The Dodgers and Yankees, two of probably the most storied franchises in baseball historical past, have related win-loss data this season and two of the most important payrolls in sports activities. However although the World Sequence groups match up intently on paper, there’s one class the place the Dodgers have a transparent edge: their stadium.
Dodger Stadium, born in 1962 and now the third oldest park in baseball after Chicago’s Wrigley Discipline and Boston’s Fenway Park, is a jewel of a spot that to today captures the quirky, futuristic, giddily optimistic spirit of midcentury Los Angeles in what’s probably baseball’s most bucolic setting (minus the ridiculous, sprawling parking zone).
Yankee Stadium, which was rebuilt in 2009, is not any slouch both. It’s a monumental, energetic place within the coronary heart of the booming Bronx that evokes a storied period in baseball historical past. However finally it’s a facsimile: a brand new stadium hiding in throwback clothes. As onerous because it tries — and it actually tries — it could possibly’t re-create the unique Yankee Stadium’s spirit.
The advanced story of how we bought right here represents how structure, cities and widespread opinion can dramatically shift over time. It was the Dodgers, in fact, who first deserted their historic residence, the shabby however beloved Ebbets Discipline (1913), within the coronary heart of what was then equally shabby Brooklyn, in 1957. Proprietor Walter O’Malley had needed to construct a brand new park close by however didn’t get assist from New York’s wannabe pharaoh, city planner Robert Moses. So O’Malley and his staff fled the East Coast for a glowing new facility being inbuilt L.A., above the flattened stays of the predominantly Mexican American neighborhood generally known as Chavez Ravine.
The positioning had been cleared for a public housing growth known as Elysian Park Heights, and O’Malley employed Emil Praeger — a New York engineer who had designed piers, bridges and even a breakwater used throughout the Allied invasion of Normandy — to create a futuristic stadium that regarded resolutely ahead, true to the spirit of its time. With its its powdery pastel colours, zigzag steel canopies, space-age scoreboard and verdant terraces crammed with UFO-shaped urns, Dodger Stadium lived as much as the hype. It nonetheless does.
The staff’s varied homeowners have stored renovating, sustaining the park’s type and integrity whereas refreshing it for present wants and guidelines. A few of the most vital updates have been a village-like new middle discipline plaza crammed with meals, leisure and retail; wider concourses; improved concessions and bogs; drought-tolerant landscaping; new luxurious packing containers and revamped audio and video techniques.
The scene inside Dodger Stadium throughout Sport 1 of the World Sequence.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Instances)
Against this, Yankee Stadium, inbuilt 1923 by Osborn Engineering (authors additionally of legendary parks like Fenway and Tiger Stadium in Detroit) had lengthy been a monumental beacon of historical past in a metropolis recognized for convulsing change. One of many first true baseball “stadiums,” in distinction to quainter “ballparks,” the “House That Ruth Built” included a number of decks wrapping across the discipline, permitting for the biggest seating capability within the sport. Its hulking type and heavy supplies — oceans of granite, limestone and concrete — created an intimidating place that stood for power, energy and successful.
However after it turned clear the stadium wanted a refresh within the Nineteen Seventies, new proprietor George Steinbrenner delivered a characteristically heavy-handed renovation, bringing the park as much as trendy requirements however changing a few of its traditional design parts, such because the stately entrance and crowning frieze, with awkward, utilitarian parts like a spiral entry ramp and a smaller, clunkier frieze within the outfield. Within the mid-aughts, the staff determined one other refresh was infeasible and opted for a teardown as an alternative of a transform. By 2009 they’d opened a brand new Yankee Stadium, proper subsequent to the unique.
Yankee Stadium reopened in 2009, proper subsequent to its unique location.
(Seth Wenig / Related Press)
Its design staff was led by sports activities structure agency Populous, which has designed dozens of ballparks, from Baltimore’s Oriole Park at Camden Yards to the New York Mets’ Citi Discipline. Populous moved heaven and earth to make a much bigger, extra snug model of the unique Yankee Stadium. They stored the sphere dimensions, re-created the limestone and granite façade, preserved views as much as the elevated rail tracks and approximated the unique frieze above the higher deck. Their seats, concourses and bogs are extra nice than the unique’s, and the constructing meets close by streets in a extra people-friendly method.
And but, the brand new Yankee Stadium feels somewhat vapid — such as you’re visiting a tribute to a once-great place, not the place itself. It’s a Yankees-themed variation on any variety of fake historic stadiums. My spouse likens it to going to a company occasion or a theme park — an “officially licensed experience.” And even worse, like a day at Angel Stadium.
After all sports activities are a enterprise, and homeowners shouldn’t maintain their buildings alive out of a way of obligation. However what the Dodgers have gotten proper is you could’t re-create a traditional. You’ll be able to, although, maintain bettering on it — usually in artistic methods. And it pays. In keeping with Main League Baseball, Dodger Stadium has had the best attendance within the sport for the final 10 years. After all L.A. is a big market and has an excellent staff, however the stadium is actually serving to, not hurting, the underside line.
There are such a lot of extra causes to protect and improve present stadiums. Given our environmental disaster, there’s no excuse for the epic waste concerned with tearing down and beginning over. And given the numerous advances which have been made in restoration and reuse — which now, based on the American Institute of Architects, characterize greater than half the development market — doing so may be extra possible, and ingenious, than ever.
Preserving buildings means preserving their recollections. Any construction is a dwelling embodiment of historical past, and lots of stadiums are hallowed floor to their followers. Roger Maris didn’t break the single-season residence document within the new Yankee Stadium, nor did legends like Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio and Reggie Jackson make their marks there. However Sandy Koufax did pitch his excellent sport at Dodger Stadium, and Kirk Gibson hit his World Sequence walk-off right here. This stuff matter to the importance of a spot, as do its unique quirks, artistic variations and the 1000’s of hours that generations of followers have spent there, cheering, crying and constructing a house away from residence. When a spot dies, probably the most potent container of its historical past dies with it. Yankee Stadium is an efficient place to observe baseball. However Dodger Stadium is a treasure, not simply to Los Angeles, however to baseball.
Followers have fun Tommy Edman’s residence run in Sport 2 of the World Sequence at Dodger Stadium on Saturday.
(Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Instances)
