Clearly the San Francisco Examiner reads the Giants newsgroup, because days after Richard solicted group members for material for this article, the Examiner began soliciting readers for material for a similar article. That's enough evidence right there that EEEEEE!'s got the goods....

Warmest thanks and regards to Richard and Julie for their efforts on this article.-- GP

Candlestick Park first opened in 1960, with the then-Vice President of the United States throwing out the first ball and proclaiming the stadium the finest in baseball. It's hard to blame Richard Nixon for this; he was, after all, running for president at the time, and flattering Candlestick Park could not be considered any more reprehensible in political terms than kissing an ugly baby. The August 1961 issue of Harper's magazine expressed a viewpoint that seems more believable in retrospect. It included an article with the apt title of "How Not to Build a Ballpark."

And yet, for all of the deserved scorn and disdain that has been piled on Candlestick/3Com Park in the 40 years since it first opened, there is one indisputable fact that cannot be forgotten: For most Giants fans, this is the only place their favorite team has ever called home. Many fell in love with the franchise as young visitors to that frigid edifice, and they never understood until many years later that baseball was supposed to be a comfortable, summer sport, not an Arctic-like ordeal of survival. Those early memories, as well as exciting moments in recent times, provide satisfying nostalgic backdrops to significant portions of their lives.

With Candlestick now in its last year before giving way to Pac Bell Park, many of the participants of alt.sports.baseball.sf-giants, the Giants' Usenet newsgroup, have written down some of those memories. First games, worst games, best games, funniest games -- these memories (while not always 100% in line with actual history) provide a fitting kind of tribute for a place like Candlestick Park. Many long years from now, when the stadium is finally and deservedly consigned to the trash heap of architectural and sporting history, memories like these will probably help to rehabilitate the stadium's memory in a way that its actual existence could never do. Read on and get a sense of what our future nostalgic ramblings will probably sound like.

Candlestick was not often a good place to watch a ball game, but like everything else from our youth, it was wonderful because it was ours. We had fun, we had thrills, we damn near froze to death. We all hope that Pac Bell Park will give as much to us and our children. Please hold the hypothermia, though.

by Tom Austin

My family moved from Denver to Southern California on Flag Day, June 14, 1966. We got off a United Airlines DC-8 in San Francisco, bought a Beetle that my brother is still driving, and stashed ourselves with Grandma while Dad went south to rent a house for us. I was five years old, and I became a Giants fan that summer, although I wouldn't know who the Giants, or Willie Mays, were until a year or so later. It's a San Francisco thing, I think.

The next year, Dad introduced us to All-Star Baseball, the board game from Cadaco, and a lifetime of Giants fanhood burst forth. By the time I was 10, I was completely hooked. It was now 1971, and we were well ensconced behind the Orange Curtain in Garden Grove. But we still visited Daly City and my mother's parents several times a year. It was on one of those trips that we decided to take in a game at the 'Stick. I would finally get to see my idols in person!

We got to the park and bought some cheap seats in the left-center bleachers. (My always-frugal dad picked the seats.) This was back when the whole field was Astroturf, and the outfield fences were chain-link. From my seat, hopefully I would watch Say Hey climb the nearby fence and rob a Pirate of a homer.

I eagerly opened my scorebook and licked my pencil when the PA announcer announced the lineup for "YOUR San Francisco Giants!" I had been a Giant fan behind enemy lines for five years, and now the announcer was saying "YOUR San Francisco Giants" in front of a massive crowd of, oh, 12,000 people! Was I ever stoked.

You might be expecting a reverent run through the lineup of that magic day, and if you are, I'll have to disappoint you. I don't remember the lineup. More precisely, I remember exactly one thing about the lineup:

Willie Mays was not in it.

It took me a minute to believe it was real, and another for my dad to explain that sometimes 40-year-old bodies needed some rest, especially for a day game after a night game. Bobby Bonds was out there, and so was McCovey, and I wouldn't be surprised if Perry was pitching (no, I would have remembered Marichal). No Willie in center. I think maybe Ken Henderson was out there that day.

