The most popular funeral tune is Amazing Grace. I can hear it now, the strains of the old notes riding the breeze north from Miami. How sweet the sound.
The original Sugar Bowl in New Orleans is gone, demolished in 1980. Technically, it was called Tulane Stadium. But the world called it the Sugar Bowl. The Orange Bowl in Miami is called, well, the Orange Bowl. It is about to be called “deceased.”
The old stadium has seen it’s glory days and locals are writing its obit. A friend of mine recently read about the demise of his beloved Orange Bowl and went into a whining and moaning fit, waxing on about the sports history that had played out in the crook of the old orange horseshoed bleachers. I tried to console him as only a male friend can. “Get over it,” I told him. “Be glad you don’t have prostate cancer at your age.” Geez.
These old coliseums of athletic grandeur remind us of simpler sports time when there was no ESPN to follow every amazing fete or nasty little injustice. No instant replay from six cameras, strung to wires sliding up and down the field to correct the play when the ref blew a call. No steroids to jack up your stats and shrink up your manhood.
In the old stadium, known both as Tulane Stadium and the Sugar Bowl, the Saints’ Tom Dempsey kicked the longest field goal in NFL history (63 yards) with half a foot and twice a heart. I have fond memories of Sugar Bowls with Alabama playing Notre Dame for the national championship in 1973 (they’d be much fonder if Bama had won).
Now the Orange Bowl is on the demolition schedule, although bids are just going out. The old symbol that was Miami as much as the famous beach, will fall under the wrecking ball soon and pieces will be sold off eBay style. How the mighty have fallen.
The Dolphins went 17-0 in 1972 with the Orange Bowl as their home. They moved to Joe Robbie Stadium in 1986 and haven’t had quite so good a run in their new home. The Miami Hurricanes, who won a record 58 straight home games there, will follow now and from the way their current season is going, they will miss the Orange Bowl aura as well.
Texas Stadium will soon be gone as the Cowboys move into what can only be described as the most amazing football stadium ever built – Jerry Jones’ behemoth $1 billion “oh-my-gawd-what-in-the-hell-is-this” stadium in Arlington, Texas. Check it out: http://stadium.dallascowboys.com
I got carpel tunnel vision just clicking through the site. If you can’t get excited about two HD flat screens, 60 yards-wide, then you better suck down a big can of Rockstar and chase it with some roofing nails.
Cotton Bowl fans in Dallas are arguing over why the Cotton Bowl (event) organizers are spending millions to keep the old relic that is the original JFK-era Cotton Bowl (stadium) alive and why the Cotton Bowlers aren’t considering a move to Jerry’s 100,000 seat glass, steel and hype-fest being built just west of town on I-30 – and escalating their status out of the New Years left-behinds and into the BCS stratosphere. Good question, especially after ogling the new Texas Stadium. In that environment, the Cotton Bowl instantly becomes the premiere facility on the BCS tour.
So what is lost with these old stadiums getting erased? Tradition? History? Nothing?
We attach some odd and clingy memories to sports. Even with Nick Saban at Alabama, 70% of the supporters down there would still love to have a dead man coach their team. Last year on a trip home, I heard an old timer say in seeming earnestness, “What we need to do is dig up Coach Bryant and prop him on the goal post like a stuffed Trigger for every game. I guarantee we’d win again then.”
Ah, no. But you’d win the Most Morbidly Sad, Sick And Twisted Fixation On The Past Award if they give that out at the ESPY’s. Sorry, Coach Bryant and his seriously good teams won those games, not some wistful memory or reliance on tradition.
Times have changed. Things aren’t the way they were in the 1920’s and 1930’s when the Orange Bowl, Cotton Bowl and Tulane Stadium were born. They aren’t the same as the 1970’s or 1980’s either. All of the old, round, multi-purpose Riverfront, Busch Stadium, RFK-type arenas exist only in memories, and photographs as well. We can shed a tear and toss back a beer and a mustardy hot dog in their honor, but the past is just that. Relish your memories. And enjoy those nice new digs sprouting up. Build some new memories. Fifty years from now, the latest stadiums will be gone too. Look around; see any dinosaurs crying?
I grew up in a world where the Colts won in Baltimore, not Indy. I cut my teeth as a kid watching Namath, beat those Colts against all odds in the old Orange Bowl for Super Bowl III. I saw Lombardi win in the Orange Bowl when it hosted one of its five Super Bowls. I saw Darrell Royal turn the Longhorns into a powerhouse in the Cotton Bowl. I watched with my guts in a cramp as Bryant lost a tight heartbreaker to Parseghian in Tulane Stadium back when the Sugar Bowl was played on New Year’s Eve and Notre Dame took home the national championship once again.
I am not immune to memories; far from it. My blogs are filled with them. But just like some of the most beloved people in my life, stadiums go away and they are missed deeply and remembered fondly. Let’s send the Orange Bowl off with a little respect. Here’s a little toast with a glass of sunshine.
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