Citifield and the cancer of corporate naming...

It was announced yesterday that the name of the new Mets ballpark will be called CitiField, because Citigroup (the same people who take care to my student loans for Fordham) brought out the naming rights for the stadium, reportedly spending as much as 20 million a year for the name...

From Bloomberg.com:

Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) -- Citigroup Inc., the biggest U.S. bank, will put its name on the New York Mets' new ballpark in what might be the most expensive stadium rights agreement in history, people familiar with the negotiations said.

The ballpark, adjacent to the baseball team's Shea Stadium in the Flushing neighborhood of Queens, will be called "CitiField'' and will open for the 2009 season. The team plans to unveil the name at a groundbreaking ceremony on Monday, said the people, who declined to be identified before the announcement.

The push to raise Citigroup's profile is part of Chief Executive Officer Charles Prince's plan to boost flagging revenue growth at the U.S. consumer business.

"From Citigroup's perspective it makes tremendous sense,'' said Marc Ganis, president of SportsCorp Ltd., a Chicago-based consulting firm. "Financial services companies are among the best positioned to benefit from naming rights of sports facilities.''

Call me an old fart, which would be ridiculous because I'm only 19, but if I go to a Mets game, I will honestly feel a bit of a sell-out... going to a game at CitiField will show me where the money I'm borrowing and paying back to them is going... my attachment to the Stadium itself will seem superficial and bought out... as baseball fans, ask yourself this question, "Which of these two sounds and feels better to say: "Welcome to Shea Stadium" or "Welcome to CitiField"?

Long gone are the days where stadiums were named after the name of the team or a significant person in the franchise...

• The story of the name of Shea Stadium is a beautiful one: the name was to commemorate William Shea, the man who brought New York baseball back into the National League...
  
  
• Yankee Stadium was to dedicate a franchise that would end up being the most successful franchise in all of sports (championship-wise)...
  
  
• Fenway Park was named after a seemingly insignificant comment by the owner at the time John I. Taylor, he stated: "It's in the Fenway section of Boston, isn't it? Then name it Fenway Park."

What will the history write for the origin of CitiField? "CitiField was named as such to glorify what you can do with lots of money"? Is the name of the new Stadium meant to glorify the corporate mindset of NYC (though its hub is focused in Manhattan, not in Queens)? Is the name of the new stadium supposed to satisfy Mets fans, who have been lobbying to have the new stadium named after Jackie Robinson?

What will become of one of the most well-known fight songs of baseball?

"Meet the Mets, meet the Mets,
Head for the park and greet the Mets.
Hot dogs, green grass all out at Shea,
Guaranteed to have a heck of a day."

I don't think Citifield or even Citi has the same ring as Shea in this 1984 version of "Meet the Mets", don't you?

I'm not a Met fan by any means, I will admit that I loved to see Carlos Beltran strike out looking to end the NLCS, but I always had a small connection to the Mets for a few reasons: my uncles tried to raise me to be a Met fan, I love "Meet the Mets", and the Mets is a New York team...

I have met extremely passionate Met fans who bleed orange and blue as much as I bleed pinstripes... the history of the Mets has its highs, its low, but most of all, its drama, the drama that I love to read and write about... and to be honest, even though I hate the sight, I hate the planes flying over it, and my knees hurt after seating in their Tier seats, I actually enjoy the games I have seen at the purple "was-better-made-to-be-a-parking-lot" stadium...

I assumed that the Mets, being in the biggest market for baseball, would have enough money to be able to name the new stadium anything they want... I assumed that the Mets would know how to go about the naming of the stadium to please their fans... I assumed that the Mets were better than to sell the name to a soulless bank... but I guess I assumed wrong...

As a kid, and as a baseball fan, I have a connection with some stadiums, and with that connection comes the name... if Fenway Park's name was bought out by, let's say, CVS, I could never imagine remembering a park called "CVS Park" being connected to a prestige baseball franchise like the Red Sox... same with the Dodgers... and of course, the same with the Yankees...

The Mets have done their best to cement themselves into the New York baseball atmosphere the past 40 years, and the connection many people have to the Mets fall short, but can rival the connection many people have to the Yankees... when people hear "Shea Stadium", they think "the Mets"... however, when I hear "CitiField", my mind goes to thoughts of new football stadiums, Petco Park, PNC Park, Reliant Stadium in Houston, and others like it... and those stadiums don't exactly inspire great feelings of nostalgia and love towards the team and the stadium...

As a Yankee fan in the middle of a stadium transition as well, it does pain me to see talks about the demolition plans for the old Yankee Stadium, and hearing that it's not a national landmark (which would save the Stadium)... it pains me even more to read this quote from the Wikipedia article on the new Stadium:

"While the stadium will have Yankee Stadium in its name, naming rights will be sold. Possibilities include Yankee Stadium at (sponsor) Plaza or (sponsor) Yankee Stadium."

However, the one thing that is attached to it is the name "Yankee Stadium", that name will always carry with the Yankees and in Yankee fans' hearts, and to me, the name brings chills, nostalgia, and the legacy of the old Stadium, and the bright future of the new... no matter what Stadium is made for the Yankees, it will always carry the name "Yankee Stadium"...

The Boss isn't dumb enough to lose the historical name of the stadium, the Cardinals didn't lose the name "Busch Stadium" when they started play in their new stadium this year, the Red Sox, Dodgers and Cubs would keep the name of their stadiums and carry the name wherever they play next...

Met fans, however, will need to suck it up and know that any sweet plans they had of naming the new stadium "Jackie Robinson Stadium" or the like is vanished because of CitiGroup and the cancer of corporate naming... any identity to Shea will be gone as soon as the wreaking ball collides with the concrete walls of the Purple Monster... the five teams I mentioned will always carry that identity with them, no matter where they play... but the Mets? Total corporate whores for as long as the stadium is leased...

Yes, baseball is a business, but some things are still sacred in the game, and the namesakes of historical stadiums are one of those things... sometimes, all you have to remember a moment in your life is a name, a name that carries so much history and love behind it... whether it's a name of a high school sweetheart, a band, a relative, or, yes, a stadium, that name will always carry some memories...

When it comes to Yankee Stadium, no matter where they call home, it makes sense to keep the name "Yankee Stadium" with it so more memories can be built with the name... with Shea, those memories are one and done when Shea gets torn down... if I was a Met fan, I would be pissed, not only because the new stadium's name got bought out, but because the owners did not listen to you and your suggestions... Yankee fans wanted the name "Yankee Stadium" to stay with the new Stadium, and we got what we wanted... Met fans on the other hand... eh...

This is one of those days where I'm glad to be a Yankee fan... to know that the name will always be there, and more importantly, that name will have a physical representation...

Yankee Stadium (old and new):

Thank you for the memories you have made and will make until 2009, old Yankee Stadium, and to the new Yankee Stadium, let's win some more World Series in there... yes, it's the House that the Boss Built, but damn it, if that fact will slow us down... :-)

Happy reading!

B(rent)