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| Baseball fans wait to enter Wrigley Field on the 100th anniversary of the first baseball game at the ballpark, before a game between the Arizona Diamondbacks and Chicago Cubs, Wednesday, April 23, 2014, in Chicago. |
CHICAGO (AP)
-- There was a giant replica cake right next to the Ernie Banks statue,
and an old-time band played as fans made their way through the main
entrance.
The famed marquee had a message, too.
"Happy Birthday, Wrigley Field," it read.
Exactly
100 years after the Chicago Federals pounded the Kansas City Packers in
the first game at the famed ballpark, Wrigley was the scene of a joyous
birthday bash on Wednesday afternoon. Banks and other Hall of Famers
such as Billy Williams, Fergie Jenkins and Andre Dawson were on hand,
and so were Bears greats Dick Butkus and Gale Sayers.
The
Cubs and Diamondbacks went retro, wearing throwback 1914 jerseys, and
the famed scoreboard listed Kansas City and Chi-Feds in their place. It
was a day of celebration, a day of reflection. And a day that ended with
another loss, the Cubs falling 7-5 after blowing a ninth-inning lead.
But before that, the memories, the stories, flowed like runs in a big rally.
"It
just gives me goose bumps because I had a chance to play here,"
Williams said. "I often said this was my playground during the summer
for so many years. So I have enjoyed it and I still enjoy it."
The
celebration was held as Cubs ownership and the neighboring rooftop
owners remain in a standstill over proposed renovations. The $500
million project, which includes a giant Jumbotron, is on hold because
the Ricketts family wants assurances that it won't be sued over
obstructed views.
"You can't ask a team to be
competitive and you can't ask people to do things and then tie their
hands and their legs," baseball Commissioner Bud Selig said. "It's just
wrong. Somebody has to say it so I'm happy to say it."
The
rooftop owners, who charge fans to sit in bleachers atop their
buildings, have a contract under which they share 17 percent of their
revenues with the Cubs. The Tribune Co., the previous owner, signed the
deal and "this ownership didn't," Selig said.
He
said the treatment the current owners - the Ricketts family - has
received is "beyond unfair" and that he'll do everything he "possibly
can" to help them.
He also said the Rickettses
have not approached him about moving, that they're committed to
renovating Wrigley and staying there.
"They
know the right thing to do for this franchise and this sport is to
preserve this, just like the Red Sox preserved Fenway," said Selig, who
made his first trip to the ballpark in May 1944.
Assuming
they eventually go ahead with the renovations, it'll be up to the
Ricketts family to preserve that charm while bringing the stadium into
the 21st century. Wednesday was a day to turn back the clock, a day to
celebrate the century that was at the neighborhood park on Chicago's
North Side.
Ushers wore party hats, and fans
received birthday cupcakes and throwback jerseys. There was a replica
Wrigley Field cake from Carlo's Bakery, setting of the hit TLC show
"Cake Boss," just outside the ballpark.
On his
way in from suburban Glen Ellyn, Illinois, Williams thought about all
the events besides baseball games that have taken place at Wrigley Field
over the years. The ballpark has hosted everything from boxing to
soccer to pro wrestling to the circus to the rodeo to concerts to a
Chicago Blackhawks game. There was even this: On back-to-back weekends
in January 1944, ski jumpers leapt from scaffolding covered in snow and
ice and landed behind second base.
Wrigley
Field, it seems, has seen everything but a World Series championship.
The Cubs haven't won one since 1908 - eight years before they started
playing at what was then known as Weeghman Park.
Of
course, the Bears celebrated a few at Wrigley. They won NFL
championship games there in 1933, 1941, 1943 and 1963 before they moved
to Soldier Field in 1971.
Williams recalled
watching the Bears at Wrigley, back when Sayers and Butkus and Mike
Ditka were playing and when George Halas was running the club.
Butkus had a few good stories, too.
He mentioned the stench one time in the locker room, one he thought was coming from Doug Bufone's "ratty" gym shoes.
Bufone
insisted the smell wasn't coming from the shoes. Butkus didn't believe
him at first. Then, he said, they were putting something on top of a
locker when a tile fell and out plopped - you guessed it - a dead rat.
"I said, `Oh, there it is,'" Butkus said.
To
Butkus, a South Side product who starred at Illinois and his hometown
team, playing at Wrigley meant he'd made it - not because of his Chicago
ties, but because of the stadium itself. Because of its quirks, its
imperfections
"Pros aren't supposed to play where everything is perfect," he said.
Dawson agreed.
"The
ballpark itself, there's just something about it," he said. "The
intricate angles. You came out and you walked around and looked around,
and you just said, `Wow.'"
