It´s true that several of the Yankees core players weren´t procured by the “Stick” Michael administration. However, they were developed and – most of all – kept during that tenure as the Yankees stopped shooting for “today” after well over a decade of “quick fixing” things and were almost forced to rebuild without Steinbrenner being able to open his wallet or mingling with decision making at the major league level.

And looking at the current Mets´ team, at least three players procured under Omar Minaya´s watch, i.e. Matt Harvey, Jon Niese and Ike Davis could be key towards the Mets longterm chances and be part of their longterm core. Besides several complementary players also procured (not necessarily developed) by the previous administration. Let alone the state of the art Latin American pipeline that Omar Minaya & Co. built up and that gives the Mets a leg up in that market even today – and several graduates being represented on the current Mets Top 30 prospect list. Whether they were technically signed under Minaya or under Alderson.

Of course, beauty is only in the eye of the beholder – that has to be the reason why my better half married me over 36 years ago! LOL

But it is true when it comes to one’s opinion about Shea. Have not denied that I grew up with Shea so that I am biased because it was a big part of my life which I wanted to hang onto as I was getting older and so many of the people and things that I loved were being lost.

But as far as the long lines for the bathrooms, those still exist at Citi Field today. There is still only so much a restroom can hold when too many have been drinking too many beers.

Also, regarding the sight lines, I never had it when sitting just past third base (section 525 at Citi FIeld) where a third of left field was cut off from view – we could see nothing to the left of the commerative “Shea” Baseball that was in line with the left fielder playing his normal position. I know how bad it was with the overhang at Shea – I once sat in the last row of the mezzanine and hated it – but at least if somebody made a great catch I was able to see it.

But again, it’s all a matter of one’s taste. As mentioned in the past, I truly love the old style interior of Citi Field. Whenever one gets off from the rotunda escalator and sees the left field stands it’s like stepping back in time and feeling as if one was in an old time ballpark from almost a century ago as we’ve seen in photographs. Very imaginative.

But there were so many issues with the design and so much had changed regarding what infrastructure was needed there was no way to fix that place without blowing it up and starting from scratch.

Funny story regarding Yankee Stadium…
Most TV production trucks before the year 2005 used a cable called Triax (copper) to connect the cameras to the trucks used to make the broadcasts. It is still used by many of the older trucks still in use, many of which have been converted to be Sports trucks because you don’t need a lot of capability and the highest quality equipment for a sports broadcast. Since tape decks have been replaced by EVS servers they simply took the old decks out, converted to HD and put in the servers.

When they built the NEW Yankee stadium they opted to go all fiber optic thinking it was the new standard and everyone who showed up would use the better technology. Until all those converted Triax trucks started to arrive! LOL

They had luckily had a good cable running design in the plans and were able to run Triax so that most of the trucks that would come could use it. It wasn’t a problem for Yes as they had a brand new truck built for them that could use the fiber without an issue.

But for the first couple of months trucks had to rent Fiber to Triax converters (100K a pop to buy) to be able to use thier cameras and broadcast the games.

But it was a great place to watch a game. Assuming you were in the field level. Upstairs? man, those stairs were scary steep! And forget about being in the back rows of the mezz or loge!

bathroom lines, always fun (pity the poor women too).

by the end, i highly doubt there was a shot at refurbishing Shea. You could never really modernize it, and the infrastructure really seemed shot (I am surprised a deck never came down). Now, you can certainly argue the merits of what they built to replace it, but i don’t think you can really say that after 45 years, that Shea did not need to be replaced!

As for your assertion the jets were losing Revenue that was not truly the case and it did not get solved when they moved to Giants stadium where the Giants had the stranglehold on consessions.

The mets did not have such a stranglehold at the time and complained loudly when the Yankees came to play there and were getting what in the MET contract said proceeds from BASEBALL they felt they should have gotten from the Yankees but never did.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I suppose….
Compared to CitiField orYankee Stadium it hardly can be compared in the same beauty breath….

I don’t need to see the films and Video I had season tickets for a decade and can tell you it was not a great place to see anything compared to other stadiums and facilities.

And the sightlines were MUCH WORSE in Shea than they are in those few sections where sight is limited.

Everything with a roof over it made it impossible to see fly balls and where they were going.

It was not what you could ever call an Architechural stroke of genius.

You know we’re going to have a friendly disagreement about Shea.

You know the Jets left not because of Shea Stadium but because the Mets held a stranglehold on that lease which cost the Jets a tremendous amount of revenue loss that went right into the coffers of the Amazins instead. Once the lease expired they wanted nothing to do with both the City and the Mets ever again.

As far as Shea’s beauty, I remember how beautiful it was that first decade. Just look at the films and videos of those old days and see how bright and cheerful the place was. The scoreboard in right was beautiful before it was turned into an ugly Budweiser sign. There was open space behind the outfield fence, the color selection of the seats were bright instead of dark and drabby, the interior was kept clean and the place overall did not feel or appear cluttered. It was a wonderful place to be at until the owners allowed it to decay so – distance and height from the field regardless.

Unless it was not structurally sound, renovating it would have been more advantageous in the long-term because so many fans associated with it. Perhaps had Citi Field continued as being a part of the Met tradition instead of a shrine to a ball club of a half-century before, it would have eased the transition pains for some of us.

I’m convinced Gene Michael tried to systematically duplicate the Met success of the mid to late 80′s — amassing a cohesive core of prospects and moving them through the system to the majors as a group. His only “tweak” was he insisted on high character guys, and that was the difference — they ended up sustaining their success and realizing their potential because they kept their noses clean.

Halladay, Lee, Santana, Sabathia….Look at thier situations….