Mike McCann's Field of Fotos

Fort Lauderdale Stadium was another famed Florida pre-season facility. Built for the Yankees when they moved their camp from St. Petersburg, the park was the March home of the iconic Mantle, Maris, Ford, Howard and Berra crew that closed out the Yankees post-World War II dynasty -- as well as the Munson, Jackson, Nettles, Guidry group that restored the Yankees winning tradition in the late '70s. But in 1996, George Steinbrenner moved the Yankees spring headquarters to Tampa, his adopted home.  They were replaced as tenants by the Orioles, who left rundown Miami/Bobby Maduro Stadium.   From March 2007, above, it's pitcher Jamie Walker; below, outfielder (and future MLB Network co-host) Kevin Millar. Two years later, from the ballpark's final Grapefruit League season, the Orioles hosted the Mets. Below: ex-Met Ty Wigginton hits for the O's. Darren O'Day's on the mound for New York. After finishing its life as home for soccer's Fort Lauderdale Strikers, this on

The Mets Grapefruit League home opened in the late '80s as Thomas J. White Stadium, and has been re-branded several times since.  It was Tradition Field when I saw a night game there in 2007.   Below: the park sports one of the first berms just past the outfield wall. The grassy incline adds to the informal mood of spring training. A few moments around the batting cage. Just before the first pitch, there were a pair of ceremonies. The first included Willie Randolph, who managed the Mets to the NL East title the year before. The other focused on the Mets minor leaguers.  Hall of Fame catcher Gary Carter, who managed the Single-A St. Lucie Mets to the Florida State League title the year before, is second from the right. It's game time with the Mets hosting the Orioles.  Below, David Wright smacks one toward the left field line.

Listen carefully, and you can almost hear the ghosts.  The spirits of beloved Dodger legends Jackie Robinson and Pee Wee Reese, Don Drysdale and Don Newcombe, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges.  Just some of the legends who began their baseball years in Vero Beach, Florida at the complex known as Dodgertown.  I made my first visit there in 2005. Dodgertown's street signs honored franchise legends, including one who never suited up. Players who took the field at Holman Stadium were well aware that they were standing on hallowed ground, where the team that integrated baseball -- and then brought the major leagues to the West Coast -- prepared for their seasons from 1948 through 2008. A simple stadium, not much bigger than some high school fields, where the purpose was preparation.  If you wanted "up close and personal," this was the place.  More than 100 miles from Miami, the onetime Navy air base had barracks to house all the players.  No need to worry about segregation of a p

From March 2005, the Cardinals host the Dodgers in Grapefruit League action. Below, the visitors take batting practice. Above: catcher Yadier Molina ready to work with the Cardinals pitchers, who've gathered in the right field corner. Below: Bob Gibson, in camp as a special instructor, heads to the dugout. Above: a pre-season tradition, with manager Tony LaRussa -- bookended by coaches Dave Duncan and Jim Leyland -- watching the game from the field.  

Above: Phillies backup catcher John Russell takes batting practice at Jack Russell Stadium.   Below: Phils and Mets mingling on the field. Finally, yours truly interviewing Von Hayes .

As camps open across Florida and Arizona, I'll begin looking back at some of my memories spanning nearly 40 years of Spring Training.   Above: the Mets take batting practice before a 1985 Grapefruit League game against the Phillies at Jack Russell Stadium in Clearwater.  Darryl Strawberry waits his turn to hit. Then it's  pitcher Joe Sambito   just outside the cage. Below: before they were "media credentials," a couple of press passes from the more informal access I obtained back in the 1980s.    

10 years ago this summer, Metallica, whose song "Enter Sandman" became part of Yankees history as Mariano Rivera's entrance music, performed at the Stadium prior to the retirement ceremony for the Yankees closer and joined him for a one-of-a-kind photo op at home plate. Metallica was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2009. Mariano Rivera was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2019.  

Here's something you don't often see: the Yankees -- with Joba Chamberlain front and center -- go through their pre-game stretching before a Subway Series match with the Mets in May 2013.

It's February 6th, the birthdate of the man without whom, we would not love and celebrate baseball as we've done for over a century.  George Herman Ruth sounds like a lawyer's name, maybe that of a captain of industry. Thankfully, he didn't spend his professional life in a court house or executive suite.  His home was on the diamond, wearing a uniform, with one glove, one bat and a boyish enthusiasm befitting his nickname. He came along at the right moment, emerging as baseball's greatest star just as the game rebounded from the ugliness of the Black Sox scandal.  Ruth's talent and personality turned a struggling New York team that had never won a pennant into the game's dominant franchise. If you're into numerical coincidences: the Babe was born 2/6 -- in "old math," two into six is three -- the  number 3  he wore from 1929 on as a Yankee. As the author Jane Leavy says so well in her book  The Big Fella , he was the first true sports celebrity

Just a couple or three years ago, Miguel Andujar and Dom Smith were on track to be homegrown stars for the Yankees and Mets.  But fate had other plans: these photos were from a Scranton/Syracuse game last June 8th, when both were in Triple A ball trying to play their way back to New York.  Sidetracked by slumps and injuries that not only inhibited their progress, the players will report to training camps in a couple of weeks with different organizations. Andujar was waived off the Yankees 40-man roster in late September and was snapped by the Pirates in the season's final days. He hoped that like Bill Robinson, a decades-earlier flop in pinstripes, he could turn around his career in Pittsburgh gold and black — until his roster spot went to veteran free agent Andrew McCutchen. Smith, stuck behind Pete Alonso and Daniel Vogelbach on the Mets depth chart, was non-renewed and signed with the rebuilding Nationals.