awesome. can't wait! let see those white sox get the brooms out this weekend! go twins!

Rick, it will hopefully be a meaningful OCTOBER baseball game on Sunday. As one of the Twins fans who is not old enough to have gone to an outdoor Twins home game, I can't wait; but it will be bittersweet to see the home of my childhood memories come to the end of its run.

"Target Field" and the Target symbol on the back of the scoreboard were lit up last night. Didn't realize they were going to be lit, but it looked pretty cool.

Speaking of rat-infested. How to keep them out of the new park? Will they even bother to try? I remember going bat hunting at the old Met with a friend of mine who worked there. There were zillions of bats there.

Rick - do you know, how far below street level is the playing field at TF? I think the Dome field is 38 feet below street level.
It doesn't appear to me that TCFBS is very far below street level, because that student gate has the huge staircase going up to the main concourse.

Great post, as usual Rick.

And your right...the memories are created regardless of the venue.

I remember going to Opening Day at Met Stadium one year when it landed on my birthday (April 22!) with my dad. He's gone now, the Met's gone now but that memory isn't.

My son and I have gone to every Opening Day together now since he was 6 - even though we hate the dome.

He and I were talking last night about all the great games and fun memories we have had just from this year.

Opening Day. Game 2 when the Twins were down by three in the bottom of the ninth with 2 outs and 2 strikes and came back to win. Him taking a batting practice ground rule double off the face and then sticking around for all 17 innings of the game. Getting to see our friends honored on the field for winning a state championship, and then singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" for the 7th inning stretch. My daughter's excitement seeing her picture on the "big screen".

So while the dome is a terrible place to see a game, I know I'll have these memories for years, and undoubedtly they will have a few of these and more to pass on to their kids.

I'm not sure I'll shed a tear either, but like it or not the dome will always be part of fond memories.

And THAT is the important part!

thanks Rick. just curious.

I remember going to my first Dome game in 1986. We were either playing Texas or KC...I was only 8.

I went to a game against the Indians in 1987, and a lady 20 rows behind home plate got hit by a broken bat. Still can't figure how it got up that high, and over the netting. But it did.

And, in 1987, I was 9 years old, and stayed up until way past 11pm, waiting with 55,000 fans for the Twins to come back from Detroit.

Other than that, I don't have too many Metrodome memories.

AAA to my last post - Rick, in that 1982 pic, what did they make the warning track out of back then, linoleum? The pic looks like the warning track had just been mopped two hours before game time.

I was at the game last night, and got a pocket schedule and calender. Both had inaugural season logosm along with the 50 year anniversary logo. They look nice!

really bummed right now about the gophers loss earlier today. almost came all the way back for the win at the end too, which made it that much harder to stomach in the end. :-(

go twins! go (cough) white sox!

My first game was at the dome in the 90's against the O's and Cal Ripken. That's a big deal for a kid from South Dakota. Went to college in MN and still live here and have been to many many games since. For me, it wasn't about the venue because I was just happy to get to see the game at this level in person. Yeah looking back its a dump but its all i know. Target Field will make the experience that much better.

We will be at the Met for the last game and we will be making a trip out to see the lights at night (maybe on more than one occasion). I will have the new SLR camera, new tripod and high hopes for amazing pictures, memories and game. Hope to see you all there!

BB - do you think they'll pass those out at the final game?
I'm hoping the Mirosoft Word generated "certificate" isn't all we get.

Beta - I watched that game from beginning to end, and I totally agree. From the Gophers' holding penalty on the opening kickoff - to the Gophers' 88 yard return for a touchdown...the back and forth between the two made for an interesting, but frustrating game.

There were tons of offensive mistakes by the Gophers today. I suppose we should be glad we only lost by 3.

Jared, Where at in SD? I'm a Brandon guy. Those trips in the mid 80's for me with the fam were priceless.

I've been pretty darn lucky this year when it comes to Twins games at the dome. I stayed long enough to see Crede hit his walk-off grand slam, I got to see Morales hit his walk-off single, and the other two games I've been to ended up as W's for the Twins. But the game I was happiest to see this year was last nights game, because I got to go with my dad. As a college student, basically all of the games I see now are with friends, but I wanted to make sure the last game I ever saw at the dome was with the person who took me to my first game.

I've seen all I've wanted to see from Jose Mijares over the past 3 days...ADIOS MUCHACHO!

The clubhouse in the new ballpark looks really nice, a big step up from the dome clubhouse. I also like the signage in the concourses.

Mijares still needs to lose a few pounds...he can hardly jog from the bullpen to the mound. Imagine what it'll be like next year for him when the bullpen is in center like it should be ;)

Locker-
I'm from Yankton. I was born in '84 so I was a kid at the time of my mentioned first visit. It also was a family "vacation" and no doubt my 4 sisters and I tortured my parents. It was a game against the Orioles and I went and got one of those plastic helmets, but not a Twinks one, it was a Mariners one! How lame was I? What can I say? Ken Griffey Jr. was my favorite player at the time. But the Twins were always my favorite team.

