Al Lang Field Today
Not being much of a soccer fan, I wasn't even aware that the spring training home for the Mets and Cardinals from the 1960s through the '80s was still in use -- as the home of the MSL Tampa Bay Rowdies.
And while the colors have changed to reflect the futbol club's green and yellow, fans who visited St. Pete or saw spring training games on TV won't have a hard time recognizing the place.
The dugouts remain, the grass is still real, and the ghosts of Casey Stengel, Johnny Keane, Tommie Agee, Stan Musial, Bob Gibson and Tom Seaver can almost be heard.
For decades, Mets and Cardinals fans wondered who Al Lang was. A plaque outside the ballpark tells his story.
The stripes now fit a pitch instead of a diamond.
I didn't quite match the angle down the left field line, but the stands, save for the new seats, remain the same as in March 1985. And a nice grove of palm trees now borders the bay just past the ballpark.
A final look back at the stands, from just outside the left field line... St. Petersburg is in the middle of a construction boom, with more and more high rises about to hover over the ballpark.
Comments
Great piece. I never got to Al Lang Field, but it has to be better than the soulless, Wilpon-built scheme that is Whatever-They-Call-It-Now Park in Port St. Lucie. I will say, though, that PSL's location near my father's home in Boca Raton allowed me to go there for many games and afforded me the accessibility (thanks to the late, great Shannon Forde)for many casual interviews that were among the best in-person interviews I have done. But I'd still rather have been at Al Lang!