I do remember borrowing the binocs and scanning, for minutes at a time, the Giant bench 400 feet away, trying to pick out Willie. I think I did, but none of the tiny little bodies so far away was doing much. The Giants won the game 8-7, and it was a great game, but I just remember the shock of slowly realizing he really, really wasn't going to play today. I also knew that 40 was pretty old in baseball terms, and that we lived in an AL city.

I never saw Willie play in the flesh, either. Saw Hank Aaron hit Number 750 as a pudgy Brewer DH (line shot to left-center), saw Stretch McCovey's last Dodger Stadium homer (a Grand Salami, no less) but I never saw Willie.

I'm almost over it.

by Richard Plumb

I grew up on the East Coast, so going to Candlestick was impossible.

Usually my dad would bring our whole family down to Shea Stadium once a year to see the Giants play the Mets (my brother's favorite team). This was the late '60s/early '70s. My all-time favorite game was Willie Mays' first game with the Mets. With a full stadium, he hit a game-winning home run, an incredibly exciting moment. Even though it beat the Giants, for that one game it was all right.

My mother, who was a high school English teacher, received a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to go to summer seminars for three years. In 1973 NEH held the seminars at St. Mary's College in Moraga, Calif., which is in the East Bay somewhere. She brought my two sisters and me with her that summer. We drove across country with another teacher and two of her children. It was a really long drive, much of which we spent listening to the Watergate hearings, but we also saw some great sights along the way.

My mother, who was also a big baseball fan, knew how much I wanted to go to a game. Since she couldn't take off a weekday, she helped me figure out how to get into San Francisco and find my way to the stadium. On that day she drove me to catch a Greyhound bus and I was on my way. Unfortunately, I was not very well prepared for the trip. At the bus's first stop in San Francisco a bunch of people got off, including several with Giants caps. I think I should have exited there, but I was clueless.

I eventually got off at the main Greyhound terminal. I asked a bunch of people there how to get to Candlestick Park; none of them knew. It was a couple of hours until game time, so I decided I'd start walking and maybe I'd find the bus and, well, I didn't think of any other alternative.

At this point in my life, I had an incredible memory and actually had a pretty fair map of the city in my head. I didn't come across any bus. I walked and walked and walked and finally got to a point where I figured that, if I turned left, I should come upon the stadium. Unfortunately, it was a slight miscalculation.

After a couple of blocks, I walked by a garden apartment with a bunch of black teenagers sitting on the stoop. They yelled, "Hey, honky, what are you doing here?" I tried to ignore them. They might have thrown some stuff at me, i.e., sticks and rocks, but I can't remember. I continued to ignore them. A short time later, they ran up to me. I could no longer ignore them. Just at that moment, a black guy dressed in leather came roaring up on a big Harley and told me to get out of there and told the black teens to leave me alone.

I was walking off, thinking I'd escaped whatever harm was to befall me, when I heard steps and these same kids ran up to me again. I knew they wanted to take what money I had, so I put my right hand in a fist in my pocket. They told me to take it out and I didn't. One of them then took out his metal Afro pick and slashed my right arm several times. I took my hand out of my pocket, but kept it balled up. Another of them then started biting my hand to try to force me to open it up. Man, did that hurt. I yanked my hand away and finally ran. I ran until I couldn't run anymore. They didn't chase after me.

I now had no idea where I was, but I figured I needed to head south. I walked a few blocks and crested a hill and there was Candlestick, shining like a beacon off in the distance. I had to cross through some heavily industrialized areas, but got there with no more problems. I paid my $2 or $2.50 to get in general admission. After I walked through the gate, I looked down at my arm and it was covered with blood. After a quick stop in the restroom to clean it up, I went out to the field. It was still the first inning. I enjoyed a fine rest of the afternoon. The Giants won 7-1 over the Cubs, as I recall. That was when the field was totally Astroturfed and the outfield consisted of Matthews, Bonds and Maddux. What a team.

Afterward, I asked people how to get back. Thanks to them, I was able to catch the proper bus back to the Greyhound station. That was certainly my most adventurous trip to Candlestick.

by Todd Hawley

Best memory: Probably the games I went to in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Back then, I was a boy living in Los Angeles, and my mom and I would come up every summer to visit relatives in the Bay Area. Candlestick looked different back then -- way more open, of course -- you could look out and see the bay. And there were those old 75-cent bleacher seats; I never sat out there, but I always remembered seeing them. Of course, how could you ever forget how dang cold it could be on a windy July day?

