That’s right. I hadn’t thought of that. I had my cap until recently, and it was ugly. I used it to paint with. One of the few that survived that night.
Haha, you actually painted with a painters cap? Nice. You are a rules-follower. To further clarify my memory of that game, it's not as if everyone lit their caps on fire. It was really just one pile of caps set ablaze in the upper deck. I mean, still, that is something of note but it wasn't some sort of stadium-wide phenomena. I certainly didn't burn my hat. But- I didn't save it for future painting chores either. PS - Love your updated avi of senior citizen Joe Willie.
Exactly! My first football game was a Giant game at the old Yankee stadium. It was cold as hell and I sat behind a metal beam that helped hold up the upper deck. Shea was built in the 60's. Like most contemporary structures built in the 60's Shea had the architectural embodiment of the time that was a reflection of a bad acid trip. It was a terrible football stadium built for baseball and to reflect the design of the early 60's. 60's architecture was so bad that people across the globe have fallen back in love with mid-century modern architecture of the 50's. The good part was the actual team. Giant stadium was actually built to watch football. It was spartan but there literally wasn't a bad seat in the stadium. Met life was built for the comfort of the few at the expense of the many. I'm confident that in the next socialist revolution it will be torn down as an edifice to greed and debouchery, reminiscent of the viomitoriums the rich Romans built so they can eat and drink themselves into oblivion and have a place to puke that they wouldn't step in on the way to the urinal in the middle of the night.
While we're at it throwing out stories of Good Old Shea, that MNF game on 10/15/79 was special to me since it was my first year with season tickets, and I was still in High School. I was thrilled to convince my parents that it was OK for me and three friends to drive to Queens on a school night. Perfectly safe event for us 17 year olds in suburban Union County, NJ What could go wrong? We all know it was a rowdy crowd. I can attest to seeing several fights, the worst of which was not the fight itself but it's after effects. Leaving the stadium on a ramp, the crowd was backed up and moving slowly, parting around a man lying face-down with blood trickling away from the body. Nothing to see here, keep moving... But, my favorite memory that night was a fan who climbed out of Row 1, Section 1 of the Loge seats behind where home plate was. He climbed out on top of the screen that's used for baseball, and was bouncing on it like a trampoline. The crowd loved it! They went crazy! For about a minute... I mean, every act gets stale. You gotta know when to get off the stage when things are going well. So, you could've guessed what was coming. All it took was for somebody to throw one thing down at him from either the mezzanine or upper deck to ignite a fury of debris shower reigning down on the poor bastard. He had to assume a prone-position, lying on his stomach, hands covering the back of his head. (In those days there were plenty of cans and bottles in the stadium.) Maybe he was the same guy lying the same way on the exit ramp. I wouldn't put it past the cops to have taken a few shots at him and leaving him there. Then that same season several weeks later, a lawnmower entertained us at halftime. On the bright side the Jets won both games. What a year.
Here's a little history as to how Shea came about...and why the Dodgers moved to LA from Brooklyn I had always heard that Robert Moses had something to do with Shea Stadium. Somehow after reading this, I saw some similarities to what just happened to our new West Side Palace.
A few small details. We were tied with Buffalo for first place in the division when the game started. The crowd was loud and energetic! The high point of the game, for the Jets, was when we kicked off the ball to start it. It went downhill from there. At halftime, about 2/3’s of the crowd went home, I forget the score, many from the upper deck set fire to their hats and threw them onto the lower level. Luckily, I was sitting in the 3rd row so I didn’t get pelted. After halftime, it REALLY got ugly. That’s when all the real s... started to happen. As a footnote, I believe that it was also the first game where a blowup sex doll was released into the crowd. That went on for about 2 seasons so I guess they finally caught the guy responsible. Also, I remember seeing a guy trying to put out the fire (there were multiples that I could see) with his personal fire hose. Security changed dramatically after that game.
