The Dean of Ballparks

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The exterior of Fenway Park in 1914.

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Now that Yankee Stadium has ended its 85-year tenure as the home of the New York Yankees, which stadium holds the title of dean of America's ballparks?

Actually, that much hasn't changed.

Yankee Stadium opened its doors in 1923. But the ballpark that has been open longer than any other was — and still is — Boston's Fenway Park, which, as baseball historians will tell you, was Babe Ruth's home for many years before the Bronx opened the House That Ruth Built.

In fact, Fenway Park opened in 1912. Ground was broken on the construction site 97 years ago tomorrow, on Sept. 25, 1911, and the first baseball game was played there the following April — a few days after the "unsinkable" Titanic sank in the North Atlantic.

And Ruth, who began his baseball career as a pitcher, played his first major league game with Boston in 1914.

Every other ballpark in the major leagues came into existence after Yankee Stadium. The oldest baseball stadium in the National League is Chicago's Wrigley Field, which opened in 1926.

With the noteworthy exception of Wrigley Field, all the other ballparks in the majors are mere infants by comparison.

In the National League, for example, the next-oldest ballpark after Wrigley Field is Los Angeles' Dodger Stadium, which opened in 1962.

All the other ballparks in the American League are still practically waiting for the paint to dry when compared to Fenway Park. The next-oldest baseball stadium in the American League — now that Yankee Stadium has closed its doors for good — is Baltimore's Camden Yards, which has been open since 1993.

Almost every major league baseball team plays in a ballpark that was built in the last 15 years. And almost all of those ballparks were said to feature something that distinguished the ballparks of yesteryear.

Why not renovate those ballparks instead of starting over from scratch? That seems like a fair question to ask. But the answer is different in each city. Maybe the location of the ballpark creates parking problems that can't be resolved or land can't be acquired to expand the seating sufficiently.

Maybe the stadium's location interferes with commerce. Maybe the financial operation has been poor and the owners had to sell to someone who doesn't care about history, just how much money there is to be made from buying and selling the land.

Sometimes, the structure is simply antiquated, unstable, and needs to be replaced.

Whatever the reason — and, in spite of the fact that the new stadium will be called Yankee Stadium and won't be given one of those hideous names that incorporates the sponsor's name (which could prove to be embarrassing if the sponsor goes out of business or has to endure a humiliating public scandal) — another monument to the past is coming down.

And we are the poorer for it.

It reminds me a bit of an episode of "Frasier," in which Frasier and his brother decide to buy and restore a restaurant that was significant in the family's history but is about to shut down permanently.

They decide to do this while having a one-last-time family dinner at the restaurant, after Daphne observes that, in her native England, they cherish their "antiquities," but Americans can't wait to tear them down.

It's not quite that simple. But it does strike me as ironic.

The Last Days of 'The Cathedral'

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If you're a sports fan — not just a baseball fan — you have to feel something in these, the final days of Yankee Stadium.

Yankee Stadium opened 85 years ago, in 1923, and it's been the home of baseball's New York Yankees ever since — except for the 1974 and 1975 seasons, when the stadium was closed for renovations.

Yankee Stadium has played host to college and pro football games, as well as some noteworthy boxing matches. Outdoor venues rarely host fights anymore, but it happened frequently at Yankee Stadium. Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney both won fights there in the 1920s, and Joe Louis beat Max Schmeling in Yankee Stadium in the 1930s — in a symbolic victory for America over Nazi Germany.

Tony Zale beat Rocky Graziano there in 1946, and Sugar Ray Robinson lost there in 1952.

In the final fight at Yankee Stadium — the only fight held there after the renovation — Muhammad Ali defeated Ken Norton in 1976.

It is as the home of the Yankees that the stadium will always be remembered. So many of baseball's greats have played there — Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford, Reggie Jackson, the list goes on and on.

And, because the Yankees have won so many world championships, it follows that there have been more postseason games played in Yankee Stadium than any other ballpark.

A total of 16 World Series championships have been clinched with victories at Yankee Stadium — nine by the Yankees, seven by their opponents.

Other than the Yankees, the St. Louis Cardinals are the only team to wrap up more than one world championship at Yankee Stadium.

Unless a miracle happens and the Yankees sneak into the playoffs, Sunday night will be their final game at Yankee Stadium. The Baltimore Orioles will be the opponent. ESPN will be there to present the final game — and I'm sure there will be some nostalgic film clips from the stadium's 85-year existence.

The game "will be an open-casket funeral for the House that Ruth Built, with no shortage of eulogies, tears and fond remembrances," writes Jeremy Olshan in the New York Post.

"Though some 40 former Yankee greats are expected to pay homage to the Stadium," Olshan writes, "more notable perhaps are the two biggest absences: Yankee boss George Steinbrenner and public-address announcer Bob Sheppard, who are both too ill to attend."

Of the two, I would say that Sheppard's absence is the more significant. His distinctive voice has announced the players at Yankee Stadium since 1951. Reggie Jackson called him the "Voice of God." It's hard to imagine the final Yankee game at Yankee Stadium without the 97-year-old Sheppard at the public address microphone. But that's the way it will be on Sunday night.

Nevertheless, it should be a memorable day for the folks who are fortunate enough to be there. For three hours on Sunday afternoon, fans will be allowed to walk around on the field, reports the Associated Press.

Can't be there? Tune in that evening.

If you need something to help you get in the mood, ESPN Classic will be showing films of some of the great sports events that have occurred there in the last 85 years — including some of the noteworthy fights.

There's a slight chance of showers in New York Sunday night, but it doesn't look like it will be enough to dampen the occasion.

Among the many for whom the final Yankee game at Yankee Stadium will be a bittersweet experience is famed songwriter Paul Simon, who reminisces in the New York Times about a lifetime as a Yankee fan.

For those who are old enough to remember Simon and Garfunkel's classic songs in the film "The Graduate," there is a special poignance in the reflections of the man who wrote the lines, "Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio/Our nation turns its lonely eyes to you."

And, in Simon's words, it's time to say "so long" to the House that Ruth Built.