I recently contributed an essay to a series celebrating the final year of Yankee Stadium on the website Bronx Banter. I'm in distinguished company: Jane Leavy, Pat Jordan, Bob Costas, Joe Posnanski, Rob more than sixty of us altogether. It makes for great reading. One thing that has struck me in following the series is how formative the bleachers, the subject of my piece, have been for so many of the contributors.
The opportunity to sit in cheap seats close to the field and to become a part of a community is very special. One of the things I find most troubling about the new ballpark is that this opportunity will be dramatically compromised. The new bleachers will be more expensive, separated from the field of play, and some seats will come with obstructed views. This is all part of the evolution of professional baseball from sport to entertainment event. I don't know what this will mean for the next generation of baseball we might already be seeing it in the detached, pitilessness "snark" that marks the worst of web writing and yellow journalism. Reap what you sow.