I remember going to a game in 1970 right after it was announced they were adding seats to the 'Stick. They had removed the bleachers and had a tarp over the area where they had been. Willie Mays wound up hitting a home run that landed right where they had been. My granddad took me to some Giants games in the late 1960s, and in those three games, I got to see the two Willies in their prime. What a great experience!

There was something about seeing games in that era which was totally different from today's game. I remember in those days, the public address announcer had this deep booming voice, and it seemed like he mumbled half the names he announced. While I wasn't at any of these games, I remember watching classic Dodger-Giant games on TV, with Juan Marichal on the mound staring down at the Dodgers and the fog rolling in in the background. Ah yes, the fog. Another thing I'll always remember about Candlestick.

Worst memory: This would have to be Game Three of the 1989 World Series when the Loma Prieta earthquake struck! I still remember that night so vividly. I got out to the stadium by BART and a shuttle. The guy I went with was in high school at the time and we got there about 4:30 p.m. It was an unusually warm day, typical of early October. I still remember hearing them play "What Is Hip" by Tower of Power over the loudspeakers, and all the scoreboards flashing "GO GIANTS!" over and over, not to mention some drunk guy, dressed all in black, yelling insults. There was another cheer, and then we all heard a rumbling, which at first we thought was from people stomping their feet.

A collective gasp went up when we realized it was an earthquake. I remember thinking I was a sitting duck, and all I could do was just ride it out and hope the stands held! I sat in the section next to the one where the stairs cracked, in the upper deck of left field. I remember watching people run from the top of the stadium when the shaking started and not understanding why. Then I saw the cement pilings at the top of the stadium shaking and thought "Ohhhhh shit!" To this day, I still look at them a little warily when I'm at a game. When the shaking stopped, we all let out a huge cheer!

I looked across the field and the flagpole still was shaking! There was a guy who volunteered to put orange and black bunting up around the light stands, and apparently he was on one when it hit. He later said that he just grabbed hold of the light stand and threw up! I also remember the small scoreboards around the stadium; the boxes had totally filled up with light; that was before the power went out!

All of the people in the stands were just kind of looking at each other and trying like hell to find out any information. The way I found out the game had been canceled was by some twentysomething guy listening to the radio telling me. I went back and got my friend and another guy who was on Muni riding to the game when it hit. He hadn't felt it!

After marveling at how the 'Stick stood firm through Loma Prieta, I never again could speak too badly of the place!

Interesting/funny stories: Hmmmm... I can remember a Dodgers-Giants game in the late 1980s when Tommy Lasorda came out to talk to his pitcher and they played a Porky Pig monologue over the loudspeaker. One thing about Lasorda: As big an ass as he could be at times, whenever the Giants fans booed him, he'd just wave at them! That took some chutzpah!

I was at a game in 1994 against the Marlins when Matt Williams hit a grand slam. That's the only time I've ever seen a grand slam live. The guy who sat next to me that evening told me about seeing a Giants doubleheader in 1962 against the Mets when the Giants annihilated them; Mays and McCovey both had field days against the expansion team's pitching.

I went to a post-strike game in 1995 against the Phillies, got an upper-deck seat and had the whole section of seats to myself. I looked across the way to the bleachers where some kids had a homemade "Free Mumia" sign up (Mumia, of course, being Mumia Abu-Jamal, the journalist convicted of murdering a police officer in Philadelphia).

Another memory I have is from 1992, when it looked like the Giants were headed for Tampa. I went to a Dodgers-Giants game near the end of that season because I wanted to say I had been to one last game at the 'Stick before they moved. It was a dreary game, as both teams were awful that season.

One other memory I have is of my dad in 1964 paying a couple of my cousins (who were not sports fans) to go to a Giants game at the 'Stick that was being televised, and to hold up a homemade sign advertising Chevrolet cars. My dad at the time worked for an ad agency in L.A. and Chevrolet was one of his big accounts. I remember watching the game with my dad and, sure enough, Channel 2 (yes, they did the games even back then) showed the sign!

