happened.  While our teacher was over in a corner of the classroom working with a small group of kids on a reading lesson, and the rest of us were at our desks doing busy work (though I’m sure I wasn’t), Duffy, our lovable lady janitor burst into the room and yelled that Bill Mazeroski hit a home run and the Pirates won!  Me and my classmates started jumping up and down screaming, including those girls that didn’t know a baseball from a bowling ball.  Maz, my favorite Pirate player, was the hero.  It was an exciting end to the school day, even though I wasn’t able to witness it first-hand.

Our class reaction to the victory of course paled in comparison to the reaction of Bucs fans in Pittsburgh and the surrounding areas.  The celebration went on well into the night.  I read some accounts suggesting that the celebrating even exceeded the level of the V-E Day and V-J Day celebrations!  There were reports that the amount of confetti that rained down from buildings throughout the city buried the trolley tracks to the extent that the trolley system was brought to a standstill.  People began pouring into the city from the outlying areas to join in the celebration.  Traffic got so bogged down that police were forced to close off some of the roads leading to the city.

Here it is fifty years after the fact and I still have a strong emotional reaction every time I think about Maz’s homer.  But I am far from alone in that regard.  The exuberant response immediately after the Pirates won that 1960 World Series is understandable.  But why is Mazeroski’s home run still considered one of the most, if not the most revered moment in Pittsburgh sports history, even by many who were born years after he hit it?  To answer that, you have to understand and appreciate what led up to that moment.

First the historical significance.  Prior to 1960, the last time the Pirates were in the World Series was 1927.  They were swept in that series by the Yankees.  That Yankees team fielded a devastating line-up that was commonly referred to as “Murderer’s Row” which featured eventual Hall-of -Famers Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Earle Combs and Tony Lazzeri.  The last time the Pirates had won a World Series was 1925  when they bested the Washington Senators led by Walter Johnson.  Early on in that 33-year World Series drought, the Bucs came close to winning the pennant, finishing in second place several times.  But after World War II, things got ugly.  In the 14 seasons from 1946 through 1959, the Pirates finished in last or next to last place ten times.  For much of that time, the fans did have a bonafide star to cheer for.  There were seven straight seasons, from 1946 through 1952, where outfielder/first Baseman Ralph Kiner either led the league or tied for the league lead in home runs.  That essentially was the only excitement for Pirate fans in those days.  And it’s not like sports fans in Pittsburgh at that time had an enticing alternative.  Their pro football team, the Steelers, (there was no hockey team in town then)  was just as awful as the Pirates, hardly ever even making a serious run at getting to the Championship Game.  The City of Pittsburgh and the surrounding area, well known for it’s steel and coal production, was a leader in regard to the nation’s industrial might.  When it came to sports however, Pittsburgh  became a synonym for the term perennial losers.

But then came the magical 1960 baseball season.  Going into the season, folks just didn’t know what to expect.  The Pirates had a disappointing 4th place finish in 1959.  The 1960 roster included some good talent but no real superstars.  Roberto Clemente was the rightfielder on that team and he ended up hitting .314 for season, but he was just starting to emerge as a star.  As it turned out, in that 1960 season,  shortstop Dick Groat led the league in hitting and won the National League MVP Award and pitcher Vern Law went 20-9 and won the Cy Young Award.  But for the most part, the team was a bunch of solid players who played the game the right way under fiery Manager Danny Murtaugh.  The Pirates started out the season strong and began to believe in themselves.  It seemed like they thrived on come-from-behind rallies to win games late.  Most importantly, the fans started to believe.  ”Beat ‘em Bucs” signs and bumper stickers were everywhere.  This was the year!  And indeed it was as the Pirates ended up winning the National League pennant by 7 games, earning the right to take on the dreaded Yankees in the World Series.

The Pirates weren’t given much of a chance to win it all.  The Yankees were a dynasty.  From 1949 through 1953, the Yankees won five straight World Series titles.  They appeared in four more Fall Classics in the 50′s, winning two of those.  Going into the decade of the 60′s, the expectation was that the Yankees reign of excellence would continue.  The 1960 Yankees had a formidable line-up, led by Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Yogi Berra, “Moose” Skowron and pitcher Whitey Ford.