If anybody can post the inaugural season logo, that would be cool to see.

I have jpgs of the inaugural logo and the 50 seasons (not too clean a scan; how can I post?

fyi - the white sox vs. tigers game is on mlb network if you have that channel. if you have comcast digital level cable you should have the mlb network channel.

I'm sure this has been posted already, but just in case, here's a story int he startrib about the flag pole..

Are the lights at TF already aimed, or will they be doing that during this upcoming test?

Rough one for the Gophers, but did I actually see some empty seats up in one of the corners!? Gophers vs Badgers? Brand new stadium? Empty seats? Hopefully it was just an illusion.

Twins can't be stopped.

I thought I had seen a short glimpse of the Inaugural logo, can't remember where, but it looked pretty cool.

Expectorate, I think the seats you saw were up in the U of M student sections. It may have been too cold for some, but then again, there were some crazy nuts out there in their war-painted skins.

It was gratifying to see that there was alot more gold than red. Bucky fans were put way up in the top in two corners of the stadium (at least from what I saw) - and they even mentioned that on ESPN - that at the Dome, red far outweighed the gold more often than none.

I would like to issue an apology to the Minnesota Twins...

At the end of July I doubted the team and tossed the season up on the board as a "loss." I am sorry. I made a mistake. Please excuse my moment of faithlessness.
Thank You.

Ok, now that that is out of the way... Let's Do This! Wooot!

Looking at your "Abbey Road" picture above - the Twins should buy the giant Grain Belt sign and put it on the Ford Center. It would look great as you come up 5th st, and would give the folks in the grandstand some "neon love," since they won't have a very good view of the Dudes. (I'm sure Anheuser-Busch won't mind)

I know we'll eventually get links/pics of the Twins "new" logos for next year. Hopefully they arent as bad as this anniverary logo (click my name) for the NHL's Atlanta Thrashers (courtesy of UniWatch).

what an awesome day,

1. a badger win to cotinue our streak with the axe, and to keep all four of the gophers trophy cases empty, (I'm sorry gopher fans but that is sad) a twins win, and a detroit loss, tomorrow is huge, you couldn't really ask for a better way to send off the dome.

Dirwin,
Shouldn't you be a Brewers fan? Also, count the national championships... 6 for us and hmmm... I rest my case.

Let's get City Center to buy the sign, and put it on top of their parking garage, to cover part of the Multifoods Tower.

jim,

don't get all sore and butthurt because you lost to us for the sixth time in a row and your seniors will have never touched the axe in their entire gopher career, you should be mad as hell, but don't take it out on me, you owe it to your school to be mad and demand a higher level of play from them, to be honest with you we should have beat you by a lot more than we did, I honestly almost feel bad for how pathetic and sad your program is, but then I stop myself from feeling bad b/c it was your choice to either attend, or choose to be a fan of a university that has four "rivalries" with trophys that they struggle to be competitive in any of them. So if you gopher fans want to continually bring up the fact that you have 6 nat'l championships that is fine and your right, you won them, but us Badgers demand more of our football program today, we do not rest on our successes of 100 yrs ago, we stay hungry for the future, and we expect to win, and we do.

On Wisconsin!

expectorate - there were no empty seats in the student section. every game is sold out. the empty seats you see on t.v. (this is noticable every game) is because all of the students crowd together downwards and towards the middle, thus making it look like there are some empty student seats way up in the corners of the student section. i have heard that the U of M is going to reduce the width of each bleacher seat in student seating next year and up the number of student tickets sold which will eliminate the "empty corner" illusion some see on t.v.

jim - exactly. for any becky football fan football history and reflection starts in 1992. all other records, accomplishments, etc. by them or any other team doesn't matter. in fact in many of their minds college football did not even exist prior to 1992. they seem to have completely forgotten what a "special" little team becky badger football in the 1980's. can you say don morton?!?!? please dirwin!

p.s. dirwin - go stick your finger in an electrical socket you becky troll.

all i know is all of the meaningful records (all-time series, national championships, big ten championships, all-americans) are still in the gophers favor and always will be.

go gophers! the gophers will get becky back at their place next year. guarantee it.

dirwin is a fool. 100 years ago?! this is exactly the crap i am talking about in terms of their revisionist history. the gophers last national championship was in 1960. is that 100 years ago?! becky's last national championship in football was when?!?!?! and you have been playing football for almost as long as the U of M.

when looked at in a COMPLETE historical context the becky football program is rather mediocre and pathetic. you won a couple rose bowls in the 90's during down big ten and pac-10 years against weak ass pac-10 teams. whoopty frickin' doo!

