Ballparks - # 8 - Shea Stadium, Queens, NY

(From Google Images)

I was born and raised in NYC. While I’m old, I’m not old enough to have Ebbits Field and the Polo Grounds on my life list. Those classic old venues, torn down soon after the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants broke millions of hearts and bolted for all that California sun and money, will have to be appreciated though other people’s stories and pictures.

However, this is my life list and we can add Shea Stadium to it. I was a Yankee fan in the Bronx and going to Queens seemed like an ordeal at the time so I did it just once. I don’t remember what year that was but likely in the early ‘70’s when I was in graduate school in Wisconsin. I don’t remember who I was with, who the Mets played, where I sat. Nothing. I did not bring a camera so there are no personal images. But I did do a game there and it’s now on the list…another ballpark you youngsters cannot see in person.

The home of the New York Mets (and the NFL Jets before they moved to New Jersey) from 1964 to 2008, the ballpark was demolished right after the last game was played in October…but not before memorabilia was stripped from the place. You could get a pair of stadium seats for $869…the two years the team won the World Series; ’86 & 69…get it? I have no idea how many of them were sold but you can Google “Shea Stadium seats” and still get a pair for too much money.

(From Google Images)

Unlike other stadia and large constructions that are usually

brought down by controlled explosions, the great poohbahs

of New York City decreed that the stadium be demolished

in the most expensive way possible…piece by piece. 

I guess they had their reasons.

In 1962, the Mets came into the league as a woeful expansion team, staffed by rookies and rejects from other teams. In that miserable first season, they posted the worst record in history with 40 wins and 120 loses. I remember reading the great Jimmy Breslin’s chronicle of that year, ‘Can’t Anybody Here Play This Game’. A favorite description of the team’s ineptitude was about their first baseman, Marv Throneberry. Because ‘Marvelous Marv’ was not a good fielder, Mets fans acknowledged his clumsiness by wearing t-shirts with his name spelled backwards – ‘VRAM’.

On the bright side, I will never forget the ‘Miracle Mets’ of 1969. After finishing near the bottom of the standings for their entire existence, they won their division and beat the heavily-favored Orioles in the World Series.

Sorry, my fellow O’s fans but that was special.