hiladelphia is the only city where you can experience the thrill of victory and the agony of reading about it the next day.”
MikeSchmidt
On New Years Eve in 2000, it was very cold. I was wearing about three layers of clothing, a covering for my face and gloves. Despite all this, I could still feel the wind whipping against my face and the cold penetrating all my layers. And I was going to be like this for at least three more hours.
What in the world would make me want to do this? I needed to be there to cheer on my Philadelphia Eagles.
I share this memory with you because I want to step back and reflect. But please do not be confused, I do not mean for this reflection to be in the Quaker Tradition.
The place I want to talk about has nothing to do with peace and serenity.
This place is old, not particularly attractive, unforgiving and is way past its prime. But for over 30 years memories have been made here. Some good and some bad, but all have been special in their own way. While the structure of this place is concrete and steel, this place and its legacy have been built upon the backs of all those who have passed through its doors and experienced it first hand.
This place is Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium.
For 33 years, Veterans Stadium was the home for football (Eagles) and baseball (Phillies). But it became more than that for the people like me who grew up going to the Vet to see my favorite teams play. Now after all those years and all those memories logged away in our hearts, Veterans Stadium is no more. Imploded.
No, the Vet was never physically beautiful, the concrete was pretty impersonal, the sightlines were never the best and there were definitely some stray animals living there. But make no mistake; to myself and the multitude of Philadelphia sports fans, the Vet had its own special beauty.
The personality of the fans gave Philadelphia one of the best home-field advantages in the country. The Vet, for a long time, was a perfect stadium for the city of Philadelphia. It was rugged, rough and most of all, tough.
There was the infamous 700 Level of the Vet. The fans that frequented the 700 level were, how would you say it, colorful? So colorful in fact that a certain part of the 700 level, among longtime Eagle season ticket holders was christened, “The Nest of Death.”
To be honest, the good memories were often few and far between. One World Series title for the Phillies in 1980, and the Eagles, well, we are still waiting for the first Lombardi Trophy.
While it would have been nice to see more championships, there were still plenty of great memories. Mike Schmidt’s 500+ homeruns, the 1993 Phillies, the last three years of the Eagles, Kevin Millwood’s no-hitter and many more that I do not have the space to mention.
I know a lot of people won’t get it. “How can you wax poetic,” they will say, “about a baseball stadium and not even a nice one to boot?”
It may have been a dump, but it was our dump. It was Philadelphia and its fans. If you’re not one us, you will just never get it, and I don’t mean that to sound snotty, it’s just true.
So as I bid my final adieu to Veterans Stadium, I will look back on all the good times I have had cheering on my teams. It never had the legacy of Yankee Stadium, we never ate Fenway Franks; it was always just the Vet. Philadelphia and its fans would not have had it any other way.