Not that there's a competition between the two games but for anyone interested here's the lead paragraph (complete with typo in the score) from the NY Times the morning after the first Monday night home game in New York on 10/15/79: Jets Defeat Vikings by 14‐7 By Gerald Eskenazi The New York debut of Monday Night Football ended with a 19 - 7 Jets' victory over Minnesota, with more than a dozen fans sent to hospitals, with three security guards injured, with two fans arrested and with more than thirty fans suffering from cuts, bruises and more serious injuries. The rest is hidden behind the paywall but it surely sets the scene for the evening's entertainment. Talk about a box score! Anyone with NYT access care to share?
For Ralebird Jets Defeat Vikings by 14‐7 By Gerald Eskenazi The New York debut of Monday Night Football ended last night with a 19‐7 Jets’ victory over Minnesota, with more than a dozen fans sent to hospitals, with three security guards injured, with two fans arrested and with more than 30 spectators suffering from cuts, bruises and more serious injuries. The gun sounded with Burgess Owens picking off a desperation alleyoop pass by Tommy Kramer — — the Vikings’ seventh turnover of the game — and dashing off the field ahead of a charging mob of happy Jet fans. Owens was so excited, he said later, that he did not even know there were about a hundred shouting youngsters chasing him. But Richard Todd was aware of the fans and their signs, most of which demanded that Matt Robinson take over as quarterback. He was not commanding, and the only score by the offense came from only 18 yards out after the Jets’ Tim Moresco had recovered a fumbled punt return. But there was a certain defiance in that touchdown, for Todd himself took the ball over from the 3 on an option play. Triumphantly, even before he had reached the goal line, Todd raised the ball high over his head. “No, it wasn't an I‐told‐you‐so gesture to the fans,” he contended later. “I knew I was in. I just wanted to raise it.” For the fourth time in the last five games the defense held the opponents’ running game to fewer than 70 yards. A major reason is that everyone passes against the Jets. And Kramer did from _he beginning, hurling the ball 48 times, and hitting on 28 to pick up 270 yards. Szaro: Hits and Misses But many of his passes were “underneath,” in front of the secondary, away from the sidelines. And many others went to his running backs, who could do little damage. And four of his passes were intercepted. One of them resulted in Shafer Suggs’ first touchdown in the N.F.L., a 32‐yard run in the third quarter that resulted in a 14‐0 lead after Richie Szaro kicked his second conversion. Szaro also kicked two field‐goal attempts, but they were low and missed. It was his first game as a New Yorker since 1967, when he left St. Francis Prep, where he set a city schoolboy career scoring record, for Harvard.
Shea Stadium the home of a World Championship The down side because it was the Mets home as well & they had written into the lease that NO football could be played at Shea until the baseball season was over. I remember that 1 year we had to wait 5/6 weeks until the BB season was over The bathroom scene until Hess finally brought in porta potties was challenging to say the least Parking inside Shea required getting there 2 hours or so before game time because there was limited parking within Shea itself Since I lived in NJ about 30 miles from the M/lands I was quite happy that Hess finally took that step I was there from 65 until they closed the joint
I will say the area surrounding Shea was sketchy at best.. Most times I was on the 7 IRT but when I drove, we would cruise the surrounding areas for free parking. Usually meant a decent walk too. Reminded me of Hunts Point (Bronx) back in the day...
Thanks for posting this. A lot of errors in the original article along with some old-fashioned terminology. Alleyoop pass ?? Sounds more like 1949 lol..... I think the Jets intercepted four passes that night. The following Sunday they would pick off Kenny Stabler five times in another win.
Excellent, Thanks. It looks like to get the rest of the story one would need to check both the box score and the police blotter.
I like how the majority is calling the old stadium The Meadowlands. It was Giant Stadium. Hated sharing and still hate it until this day. Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
It was a deadly lawnmower https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2014/08/27/a-drone-once-killed-a-fan-at-an-nfl-game/
