{"id":4310,"date":"2013-12-24T21:51:23","date_gmt":"2013-12-24T21:51:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/?p=4310"},"modified":"2013-12-24T21:51:23","modified_gmt":"2013-12-24T21:51:23","slug":"candlestick-park-goes-out-with-flair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=4310","title":{"rendered":"Candlestick Park goes out with flair"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The San Francisco 49ers played their final home game at Candlestick Park on Monday night.<\/p>\n

Soon, the old stadium will be relegated to … whatever. Trash. Dust. People’s memory.<\/p>\n

I hate seeing these old parks going away. The Houston Astrodome is likely to be demolished. I saw a couple of football games there: a high school playoff game and an NFL game between the Houston Oilers and the Cincinnati Bengals. The Oilers won big.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/blogs\/nfl-shutdown-corner\/san-francisco-49ers-send-candlestick-park-style-clinch-044910285–nfl.html<\/p>\n

Yes, I have a Candlestick Park memory. It’s a good one.<\/p>\n

I went to San Francisco in August 1964, having won a trip there by selling enough subscriptions to my hometown newspaper, the Portland Oregonian. It was a huge deal for me. I was 14 and had never been to California. The trip seemed like it took forever. I think we rode the bus for 12 hours.<\/p>\n

Part of the trip involved seeing a baseball game at Candlestick. <\/p>\n

The game would be between the SF Giants and the Cincinnati Reds. It was before they enclosed the stadium with seats. The outfield was exposed to the bay — and all the wind that blew in from the water. I’m telling you, the place used to be a wind tunnel in the old days.<\/p>\n

Well, the game was a pretty cool thing for a teenage baseball fan to see. I saw three Hall of Famers that windswept afternoon: Willie Mays and Willie McCovey played for the Giants. McCovey hit a home run into right field, straight into the teeth of the wind.<\/p>\n

The third HOFer, though, stole the show. Frank Robinson of the Reds hit three dingers out that day. The Reds won the game; I think the score was 7-1. Robinson would be traded two years later to the Baltimore Orioles, where all he did was win the Triple Crown in 1966.<\/p>\n

Oh, the memories.<\/p>\n

So long, Candlestick.<\/p>\n\n

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The San Francisco 49ers played their final home game at Candlestick Park on Monday night. Soon, the old stadium will be relegated to … whatever. Trash. Dust. People’s memory. I hate seeing these old parks going away. The Houston Astrodome is likely to be demolished. I saw a couple of football games there: a high … Continue reading Candlestick Park goes out with flair<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1798,4102,4103,5268,5269],"class_list":["post-4310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-frank-robinson","tag-san-francisco-49ers","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-willie-mays","tag-willie-mccovey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}