As I sat and watched the All Star Game on Tuesday I think I had more fun watching the Hall of Famers come out to great applause before the game than I did watching the actual contest. Seeing one of my favorite pitchers, Bob Gibson, brought back a wave of nostalgia of the time when players stayed with a team their entire careers. Seeing Mr October, Reggie Jackson, reminded me of great players in great situations rise to the great occasions. Watching the graceful and dignified Hank Aaron brought back thoughts to when I saw him hit a home run in Busch Stadium and how important it was for me to be there.

Most importantly I thought about Yankee Stadium itself. The House That Ruth Built and the field that Joe Pepitone tried to burn up! Never a greater moment happened in baseball or sports when Lou Gehrig stood on that very field and told us how lucky he was. The graceful Joe DiMaggio and the flamboyant Mickey Mantle, the quiet Roger Maris, who still holds the single season home run record in my book, Don Larsen’s perfect game; Yankee Stadium IS baseball, since 1923, and now it is being torn down for some new ball yard across the street….what’s next, Citgo Field in Boston while Fenway is torn down and the Green Monster is being sold off in pieces on Ebay!

To me Fantasy Baseball captures that youthful enthusiasm of going to your first game if only for a moment each day. To be that 6 year old kid sitting in the bleachers, 600 feet from home plate with my little league glove, waiting for Ted Simmons or Joe Torre to hit one to me and really believing they could. Having my Aunt Trula teach me how to keep score and helping me with my pork chop sandwich that my Mom made for me before we left. Standing in line on Bat Night with my Dad so I could watch Roberto Clemente roam right field and try to throw out Lou Brock going from first to third. Man, that is fantasy baseball.

But fantasy baseball continues to defy actual baseball and owners throw it in our face when they tear down Tiger Stadium in Detroit, Comiskey Park in Chicago, or Sportsman’s Park in St Louis. These places can be rehabbed and saved so that owners can have there luxury boxes and allow us to cherish our memories. But everyone wants new and new means better they say.

I could see bulldozing the Vet in Philly; that place was ugly from the start and so was Riverfront in Cincy but I bet if you asked the fans of those cities they would tell you they loved those cookie cutters. Mike Schmidt and Greg Luzinski hammering long balls and the Big Red Machine that had one Hall of Famer after another made those places special. The cookie cutter in St Louis is special to me, I was at Bob Forsch’s no hitter and I witnessed greatness in Whiteyball in the 80’s.

Yankee Stadium will go down and the same will happen to Wrigley eventually. Doris Kearns Goodwin wrote about the Dodgers at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, the Polo Grounds and what it meant to her. It is a distance memory to most or for me, only something to read about as something in history but it should never happen.

Fantasy baseball is a great pastime that gives us the opportunity to make new memories and cherish pennant races, if anybody even buys pennants anymore. It allows us to maintain friendships and cultivate new ones. It allows us to connect with the new players as the owners tear down the actual structures of our childhood. Pretty soon the “Field of Dreams” will only be something that can be seen on VHS. No wait, DVD.