That's about it. I guess I will miss the 'Stick; remember, it is the second oldest National League ballpark.

by Ed Yarnell

Best memories of the 'Stick:

1. The last two Dodger games in 1997 were an absolute blast. Brian Johnson's extra-inning home run will never be forgotten.

2. Joe Morgan's three-run homer that knocked the Dodgers out of the race.

3. The sound of "BEAT L.A." traveling through the stadium.

4. Waiting and watching the players exit the stadium and cheering them on.

5. The Bleacher Creatures.

I have always loved Candlestick Park and will miss it greatly. Everything about it: the cold brisk wind, the thick evening fog, and even the smell of the garlic fries.

by David Andrew Leonardo Marasco

Since I now live in Chicago, I don't get out to the 'Stick much anymore. But in my time, I saw nearly 150 games at the old barn, so yes, I have memories....

Best memories:

• A game in September '89 where the Reds put up a pair of runs in the top of the 14th, only to have the Giants push three across in the bottom half. (I went to an A's game earlier in the day, so saw about 2.5 games that day.)

• Atlee Hammaker coming up with a big K against Jack Clark in the '87 NLCS. Heck, every second of the three '89 NLCS games.

• Seeing Willie Mac put one into the upper deck in right, just a few feet foul in an old-timer's game.

• Getting flipped off by both Eric Davis and Kal Daniels in one game.

• Jumping out of the bleachers and chasing down home run balls. (I'm a small guy and always got pushed out of the way, so I never did get one.)

• Kelly Downs tossing a one- or two-hitter, facing the minimum against the Padres back in '88. Bob Brenly hitting a home run on the last day of the '87 season to break the team record for club homers. Matt Williams' first home run.

• Mike Schmidt's last game.

• "OOO-REEE-BAY!" Chili breaking his bats over his knee. One Flap Down.

There are more, but this is what jumped to the surface right away.

Worst memories:

• Game 4, 1987 NLCS, couldn't keep the Cards off the base paths.

• Most games involving Atlee Hammaker.

• Candy Maldonado breaking his finger in '87 (yeah, hard to conceive that losing Candy would be considered a bummer).

• Opening Day, 1988.

• Wow, I guess they are right about time healing all wounds, I can't bring back a lot of the really painful ones. Oh yeah, the first game after Jose Uribe's wife died in childbirth.

First game: I was maybe 8 or 9, so this would place us around 1980. I had lived in SoCal, but since my mother grew up in Brooklyn, we'd only go to Angels' games (not giving Mr. O'Malley any of her money, no way!). In any case, we moved north and after a while got a hankering for a baseball game. It was a night game. In the bleachers. Against the Dodgers.

What I remember about my first game at the 'Stick has nothing to do with the game itself. I'd really like to pin down the date to find out if I saw McCovey in his twilight, but even if I did, it wouldn't matter -- I don't remember anything on the playing field. I remember the riot police. I remember that we moved to different seats about once an inning because fights kept breaking out. I remember lots of smoke bombs. I was convinced that drinking and swearing were the key additions to the National League version of the game, not some baloney about pitchers batting. Needless to say, I had a great time. I've been going ever since....

Funny stories: A lot of these were "you had to be there" type things, but:

• A guy collecting money for the "Atlee Hammaker Fan Club" on the bus home after a real stinkeroo by Atlee.

• Going to the Fan Management Office (or whatever the heck it is called) with about a dozen ticket stubs from different sections, same date, and asking for Croix de Candlesticks. "You sat in all of these seats, yes?"

• Me and about half the bleachers missing a decent pitching duel because there was a woman with a miniskirt and nothing on underneath in our section. (Maybe this should be with the happy memories rather than funny memories.)

• Noticing early in the season that Brett Butler would either fake the bunt or attempt the bunt on the second pitch of each at-bat. Winning some money on this, only to be let down the one time I had a big bet riding on it.

• Getting 15 hot dogs from a vendor (buying for friends). Every time he'd see me after that he'd say, "Two?!? What's up with the diet?"

• Eric Davis smacking Krukow's balloon pitch about a mile and a half (you gotta be a real Giants fan to remember the balloon pitch).

• Sign from supposed last S.F./L.A. game in 1992 -- "Let's face it, we both suck." (The sad thing is that the sign was right.)