Actually, the Series turned out to be a weird one in a number of ways.  If you just looked at the statistics,  you’d have to be puzzled as to how the series even went to a seventh game and you’d have to wonder how the Yankees could have lost.  They set several World Series individual and team batting records.  For the Series, the Yankees out-hit the Pirates 91-60, they out-scored them 55-27, and they outpitched them with a combined ERA of 3.54 to the Pirates 7.11.   Two of the Yankees three wins were complete game shutouts by Whitey Ford and in those three wins, the Yankees scored a total of 38 runs while the Pirates were only able to get three runs in their Game 2 loss.  The Yankees combined for 10 home runs.  I had the good fortune of seeing Mazeroski hit a home run in Game 1 but the Bucs didn’t hit another one until Game 7, when they hit three.  Clearly, the Yankees were the dominant team, but like they had done all season, the Pirates found a way to prevail.

But all of this is just backdrop for the final act – Game 7.  That game itself had some weird, critical plays and late game heroics that provided all the tension and excitement necessary to set the stage for the dramatic climax.  The Pirates started off the scoring with a two run homer by first baseman Rocky Nelson in the first inning and then they got two more runs in the second.  Law took that 4-0 lead into the 5th inning but Skowron led off that inning with a solo homer to right.  In the top of the 6th, Mantle singled in a run and then the next batter, Berra, who was playing left field that day, gave the Yankees a 5-4 lead with a three run homer down the line in right.  The Yankees tacked on two more runs in the top of the 8th and carried a seemingly insurmountable 7-4 lead into the bottom of the 8th.  I would guess that most people probably thought that at this point the Series was over.  But arguably, the most exciting inning and a half of World Series play was about to begin.  Yankees reliever Bobby Shantz, who entered the game at the start of the 3rd inning, had completely silenced the Pirates bats for five innings.  The Pirates came to the plate in the 8th wondering if they ever would be able to get to Shantz.  They didn’t have to wait long for the answer.  Pinch hitter Gino Cimoli led off the bottom of the eighth with a single.  Centerfielder Billy Virdon came up and hit a ground ball to Yankees shortstop Tony Kubek that looked to be an easy double-play ball.  But it took a bad hop and hit Kubek in the throat.  Instead of two outs and nobody on, the Pirates had runners at first and second with nobody out.  Dick Groat followed with a single to left that scored Cimoli, cutting the Yankees lead to 7-5.  Jim Coates came in to replace Shantz and got two outs.  But with runners on second and third, Roberto Clemente hit a roller to the right of first base that was fielded cleanly by Skowron.  But inexplicably, Coates failed to cover first base and a hustling Clemente legged out an infield single that plated another run.  So with the Yankees now clinging to a 7-6 lead, catcher Hal Smith came up to bat.  Smith entered the game in the top of the 8th after starting catcher Smokey Burgess was removed for a pinch runner in the 7th inning.  Smith made his only plate appearance that day a memorable one by smacking a 3-run homer to left.  And just like that, the Pirates had a 9-7 lead.  Ralph Terry came in to replace Coates and he got the next batter to fly out to end the inning.

The Pirates took the field in the top of the 9th thinking that they were about to become World Champs.  But not so fast.  The Yankees led off the top of the 9th with back-to-back singles.  After Maris fouled out to the catcher, Mantle knocked in another run with a single.  So with the Yankees down by a run with runners at first and third and one out,  another pivotal play was about to unfold.  Left-handed batter Berra stepped to the plate to face southpaw Harvey Haddix.  Berra hit a fairly sharp ground ball to Nelsen who fielded it  near the first base bag.  But instead of throwing to second to start a Series-ending double-play, he decided to step on first to get the putout of Berra but it took the force play off.  Nelsen’s momentum carried him to the home plate side of the first base bag.  At this point he froze for just a split-second.  He could have thrown home and likely would have nailed the runner streaking in from third base.  For some reason, he chose to try and record the third out by attempting to tag out Mantle who was diving back to first base since he was no longer forced to run.  Nelsen was unable to reach him in time and the Yankees had evened the score at 9-9.  Haddix retired the next batter, so it was off to the bottom of the ninth.

