MEMORIES:
UHOHCHONGO remembers...I remember going to the ballgames at good old Shea with my dear departed dad (even though he professed his ... More »
Posted on 02/28/08
PHOTOS:
"There's a fly ball out to left. Jones is waiting...the Mets are the World Champions! Jerry Koosman is being mobbed! Look at this scene!"
- Curt Gowdy, NBC sportscaster, announcing that the Mets had just won their first World Series.
Some men conquer nations. Others cure diseases. The heroism of some is found in changing the world while for others it is in the task of keeping it the same. And in the case of William A. Shea, it was for bringing National League baseball back to the Big Apple.
After the Dodgers and the Giants broke hearts and skipped town, Shea applied the right pressure to Major League Baseball and brought the expansion Metropolitans to their new home in Flushing, New York.
A perfect circle of grandstands extending just beyond the foul poles. Nothing compares to the timelessness of watching the Mets year after year while time roars in and out of nearby LaGuardia. Home to the Mets for over forty years (and to the stinking Yankees for two in the renovation years of '74 and '75), Shea has been a destination for postseason baseball seven times, and housed the Series for four of those. And in all those years, "Meet the Mets" has met the fans before every home game.
Ah, Shea, thank God for 2005. That was the year in which the Mets had played more games at Shea than the bum Dodgers had played at Ebbets. The Mets had been legally adopted in '62, but in '05 they became blood. Shea had always been home. Now, it was a monument. It was a shrine to underdogs and miracles and never-say-die. It was built by the Miracle Mets of '69: Ryan's only Series appearance in game three, Agee's dinger to lead off game three, Swoboda's stumbling take away of Brooks Robinson's line drive, Gaspar's run from second off Martin's bunt, Jones's shoe-polish walk, mild-hitting Weis's .455 batting average, and Clendenon's three taters...
There's the beautiful geometry of it, the blue and white tradition of it, the big apple in a top hat nostalgia of it. There's the skyline on the scoreboard and the seven train on the way. There are Yankee lovers and Yankee haters, and the latter come to Shea. There's the Dodgers and Mets, and the latter's here to stay.
"So the winning run is at second base, with two outs, three and two to Mookie Wilson. Little roller up along first... behind the bag! It gets through Buckner! Here comes Knight, and the Mets win it!"
- Legendary sportscaster Vin Scully, calling game 6 of the 1986 World Series.
