My dad, like many his age that grew up in the 50s/60s, became a fan of the most dominant team in baseball. They won World Series titles in 1947, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1956, 1958, 1961 and 1962. 10 Titles from birth to high school graduation. I've got to celebrate 1 World Series with the Cubs in 42 years. That's just dominant.
Not to mention they had probably the biggest array of stars to grace a baseball field. You can name them off with out looking them up. DiMaggio, Mantle, Maris, Berra, Larsen, Ford, and Martin. They are players immortalized in baseball. Why not be a fan?
In all that time though, dad had never gone to a game at Yankee Stadium. The House that Ruth built were all those legends played. It's a cathedral. Well was. 2008 was the last year the stadium would host games and then would be replaced by New Yankee Stadium, the House that Jeter built. I suggested to mom and Mike that we needed to get dad out to New York and we had to get him to a game there.
We started to get things into motion. Looking at the schedule and things going on in the summer, we aimed for a later in the year trip, and well who else to go see the Yankees play but the Boston Red Sox? Dad HATES the Red Sox. The game Mike got us the tickets for just happened to be the last time the Red Sox would play a regular season game there too. Perfect.
Father's Day 2008 the family gathered at Mike's house to unleash the surprise on dad. This was June, the trip would be at the end of August.
Flying out of Cedar Rapids we landed got to New York during midday Wednesday August 27th. The plan the first day was to see sights after checking into our hotel at the Waldorf. Our first sight we hit was a hot dog stand, because of course. After that the first day we hit Grand Central Terminal, and then made our way up to the top of the Empire State Building.
The hilarious part of this was dad was commenting about all the people on their cell phones the time we were walking around the city, when we got to the observation deck, he got on his phone and called some buddies about how great the reception was up there.
First night after the ESB, we ended up at a beer hall for some cold ones. I ended up chatting with a guy from Seattle in town for the Yanks-Sox series. Then had my ear chatted off by a lady who was a professor of psychiatry at Columbia. She was world famous, her dead husband was too and so were her kids. As she repeated many times in our conversation. Mike and dad still think if i kept talking to her we had free drinks all night. I did end up getting us a free round due to my attire of Cubs/Bears gear. A manager at the place we were at was from Chicago, and gave us a round.
Mike and I then dropped dad off at the hotel and he and I went out to venture around Times Square. Hit all the usual spots that make New York famous. We stopped by Mickey Mantle's sports bar for some beers and watch a lil baseball. We ended up talking to a guy from Kansas City who was in town for the US Open, was arrested for scalping tickets and ended up having to come back in October to go to court. We ended the night with "mystery" pizza from Ray's Pizza.
During the 2008 season, the Yankees were not great and with the way the Rays and Red Sox were playing, they were not going to make the playoffs so we knew this was going to be the last Red Sox-Yankees game in the building.
During the game dad made conversation with a group of guys from Uruguay who buy and sell alcohol all over the city. We all ended up talking to them most the game. As for the game, it was mostly dominated by the Red Sox until the the 7th inning. Down 2-0 on the first pitch he saw Jason Giambi launched a ball 420 feet over the center field wall. The place went nuts. Tie game 2-2. No action till the 9th. The Yankees loaded the bases with 1 out, and up again came Jason Giambi. The Red Sox brought in their closer Jonathan Paplebon. On an 0-2 pitch Giambi slapped a liner to center field scoring Brian Gardner. Queue up Ole Blue Eyes and some New York, New York!
If you looks closely I think you can even see a tear of joy. It was as fun there soaking up the stadium after the game as it was after being in Wrigley in 2016 when the Cubs clinched the Central Division (that post to come). Just amazing.
Then the aftermath of the game may have been just as fun. Heading out of the Bronx getting on the standing on the subway platform waiting for the train I got "mugged" by coworkers from back in Des Moines. My dad's reaction of 'What's going on' was priceless, as was I bet my face. I knew they would be there but who knew we'd be on the platform at the same time.
Once we got back downtown we needed to go eat and celebrate. Walked a few blocks away from the Waldorf to a little Italian joint called Mimi's. We score the corner table there and spend a good chunk of time there with drinks and celebrating. Fun Fact, I had my first cannoli there. I'm pretty sure our bill was doubled due to celebrating with drinks.
After that we walked toward the hotel and hit a lil Irish pub, Naills. We walk in and we are the only ones there, order our drinks and start to talk with the bartender. You could tell she wasn't a fan of our test in music as she kept skipping the country music songs I played on the jukebox. Then the fun really started. A couple of guys walked in to the bar, and we struck it up with them. They were Chinese street volleyball players, born in South America, worked on German cars and drinking Irish beer. How's that for a combo?
If Facebook would have been around then Mike and I would have had 2 new friends. They were on a quest to get a drink at every bar from where they started back to Chinatown, AND be ready to play street volleyball in the morning. We have no idea if they made it but dad semi adopted two new kids that night.
Mike and I ended up dropping dad off at the hotel and then went back toward Times Square that night. Time was a blur but when we strolled into the room at what was about 2 am the best part was dad was still awake and drunk dialed mom back in Iowa. This day will always be a top 10 day best ever in my life.
The next day was spent hitting tourist spots. Wall Street, the Statue of Liberty, Rupert's Deli, and getting as close as we could to Ground Zero. Mike shot down to the Bull and Bear bar to try to get on MSNBC before we returned to Mimi's for another supper. We must have made an impression the night before because the bartender remember our drinks and dad ended up getting a free tshirt. We didn't get as rowdy as the night before but Mike and I did go back out after dropping dad off at the hotel again. About 11 pm dad called my cell phone to remind us that we had a 5 am flight the next day.
The next day we got home, Iowa and Hawkeye football.
Fast forward to Father's Day 2009. First off there's now way to top 2008, but the 2009 gift had a hint of the year before. I got dad a framed picture of the 3 of us after the game at Yankee Stadium that dad's ticket stub is now in with it, along with a Yankees tie fleece blanket.
I haven't been to the new Yankee's stadium or Citi Field but I'm going to go out on a limb that it won't beat the first trip there.
Up Next : Prelude to a Championship
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