felis_lupus | I'm not even a Mets fan... (Reply)

Mike Piazza and Tom Seaver, leaving Shea Stadium for the last time.

...and this nearly made me cry.

Immersed in Gloom, a Farewell to Shea Still Enchants

Nearly 30 minutes after Ryan Church made the last out that will ever be made at Shea Stadium, dashing the Mets’ playoff hopes for 2008, most of the 56,059 fans remained in their seats on Sunday.

Mets greats lined the field during the farewell ceremony at Shea Stadium after the Mets lost their final game at the stadium to the Florida Marlins. More Photos »

Surly and bruised, they booed when players from the Florida Marlins came out to collect dirt from the basepaths. They booed every time the Mets announced anything over the public-address system — “Our Shea goodbye ceremony will begin in five minutes,” was particularly unpopular. And, yes, they even booed Mr. Met.

But still, they would not leave. The Mets had scheduled their farewell to Shea for after the conclusion of the final regular-season game, perhaps not anticipating the possibility that the outcome of that game would be as rotten as it was a year ago. And yet, once the farewell ceremony began, the mood in the stands began to shift, as if the fans were seizing the opportunity to turn their back on two straight years of collapses and, instead, salute Shea’s past.

So with almost all of the current Mets team nowhere in sight, the fans chanted and cheered for players from the past, some who were part of some great Shea heroics and some who were not. There was Lenny Dykstra and Wally Backman, Jerry Koosman and Ed Charles, Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry, 1969 and 1986, and slowly the failure of the 2008 Mets seemed to be pushed aside.

The Mets had a difficult act to follow on Sunday, just one week after Yankee Stadium closed with a celebration of pride, history and pinstripes. With only two World Series titles compared with the Yankees’ 26, with only one true Mets Hall of Famer (Tom Seaver) compared with the Yankees’ Cooperstown brigade, the Mets had a far more modest history to work with. But make it work, they did.

When the players were introduced, one at a time, they entered the field from behind the outfield wall, as if emerging from a “Field of Dreams” cornfield. The Mets’ 1986 World Series team was especially well represented, with some of the loudest ovations going to Strawberry, Gooden, Keith Hernandez and Ron Darling.

Gooden has struggled with legal issues since he retired in 2000 and served a seven-month prison term in 2006. But if the Mets fans were not about to absolve their current bullpen, the source of so much misery, they were eager to forgive Gooden his transgressions.

As soon as he entered the field, he reached out to grab the hands of fans along the railing, and he seemed to bask in the ovations he received, at one point raising his arms to the heavens.

“No matter what, I had to be back,” he said before the game. “This was home. I missed this place, I missed the fans, and I missed the support that they give me. So it was a great opportunity for me to come back and just say thanks.”

Predictably, the last two players introduced were Mike Piazza and Seaver. It was Seaver who got the Mets to their first World Series, in 1969, and helped them win it. It was Piazza who took them to their last one, in 2000, which ended in defeat.

The evening then concluded emotionally, with each player — the group included Bud Harrelson, Robin Ventura, Ed Kranepool, Jesse Orosco, Sid Fernandez, Bobby Ojeda and, yes, Willie Mays — touching home plate, and some, in the spirit of the moment, going further. Harrelson, the sparkplug shortstop in 1969, jumped on the plate. Hernandez, the all-purpose leader in 1986, got into his left-handed stance. Piazza, the great catcher, pointed straight down.

And then it ended with one icon pitching to another, with Seaver on the same mound where, 39 years ago he pitched 10 innings in Game 4 of the Series, and Piazza in his customary crouch. As Seaver took the mound, he pointed to the No. 14 on the outfield wall, the retired number of Gil Hodges, Seaver’s old manager. Seaver held up one finger, and then four, and saluted.

“Let’s go Mets!” echoed around the stadium. The flashes sparkled. And then Seaver let go with the last pitch in Shea Stadium history, to Piazza. It bounced, and for a moment, Seaver seemed upset.

But Piazza walked out to the mound and put his arm around him, and the two walked off into the outfield.

It was a moving scene and, in that moment, 2008 did not really seem to matter.

All the old ballparks are almost gone... I think Fenway is the last one left. Even the Yankees closed the doors to the House that Ruth Built last week, after their wildcard playoff hopes were smushed under many many Red Sox cleats last evening. White Sox and Twins may just be in a tiebreaker game, and my Cubs are determined, once again, to make it to and win the Series. They just might do it this year. The Mariners, in a stunning display of mediocrity, have finished a whopping 39 games behind the Angels. Sad.

I have sadly neglected my baseball this year. I'll catch it on the TeeVee when we're all at post-fencing dinner, but that's about all.

(Edit: dumb me... Wrigley Field is still around, too. That was the first baseball stadium I ever went to, I think. I was 2 or 3, then we moved away from my Cubbies...)