i will take actual national championship history (from any decade) over a couple rose bowls any day.

betaband,

please, this is so typical of a gopher fan, and exactly what I was talking about, you guys need to focus on making yourselves better, b/c it doesn't take a genius to see that your program is awful. And Jesus please change your uniforms, they are hideously ugly, and your cheerleaders are fat, that is not a lie just look at them, you guys are a high school program with a big stadium. You will not win at camp randall next year, i guarantee it.

and your cheerleaders are ugly too, i've never seen a school with ugly cheerleaders but you guys did it

That was the most pathetic display of run defense I have ever seen today. That Gopher defense is a complete joke.

dirwin - keep denying it. btw - what are you 12 years old? you are showing more and more of just who you are with each and every post. some of the shots you take at college aged kids are pathetic. get a life you loser.

betaband,

college aged kids are adults, they are not children, but since you have that in your mind it is not surprising that why us badger men continually kick the crap out of you little gopher boys.

P.S I'm 27

by how senile and anal you are I would put your age 75?

we both watched the game today, the only one who is denying anything is you, who refuses to say that anything is wrong with your program and have blind faith that it will fix itself, well it's been 5 decades with that loser attitude and nothing has happened, the gophers suck and you suck personally

well, as usual your responses make absolutely no sense. it sounds like you are 27 going on 7. your parents should be so proud. done chatting with you now. PISS OFF loser!

p.s. wisconsin still sucks.....

dirwin7, not sure I'd consider last years game a beatdown. Badgers had to come back from a 21-10 halftime deficit to squeak out a win against a Gophers team that was without its best player (Eric Decker). Let's keep it real, these two programs are not all that different from one another.

Dirwin = d bag

This calls for a Royal Rumble between Betaband and Dirwin7. Both are guaranteeing victory next season. History tells us both can't be right. I want an official wager publicly declared on Rick's site and then followed up upon next college football season.

Max,

I'm in

since dirwin and i are only a couple of years apart in age i am more than happy to settle for the just "royal rumble" part, if he is game.

he can even bring some of his big, bad becky buddies, if need be. ;-)

Why in the hell is gopher football being discussed right now?!?! They are not a good football team and they lost today. Crazy. There is a pretty big baseball game tomorrow...in case you were looking for something to talk about...

the gophers and football in general weren't being discussed until our resident becky troll decided to open his trap and start talking a lot of shit. i will stand up for the gophers program regardless of whether or not YOU think they are a good team or not. deal with it.

but, i do agree with you on one thing.....let's get it back to the twins and the big game tomorrow.

btw - i just read on the mpls star tribune site that it will be carl pavano starting on 3 days rest tomorrow.

Not feeling good about Pavano pitching on 3 days rest. Methinks it could get ugly.

You can register at PhotoBucket.com and then host the image there and post the link or you could e-mail it to Rick and I'm sure he'll gladly post it. As he's mentioned, it's rick [at] this domain.

How is it possible to be a Twins fan and a Wisconsin fan? That is just fuckin sick.

Betaband, don't get me wrong, I am a gopher fan through and through, I just think they don't have very good team this year. Just my opinion. My primary gopher love is hockey though. Don't follow the football program that heavy.

Yeah, Pavano will be interesting, but Duensing has been a little shaky lately, and Pavano brings the veteran experience to a huge game. Our bats are hot right now though, and the kc pitcher is young and over an 11 era in his last two starts.

Just got my tickets for the potential 163rd game. I would much rather my next game be Game 3 of the ALDS.

It's called growing up in Minnesota and wanting to go to a school that could offer four years of outdoors, competitive football. That's how you become a Twins and Badger fan. I know that's why I did it. Hatred can be such a complex thing, eh?

ROLL CALL:

Who will be at the Twins game tomorrow and where are you sitting?

Like Jim said earlier, you guys should be Brewer fans.

Max, I will be there tomorrow in my usual spot, section 116, row 7.

I got tickets for all three games this weekekd and I hope Sunday is just as good, if not, better, than Friday and Saturday's games.

Rumors were flying around at the Dome on Saturday that there will be Homer Hanky's handed out on Sunday. I hope that is true!

It's going to be one heck of an atmosphere on Sunday!

I'll be sitting right over by the Target Field countdown sign (sec. 141), row 17.

You can be a Twins fan and a Badgers fan... I'm a Minnesotan who got his degree in Madison. (So, yes, there is yet another reason to hate me, believe it or not.) But I wouldn't trade it for anything. Going to school there was the best decision ever...

.. gotta get ready to head over to the Dome. This afternoon is going to be crazy.

Sec 120, row 31. See you there!

today's tigers/white sox game is on wgn.

i have to go to the airport at three which is going to suck...