I still remember my first Twins game a quarter of a century ago, in the blue embrace of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome. I learned two truths that day: that Kent Hrbek was the greatest man alive, and that the New York Yankees were the pure distillation of evil. (I still tend to be a bit manichean in my sporting outlook.) I also learned that ice cream is somehow better when served in a baseball helmet. But even after a lot of years of fond memories of the Humptydome I was really looking forward to outdoor baseball, seats that faced home plate with unobstructed views and just in general not watching baseball in the air-conditioned corner of a football stadium. I'd been dying for a year to get a look inside the limestone walls of the new place, our first real baseball stadium in my lifetime (besides Midway Stadium). Still, thinking back to that first game I probably should have expected it, but I was surprised on opening day by how much I missed the old place.
After the yawning expanse of the Humptydome where on a clear day you could sort of make out Torri Hunter under the giant wall of folded up seats in the outfield, Target Field just feels really small. I used to wonder how in the hell Jim Thome and Justin Morneau could hit the upper deck in right field, but Jason Kubel's homer on opening day just seemed like it had no trouble clearing the wall. It will take a while to grow on me, this cozy little field with its beautiful facade and Minnesota fir trees in the outfield, but it's already seducing me with the promise of fresh air and ample bathrooms. It's a new experience going to a sporting event in Minnesota where nobody shouts "Shoulder to shoulder, squeeze in!" while I'm urinating (and nobody giving me odd looks for standing shoulder to shoulder when it's not crowded).
There are still some teething troubles to opening a place like Target Field, like the complete and total lack of signs at the perimeter telling you which way the various gates are, and it took me a few innings for the food court to get their act together and get the lines moving, but it's too early to whine about that, even for me. And it is nice to have a properly designed building where getting in and out of a seat doesn't include pushing through a crowd and climbing 300 steps, getting out doesn't involve a crash course in claustrophobia and hoping the 9-year old I've brought doesn't get swept out to 5th street by the mob.
I've started to think that after the envious trips I've taken to Wrigley Field and Comiskey Park and Fenway to see the Twins, wishing we had real baseball in Minnesota not played on carpet, this game may have just felt too much like a road game and not quite like home. But it was a beautiful day and a nice win, and every time I looked at the Twins pennants flapping in left field, I was reminded of how much I loved watching the teams that won those division titles and the World Series teams (I missed the 1965 American League champs). Watching those real pennants get hoisted for the first time in Minnesota, it was a bit like winning them all over again, and it brought Hrbek's unlikely gracefulness, Kirby's crazy energy, Johan's killer change-up, Bert's wise-ass friendly rivalry with Frankie V and everything that made those teams into the new building.
The only thing I'd change is while it was nice to see the five retired numbers all come out together to the mound (with Kirby jr. taking his dad's place), I think they should have come out wearing their red Twins Sages robes with their numbers on the back, because that commercial still cracks me up.
So welcome home, Twins.
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