I’ve read numerous accounts of Mazeroski describing what happened next.  He said that he came off the field after they had gotten that third out and went into the dugout thinking about what just happened and how they left the Yankees off the hook.  He said that he was sitting on the bench as Terry began to take his warm-up tosses and someone finally yelled to him, “Hey Maz, you’re up!”.  He had forgotten that he was to lead-off the bottom of the 9th.  He said that he stepped into the batter’s box thinking that he just want to hit the ball hard somewhere and get on base to hopefully start a rally.  Terry’s first pitch was high and he laid off of it for ball one.  He recalls that after that first pitch, Yankees catcher Johnny Blanchard stepped toward the mound as he threw the ball back to Terry and he yelled to him, “He’s a high fastball hitter – get the ball down”.  Well, he did get the next pitch down some – but not enough.  It was right where Maz liked it.  But I’ll let legendary broadcaster Chuck Thompson describe for you what happened.  He did the radio play-by-play of the game that day and despite the fact that he misidentifies the Yankees pitcher, it is a call that I never get tired of hearing.  Here’s Chuck:  “Art Ditmar throws – here’s a swing and a high fly ball going deep left, this may do it.  Back to the wall goes Berra, it is … over the fence, home run and the Pirates win.” After a long pause where you get to experience the crowd noise and then a brief summation of what just happened, I recall Thompson making the comment something to the effect that Forbes Field has turned into an “outdoor insane asylum”.  And the bedlam was just beginning!

In addition to enjoying Thompson’s call, I love watching the video footage of the home run where you see Berra racing back to the ivy-covered brick wall, hoping to make a play if it hits off the wall and then watching the ball sneak over the 406 FT.  mark just to the right of the big green scoreboard that had the huge Longines clock on top of it.  There is also a great still photo that I’ve seen of Maz just after making contact with the ball.  It’s a ground level shot taken from the first base side that takes you right through the batter’s box, down the left field line and out to the left field scoreboard.  You see Berra standing in left field, and the big clock on top of the scoreboard showing the time as 3:36.  What a way to preserve a memory!

You know, when the Pirates moved to Three Rivers Stadium in 1970, the University of Pittsburgh purchased Forbes Field with plans to demolish it to make way for an expansion of their campus.  But they preserved that portion of the wall over which the homer disappeared.  Every year on October 13th, a small crowd gathers at the wall and at 3:36 in the afternoon they play Thompson’s call.  They all cheer as if they just witnessed it happening.  So, we come back to the main question.  What is it about this home run that evokes that kind of response?

It’s probably a lot of things.  The drama associated with that one swing.  The suddenness with which it resulted in an improbable victory.  How it took us from the frustration over blowing a 9th inning lead to the euphoria of becoming World Champs in a blink.  The what-ifs that set the stage:  what if Kubek doesn’t get the bad hop?; what if Coates would have covered first?; what if Nelsen had executed a game ending double-play?; what if Terry had gotten that pitch down like Blanchard wanted?; and what if it wasn’t Maz who was leading off the bottom of the ninth?  While I think all of those things play a part, I believe the main reason why the homer is so special to so many people is because it changed the way we thought of ourselves.  We were no longer the perennial losers, the laughing-stocks – we were the Champs!  To some back then, they hadn’t had that feeling in a very long time.  For some of us, we never experienced that feeling.  It’s something that never can be taken away from you  - something upon which memories are built – something that fathers pass on to their kids.  And that’s why I still get goosebumps whenever I hear, “Back to the wall goes Berra …”

As I often do, I was checking out the WashingtonPost.com site on Monday to read the latest about my favorite sports teams.  I clicked on Dan Steinberg’s D.C. Sports Bog and in one of his blogs he talked about attending the Redskins Draft Party for fans at FedEx Field on Saturday.  One of the main things that he observed was the large number of fans there who were wearing burgundy and gold #5 McNabb jerseys.  As he noted, this is just a few weeks after McNabb was traded to the Redskins from the hated Philadelphia Eagles.  Clearly, there is a groundswell among Skins fans that McNabb could be the long-awaited quarterback hero that will lead us to playoff glory.  The Redskins of course have been quick to facilitate the McNabb-mania, as evidenced by the picture that Steinberg included which showed one of the Redskins Team Stores at the stadium displaying several fully loaded racks of the McNabb jerseys.

