BASEBALL A63

[PLAYOFF BUZZ ANTHONY RIEBER] [email protected] Stadium roof? A retractable plan

DETROIT ince it apparently rains every day in now, the ques- Stion has been asked a lot recently: Why doesn’t 3-year-old Yankee Sta- dium have a retractable roof? If it did, then Friday’s suspen- sion of Game 1 of the ALDS would not have happened. The rain that threatened play dur- ing the resumption of Game 1 Saturday would have bounced harmlessly off the roof. So, too, would the drops that pelted when he struck out in the ninth inning of Sunday’s Game 2. Rain delays? Gone. Rainouts? None. Trying to figure out whether to go to the stadium or stay home when you spent hundreds of dollars on tickets? A thing of the past. Stadiums built for the Yan- kees and Mets cost more than $2 billion. So why didn’t any- one think to put lids on the darn things? It turns out retractable domes were part of the new sta- dium planning for both teams. NEWSDAY PHOTO / J. CONRAD WILLIAMS JR. Ten years ago. But not for the Like , Comerica Park in Detroit doesn’t have a roof, but luckily it wasn’t raining at start of last night’s ALDS Game 3. stadiums that opened in 2009. In 2001, then-Mayor unveiled a nonbinding Dome sweet dome agreement with the Steinbren- The six baseball teams with retractable roof stadiums: CAN YOU PICTURE THAT? ners and Wilpons for new stadi- Team Stadium Year Opened/To Open ums during his last days in of- Toronto Blue Jays Rogers Centre 1989 fice. Retractable roofs were Arizona D-backs Chase Field 1998 DETROIT — Artist’s renderings of Yankee Stadium with part of the deal. Seattle Mariners Safeco Field 1999 a retractable roof that were prepared in 2001 are available But new Mayor Michael Houston Astros Minute Maid Park 2000 for viewing on a website called stadiumpage.com. www.newsday.com Bloomberg quickly scuttled Milwaukee Brewers Miller Park 2001 Click on the link for “Unrealized Concepts.” It’s a treasure that agreement after taking of- Florida Marlins* New Marlins Ballpark 2012 trove of ballparks that never happened around North Ameri- fice, citing the city’s damaged ca. economy after the 9/11 attacks. *Will change name to Miami Marlins and move into new ballpark next Included are renderings of a Mets stadium with a retract- When the stadium deal resur- season. able roof; a stadium the Mets proposed for New York’s failed faced a few years later, the bid to win the 2012 Summer Olympics; a Yankees stadium in roofs were gone. Manhattan with the Empire State Building in the back- “There were some render- ed price tag of $1.3 billion. look like Yankee Stadium. All ground; a Meadowlands baseball stadium, and Branch Rick- 2011 4, OCTOBER TUESDAY, NEWSDAY, ings early on that had a dome, But for the late Yankees the attention would be drawn ey’s design for a domed stadium for the Dodgers but really they were just ren- owner George Steinbrenner, it to the roof. from 1956. derings,” Yankees president was more than just a cost issue, “Rainouts were never really — ANTHONY RIEBER Randy Levine said yesterday in Levine said. a problem. We always had two a telephone interview. “The “The Boss very much want- or three. This year is a freak real plans that led to the new ed it to look like the original year. To try and basically shoe- weather this season, home and Yankees were scheduled to stadium — a roof was never re- Yankee Stadium and have all horn in that — because of the away, including nine postpone- play the Tigers last night in ally contemplated.” the tradition and everything in- freak weather this year, we ments and one suspended play- ALDS Game 3, Levine refer- Money, of course, was part volving Yankee Stadium,” Le- should have had a roof — off game. And many other enced a character from a clas- of the reason the tops were vine said. “No matter how doesn’t make sense. This was a games were played in condi- sic comic strip. popped. Levine said it would many architects and engineers very, very unusual, freaky tions that ranged from less “Wherever we go,” Levine have added about $350 million you went to see, a roof is a year.” than ideal to awful. said. “Remember L’il Abner? to the cost of Yankee Stadium, giant physical thing and you And how. The Yankees have Told that it was drizzling yes- Joe Btfsplk with the black rain which already had an estimat- couldn’t make the building had 23 games affected by terday in Detroit, where the cloud over him? That’s us.”