Five Days Until Opening Day!
For today’s flashback, I have something a little different. I already wrote a flashback post of memories of 2008 – the last Opening Day at Shea Stadium – but today I’ve uploaded a video from that date.
I took the 7 train to the game, and so you’ll see Shea Stadium show up between the treetops. Getting off the old platform, we get a look at the under-construction Citi Field and a sense of the atmosphere around Shea. We take a look inside the dark corridors of Shea (no Shake Shake there), and then a vision any of us can recall: emerging from the dark corridors to see the bright green landscaped grass of Shea Stadium. I recorded the Opening Introductions (including a loud ovation for new Met Johan Santana), and finally a little bit of some game action. Remember what “Lets Go Mets” sounded like at Shea?
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2EWkUSQCh0?list=UUOQuTSZOL07O9JSLo2IrucQ&w=560&h=315]
I have a friend with whom I’d been going to Mets Opening Day for I don’t even know how many years. This year he called it quits on the streak. I didn’t really try to twist his arm – I hoped he would go, but he just said he doesn’t feel connected to this Mets team, he doesn’t like ownership, and he still misses Shea. Watching this video does make me nostalgic, but really it makes me nostalgic for my younger days. By the time 2008 rolled around, Shea Stadium was past its days. There really is no denying it; I just wish the architects of Citi Field had remembered they were building a baseball stadium, and not a food court with a ballfield attached.