Indeed, the sale of team apparel is a huge source of revenue for the various sports leagues.  As reported by Greg Stohr and William McQuillen in a January 13, 2010 article on Bloomberg.com, sales of NFL-licensed merchandise in the United States and Canada exceeded $3.2 billion in 2007 and the combined sales for pro football, baseball, basketball, hockey and soccer exceeded $9 billion.  My family of course has done it’s part in helping out many of those sports leagues given the multiple items of apparel and other merchandise we have purchased in a show of support for our favorite teams.  Although, I must admit I have yet to acquire a Redskins game jersey – I’m more of the polo shirt kind of guy.  But we are like  most sports fans around the country.  The thing to do is to wear your teams’ colors.

In any event, Steinberg’s blog about all of the McNabb jerseys that he saw got me to thinking about how it used to be. After all, this is Nostalgiaspeak so I have to talk about the past.  And based on my recollections, it wasn’t too long ago that things were different.  A few weeks ago, I wrote about my experience at the “Immaculate Reception Game” between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Oakland Raiders in December of 1972.  I had mentioned the older gentleman who was seated next to me and that he was wearing a trench coat and a fedora.  And as I recall, the majority of the people in the stands were wearing their everyday clothes.  There wasn’t a sea of black and gold in the stands like you would see at a Steelers game today.  There may have been a smattering of some people wearing black jackets with the Steelers name on it.  Probably the most you saw in the way of  Steelers garb was  the black and gold knit hat and maybe a few black and gold scarves.  But that was it.  If you don’t believe me, just take a look at the video of the Immaculate Reception and look at the fans who stormed the field after the play.  See how much black and gold apparel you can find on them.  Not much.  I guess back then nobody, not even the league, figured that fans would be willing to fork over  their hard-earned dollars to buy jerseys, t-shirts or even a polo shirt in their team’s colors.  I’m not sure when things did start to change.  I even checked out video of the 1980 Super Bowl between the Steelers and the Rams and while you did see a few guys wearing team jerseys and some wore clothing that matched their team’s colors,  for the most part the fans were wearing everyday clothing.  I don’t know what triggered the changeover to where it became the thing to do to wear actual team apparel.  Maybe it was around the time of the Mean Joe Greene Coca-Cola commercial where he throws his jersey to the “kid”.  Whatever prompted it, once the league realized that they had a money-maker on their hands and they began to market team merchandise, it took off.  And the other pro leagues followed suit.

But going back to the guy in the trench coat and fedora and forgetting about team apparel, I am reminded of the style of dress by fans going back well before that 1972 football game I attended.  My reference here is from attending major league baseball games as a young guy throughout the 1960′s.  Except for the occasional team ball hat, nobody wore any type of team apparel.  For the most part fans were dressed casually.  But then again, we were usually sitting in the $1.00 bleacher seats or the $1.50 rightfield grandstand seats.  It was not uncommon for the men sitting in the $3.00 field box seats to be wearing a suit and tie, and of course, the ubiquitous fedora.  The women who attended games back then with the gentlemen in the suits would also be dressed to the hilt.  I guess maybe it was a status thing – sort of like a spectator class system.  Looking at old TV film footage or old newsreel footage, it seems like the further back in time you go, the more the fan attire was formal.  It also seems that there was a more formal dress code so to speak when it got to the fall classic.  Even in the 1960′s.  Pay attention the next time MLB Network runs those old World Series Highlights productions and observe how the fans were dressed.  Coats and ties for the men were the norm and most of the women would be wearing dresses, jewelry and sometimes even the white gloves.  I still can remember going to the first game of the 1960 World Series between the Pittsburgh Pirates and New York Yankees and being impressed with how well-dressed many people were.  Being a 7 year old, I didn’t wear a coat and tie and I’m pretty sure that my dad didn’t either.  But I know that my mom and aunt who joined us were all decked out (even though we were bleacher bums that day).

