PeteU
09-24-2007, 09:06 AM
From the Washington Post:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/23/AR2007092300498.html
Nats Provide Fond Farewell, End RFK Era With a Victory
Nationals 5, Phillies 3
By Barry Svrluga
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 24, 2007; Page E01
When the ballpark closed to baseball the first time all those years ago, it did so in sheer chaos, with countless among the 14,460 in the stands spilling onto the field, ripping up the grass, forcing a forfeit loss to the New York Yankees. Baseball was leaving the District. There was no telling if it would ever return.
But yesterday, below a brilliant blue sky, 40,519 made their way to the beat-up concrete yard known as RFK Stadium, the largest crowd of the season wishing their Washington Nationals well. So much had changed since 1971. Baseball is back to stay, and the park buzzed. Home plate wasn't ripped out by hooligans but rather dug out by team owner Theodore Lerner and Manager Manny Acta in a fitting postgame ceremony. And the home team won, taking a 5-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies that allowed all those fans to file out wearing smiles that were absent a generation ago.... [MORE]
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RFK Stadium was the first of the concrete donuts to be built, and the last to be closed for baseball.
I don't know if I can provide a fitting eulogy for either RFK or the entire concrete donut cookie cutter era. Perhaps one should have been saved for posterity to tell future generations of baseball fans that these were the types of ballparks that once dominated the scene in the 1960s and 1970s. But then again, is it really worth saving something so bland and derivative? Dodger Stadium and Kauffman Stadium (and a renovated Angels Stadium) are the sole parks of the 1960s-1980s era which deserved to be saved. That Three Rivers Stadium was reduced to rubble is of no great loss to the game in the end.
Sure, one can make the point that the retro-era ballparks brought on in 1992 by the construction of Oriole Park at Camden Yards have become something of a cookie-cutter class themselves, with many of them featuring similar brick exteriors or monochromatic dark green seats. And one wouldn't necessarily be wrong in saying that. But that being said, I don't think there was anything worse than seeing RFK, Fulton-County, Busch II, Riverfront, Three Rivers, and Veterans Stadiums pop up, not only failing to provide much distinction between themselves, but really not being true baseball parks for the teams that played in them.
RFK had an interesting wavy roof and upper deck. And for those who enjoy upper decks, its upper deck was reasonably close for a columnless upper deck. And that's about all the good I can say for the place. Other than that, I can only say that I hope never to see a circular concrete donut clone stadium in baseball again.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/23/AR2007092300498.html
Nats Provide Fond Farewell, End RFK Era With a Victory
Nationals 5, Phillies 3
By Barry Svrluga
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 24, 2007; Page E01
When the ballpark closed to baseball the first time all those years ago, it did so in sheer chaos, with countless among the 14,460 in the stands spilling onto the field, ripping up the grass, forcing a forfeit loss to the New York Yankees. Baseball was leaving the District. There was no telling if it would ever return.
But yesterday, below a brilliant blue sky, 40,519 made their way to the beat-up concrete yard known as RFK Stadium, the largest crowd of the season wishing their Washington Nationals well. So much had changed since 1971. Baseball is back to stay, and the park buzzed. Home plate wasn't ripped out by hooligans but rather dug out by team owner Theodore Lerner and Manager Manny Acta in a fitting postgame ceremony. And the home team won, taking a 5-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies that allowed all those fans to file out wearing smiles that were absent a generation ago.... [MORE]
_______________________________________________
RFK Stadium was the first of the concrete donuts to be built, and the last to be closed for baseball.
I don't know if I can provide a fitting eulogy for either RFK or the entire concrete donut cookie cutter era. Perhaps one should have been saved for posterity to tell future generations of baseball fans that these were the types of ballparks that once dominated the scene in the 1960s and 1970s. But then again, is it really worth saving something so bland and derivative? Dodger Stadium and Kauffman Stadium (and a renovated Angels Stadium) are the sole parks of the 1960s-1980s era which deserved to be saved. That Three Rivers Stadium was reduced to rubble is of no great loss to the game in the end.
Sure, one can make the point that the retro-era ballparks brought on in 1992 by the construction of Oriole Park at Camden Yards have become something of a cookie-cutter class themselves, with many of them featuring similar brick exteriors or monochromatic dark green seats. And one wouldn't necessarily be wrong in saying that. But that being said, I don't think there was anything worse than seeing RFK, Fulton-County, Busch II, Riverfront, Three Rivers, and Veterans Stadiums pop up, not only failing to provide much distinction between themselves, but really not being true baseball parks for the teams that played in them.
RFK had an interesting wavy roof and upper deck. And for those who enjoy upper decks, its upper deck was reasonably close for a columnless upper deck. And that's about all the good I can say for the place. Other than that, I can only say that I hope never to see a circular concrete donut clone stadium in baseball again.