My First Game At Yankee Stadium

My father first took me to Yankee Stadium in 1973, when I was all of eight years old. I didn't realize it until last night--when I looked up the game on Retrosheet--that it was actually the final night game in the history of the old Yankee Stadium. More specificially, it was the night of September 28th, a Friday night, with the Yankees playing host to the venerable Detroit Tigers.

As I recall, we had seats somewhere down the left field line. Man, I loved that Stadium, from its classic facade, to the wonderful way the upper deck framed the ballpark, to the fading green color of the seats. It was both a stadium and a time machine. Though my father and I had an unobstructed view, some fans near us were positioned right behind one of the old Stadium's columns, which must have completely blocked their view. Those old columns, while they looked regal on TV or from a long distance, were just about the only drawback to that terrific old Stadium.

Aside from those ever-present columns, I'll always remember that game first and foremost for the fact that Woodie Fryman started for the Tigers. (For some reason, my father and I talked about Fryman a lot that night.) Fryman gave up all four Yankee runs over six innings, despite having pitched a shutout through the first five frames. The Yankees' early offensive ineptitude against Fryman shouldn't have been surprising considering that Celerino Sanchez batted fifth in manager Ralph Houk's lineup. I haven't bothered to do the research, but that might have been the only time that Sanchez batted fifth in anyone's lineup.

In the bottom of the sixth, with the Tigers leading 1-0, Fryman encountered his first stumbling block of the night. Fittingly for me, he gave up a three-run homer to Bobby Murcer, who was one of my two favorite Yankees at the time, along with Thurman Munson. (Sadly, neither man will be around for Sunday night's Stadium finale. But they will both be remembered.) The Yankees then tacked on another run in the bottom of the seventh on an RBI single by, of all people, Horace "Hoss" Clarke. That would prove to be plenty of run support for Yankee ace Mel Stottlemyre, who pitched a complete-game pseudo-shutout, allowing only one unearned run against a Tigers lineup that featured old favorites like Norm Cash, Willie Horton, Gates Brown, and Bill Freehan.

From the New York pespective, Stottlemyre, Munson, and Murcer were three of the rare bright spots for the Yankees of 1973. The team was highly mediocre, finishing just below break-even at 80-82. But none of that mattered. It was a comfortable late September night, my father giving me lessons in baseball, and an old-fashioned stadium providing an ideal setting to appreciate an early fall night. Yes, that old Stadium served its purpose very well.