But that was a different time.  And as is sometimes the case with nostalgic moments in a persons life, the memories are nice but the current is better.   Frankly, I couldn’t imagine sitting through a ballgame in a coat and tie.  Even though it can get expensive to adorn yourself in team gear, I think it adds to the excitement of attending a game.  Last week we were at the Stanley Cup Playoff game between the Capitals and Canadiens and just about everyone in the arena was wearing red Capitals apparel.  That sight helped to further charge up an already electrifying scene.  And when we go to Redskins games and walk up to FedEx Field among all those other people clad in burgundy and gold you feel energized and part of something.  (Unless of course its a night game where you then have to share that walk with way too many fans who are wearing the colors of the opposing team because of the numerous season ticket holders who sell off their tickets since they can’t be bothered to attend a night game!  No bitterness here!)  Someday soon, I hope to be able to regularly attend Nationals baseball games where the stands are packed with fellow Nationals fans wearing our team’s stuff.  So let’s see – coat and tie or team polo?  Hmmm!

“People will come, Ray. The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It’s been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game. It’s a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good…and it could be again. People will come, Ray. People will most definitely come.” – Terrance Mann to Ray Kinsela in the movie “Field of Dreams”, talking about the baseball field that Ray built on his farm where ballplayer heroes from the past came to play.

While the premise in the movie is far-fetched, the words in those lines certainly could be applied to what has happened in major league baseball in the past two decades.  It could be argued that teams adopted the notion from the movie that if you build it, they will come.  From the teams’ perspective, the “they” of course would be the fans.  Since the 1992 opening of Camden Yards, the home of the Baltimore Orioles, over half of the major league baseball teams have opened new stadiums.   I picked Camden Yards as my starting point since that is the ballpark that most observers credit as being the one that set the design standard for future parks to follow.  It was replacing Memorial Stadium, a rather bland stadium that lacked any identifiable character.  Camden Yards was considered to be the first stadium design that tried to incorporate features of some of the old, classic ballparks of the past while implementing modern architectural design elements that provided outstanding sightlines, wide and open concourses and other fan-friendly amenities. I have been to three of the newest stadiums – Camden Yards, Nationals Park and PNC Park in Pittsburgh.  All three are outstanding places to watch a ballgame.  But my focus in this blog is not to discuss the new, but rather to talk about the old.

My fondest memories growing up as a young boy in Western Pennsylvania in the late 1950′s and through the 1960′s are of playing baseball and watching the game be played.  Pro football had not quite yet claimed the title of being America’s favorite spectator sport.  So watching the Pittsburgh Pirates was what excited me the most.  Back in those days, teams didn’t televise all their games like they do today.  The Buccos would only televise about 20-25 games a year and only away games would be televised.  Fortunately, I got my love for baseball from my dad and despite our limited economic means, I could always count on him to be willing to take in a few Pirate games every season down at old Forbes Field.  Additionally, his brother was a season ticket holder and he occasionally would send tickets our way.  So I got to attend my share of games at Forbes Field.

Forbes Field was opened in 1909 and was considered the Camden Yards of it’s day – a state-of-the-art facility.  But 50-some years later when I was taking in games there, I remember thinking that it was just old.  Like many Pirate fans, I wished that a new stadium could be built for the Bucs.  Other cities were building these neat multi-purpose stadiums that could accommodate both baseball and football.  Ahhh…beware of what you wish for!  We got our Three Rivers Stadium relatively around the same time that Cincinnati got Riverfront Stadium and Philadelphia got Veterans Stadium.  Not much difference among them with their enclosed circular footprint and symmetrical  field dimensions.  I remember thinking the first time I set foot in Three Rivers – this is it?  I’m sitting on plastic seats surrounded by concrete with a green carpet in front of me.  Yeah, there weren’t any girders holding up the upper deck that blocked my view, but it sure lacked the coziness of Forbes.  Don’t get me wrong.  Three Rivers was new and exciting and the Pirates had two World Series-winning seasons there in 1971 and 1979 and a bunch of other very successful seasons there.  But it made me appreciate the character, intimacy and even quirkiness of Forbes.

