Posted by Ryan McGee
OMAHA, Neb. -- There's a giant hole in the middle of Omaha.
In the center of a municipal triangle formed by the still-new downtown hotels, the still-new Qwest Center arena and an almost-finished very long mural depicting the very long history of Omaha, there is a giant moon crater of a hole.
AP Photo/Nati Harnik
TD Ameritrade Park Omaha will open for CWS play in 2011.
In two years, that's the spot where the College World Series will be played. And the hole? It will have been swapped out, moved a few miles south to the corner of 13th Street and Bob Gibson Boulevard.
That's where Rosenblatt Stadium sits now.
"You try not to be all glum about it," admits CWS official scorer Lou Spry. Spry's right hand has recorded every CWS pitch, hit and run since 1981, from Miami's Grand Illusion to the end of Robin Ventura's 58-game hitting streak. "But I'm going to miss this old place, and if everyone here is honest with you, they are too -- even the folks who have pushed for the new stadium."
The new $128 million ballpark already has a name, TD Ameritrade Park Omaha, thanks to a sponsorship deal with the locally based online stockbroker. Architectural drawings of the new park are all over Omaha, from a giant sign at the construction site to posters in hotel lobbies to a sparkling display at the Omaha Welcome Center that greets those arriving at Eppley Airfield.
Rising from the big downtown hole will be cascading staircases and a 32-foot brick veneer with "glazing" over the openings at street level so fans can see the action inside from the street. There will be 26 luxury suites, 1,000 club seats and a 360 degree walk-around concourse. There also will be better sight lines and, unlike Rosenblatt, the grandstands aren't likely to start taking on water like a leaky canoe every time it rains.
Sounds impressive. … Well, at least to some it does.
"How are they going to re-create this?"
The question is asked by Steve Rosenblatt, son of Johnny -- as in Johnny Rosenblatt Stadium. The younger Blatt lives in Arizona now, but he always makes it back home to Omaha for the opening weekend of the CWS.
During his run as a longtime O-Town politician, he could see the end of his father's stadium coming long before it actually happened. Now he can't go anywhere without being asked about it.
"I have no doubts that the new stadium will be great," Steve Rosenblatt said. "But it won't be the same. The modern amenities will be fantastic, and after a while we'll get used to it. However, the atmosphere of this neighborhood will be impossible to replicate."
A big part of that atmosphere is provided by the 90-year-old fingers of organist Lambert Bartak, who has rocked The Blatt gently with his 1935 Hammond organ nearly since the ballpark first opened its doors as Municipal Stadium in 1949. During every seventh-inning stretch, Bartak rouses the crowd awake with yet another rendition of "Take Me Out To The Ballgame," and it rewards him every time with a hearty round of applause when his face pops up in the giant TV screen in left field.
"I don't know if they'll have room for an old man and his organ in the new stadium or not," Bartak said with a wink. "If they call, I'll show up. But perhaps they will forgive me if I accidentally drive out here to the south side of town for the first few games. It'll take a while to undo that habit."
Ryan McGee is a senior writer at ESPN The Magazine. His new book, "The Road To Omaha: Hits, Hopes and History at the College World Series," which chronicles the excitement and passion of the CWS, is now available.
ESPN.com Staff