One of the most obvious, interesting characteristics of Forbes Field was the playing field itself.  It measured 365 feet down the left field line and 300 feet down the right field line.  But there was a tall 28-foot high screen running from the right field foul pole toward right center.  A 12-foot high, ivy-covered brick wall ran out for several feet from the left field foul pole to the 27-foot high manually-operated scoreboard.  The ivy-covered brick wall picked up on the other side of the scoreboard and ran out to a point just to the left of straightaway center field where it then angled back toward the right field  grandstand.  The distance from home plate where the wall changed direction was 457 feet!  The distance to straightaway center was 435 feet and to right center it was 416 feet.  Forbes was certainly not a homerun hitter’s paradise.  Because of the vastness of the outfield however, you had a better chance of seeing more doubles and triples than normal and experiencing the excitement that comes with those kinds of plays.  I do recall seeing Bill Mazeroski hit a homer in the first game of the 1960 World Series that just cleared the wall between the left field foul pole and the scoreboard.  Of course forever etched in my memory is the highlight replay showing his more dramatic Game 7 walk-off homer (unfortunately, I wasn’t at that one) where the ball disappears over the head of Yogi Berra and the left center field wall at the 406 mark.   Both would be considered significant clouts in today’s more homer-friendly ballparks.

On top of the left field scoreboard was a 14-foot high Longines clock that was considered out of play – if you hit it, it was a home run.  There were three massive light towers on the field in left center, center and right center, the bases of which were enclosed by wire cages that were in play.  If a batted ball went into the cage, it was a ground rule double I believe.  Also in play out around the 457 mark was the flagpole – I don’t recall that it was even padded.  Neither was a granite monument to Barney Dreyfuss, the owner of the Pirates who built Forbes Field, that was located in right center field in the field of play.  Could you imagine stuff like that in today’s parks?

Another interesting feature at Forbes was the huge roll-up metal gate in the right center field wall that would be opened after the game to allow fans to walk across the field to exit the ballpark directly into Schenley Park.  Even the grounds crew had a unique feature at their disposal.  Along the third base line in foul territory was an underground vault (for lack of a better term) that housed the tarpaulin.  It was covered by a long, narrow plywood door, painted green to match the grass and it was mechanically operated.  When activated, the cover would raise, the tarp would rise out of the ground and then automatically roll the tarp forward to cover the infield.  I do believe that there were a few game delays over the years when the automated device would get stuck.

The seats at Forbes, although very close to the field, were not all that comfortable.  They were wooden slatted seats that I remember being covered with numerous coats of paint.  Of course if you were out in the left field bleachers, that was bench-type seating with lines painted on the benches delineating the seat area.  If you had the misfortune of sitting next to a hefty fan, you would spend the whole game struggling to maintain a reasonable seating area.  So maybe the plastic seats at Three Rivers weren’t so bad after all!  I do remember my dad and I sitting out there for a twi-night doubleheader in 1965 against the Dodgers and watching the Bucs beat Koufax in the first game and Drysdale in the second game.  The battle for seat space that night was well worth it.

These are just some of the things that made going to games at Forbes memorable.  But I know from watching some of those televised away games as a kid that some of the other National League ballparks. had their own unique characteristics.  I remember watching games coming from Crosley Field in Cincinatti which legendary Pirates radio & TV announcer, Bob Prince, used to call the “bandbox” because it’s field dimensions were just the opposite of Forbes.  The distance from home plate to the center field wall was just 387 feet!  Out in right field they had a uniquely-shaped bleacher section called the “sun porch” (I think at night they may have called it the “moon porch”??)  The really interesting thing about Crosley Field was that in the outfield, they didn’t have a warning track approaching the wall.  Instead, the field was inclined at about a 20 degree angle and that served as the warning to outfielders that they were nearing the wall.  The relatively new ballpark in Houston employs that same design in center field as a way of trying to incorporate something old into that facility.

One other away ballpark that sticks in my memory is Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia.  While I think that ballpark had generous outfield dimensions in right and center, there was a “short porch” in left field.  It had a two-tiered, roofed  grandstand in left.  What I remember most about that was that the Phillies’ third baseman, Dick Allen seemed to hit a couple of homers over the roof every year against the Pirates.

There is no question that the newer ballparks offer so much more to ensure a wonderful fan experience.  Certainly, they are head and shoulders above the multi-purpose stadiums of the 60′s and 70′s.  But I wouldn’t trade my memories of Forbes Field for anything.   Paraphrasing the words of Terrance Mann – that field, that game, they’re part of my past and they remind me of all that was once good!