• Kevin Mitchell falling down and giving up an inside-the-park grand slam.

The one thing that made Candlestick for me (and is no longer true, thanks to the revamped bleachers) was the walk into the ballpark from the bleachers gate. You had to climb up those stairs, and it was in the part of the stadium where you could see "underground," sort of like being in a cave. But, because your eyes had adjusted to the low light level by the time you reached the top, you were greeted by the greenest field and bluest sky you ever saw. Even when I had good seats, I would come in via the bleachers just for that. Quite a thrill.

Since moving to Chicago I've seen maybe 70 or 80 games at Wrigley, maybe 100 at New Comiskey and about a dozen in Milwaukee. I've sat through actual blizzards with snow falling on the field, thinking, "I used to whine about being cold at the 'Stick?" Some of these parks are nicer than Candlestick, but for me baseball will always be a sunny Saturday in the old bleachers at the 'Stick, Caveman on the mound, Will, Robby and Matty, and a long bus ride home.

by Rob Hedges

My memory falls under the "first game" category. First Giants game, second MLB game ever, September 1988. Giants vs. Dodgers. Atlee vs. Orel, which is basically all you need to know right there.

I wasn't really a baseball fan yet; I didn't fall in love with the Giants until '89 (and I've stuck with them since then, so I'm not really a bandwagon-jumper anymore, right?). Late in the season; the Giants were pretty much out of it, so the only people at the 'Stick were the diehards and drunks. What I remember most, of course, is the bitter, bitter cold. The Giants did their best, but Orel was in the middle of his scoreless-innings streak. The drunks were giving him tons of unrepeatable (but unfunny) below-the-belt abuse. A sad night for our boys, but I guess I can say I witnessed a few innings of history.

I remember many other games, of course: the last game in '92 and then the first one in '93, one insane night game in the early '90s when I was sitting literally in the top row, upper deck, first-base line opposite the hill -- the wind was howling, fog was pouring at remarkable speed down the hill and over the field. We were laughing at how strange it looked. The next day Hank Greenwald referred to it as "Science Fiction Night."

by Gregg Pearlman

My folks first took me to a game in 1967 or '68, when I was seven. I had only a mild interest in baseball yet and didn't know who the players were beyond the Giants' names I'd heard on the radio most of my life, though I knew (while knowing so little about them) that my favorite players were Mays, McCovey, and Marichal.

The Giants beat the Reds that night, 4-0, I think, but my folks decided we'd beat it around 9:30, figuring that was late enough to keep me up. (I laugh now, since my five-year-old son routinely conks out later than I do.) I remember watching Willie Mays stand next to Lee May during batting practice, and noting the similarity of their names.

I never went back with my parents as a kid, but I did get to a couple more games with the Cub Scouts. One of these began with a Maury Wills home run for the Dodgers (during which we were buying tickets); the Giants overcame that, however. In fact, I was probably 11 or 12 before ever attending a game that they lost.

I went to a game for my birthday in 1970, and watched McCovey put one over that strange little roof thing they had in right field. Even got some autographs, the last time I ever tried that.

I've been to, I don't know, a couple hundred games at the 'Stick, maybe just a hundred, and I've seen a lot of great games, including the home sweep of the Cubs in the 1989 NLCS. I also saw Game Three of the World Series -- the one that actually got played, to my chagrin.

For a while, there, between 1988 and 1990, it was my habit, along with Dave Beck and our friend Pat Stadille, to take a tape recorder and a few blank cassettes to the ballpark and "broadcast" the game on "KPBN, Your Partisan Broadcast Network." Dave and I played it straight -- God love ya, Dave, but you were brutal; I wasn't great, to be sure, but I sure was better than you -- but Pat adopted various identities, especially that of Ron Fairly. Pat didn't sound much like Ron, but he'd picked up Ron's dumb little expressions and kind of halting, inept style, and elevated it to high comedy.

So there we were, in our late 20s (in theory, mature people) doing play-by-play and color, as if we were 13 again. Tremendous fun. I wouldn't be comfortable doing that now, though, I don't think. And I certainly couldn't do that anywhere but at Candlestick.

As "broadcasters," we had great luck: a doubleheader sweep of the Braves in 1988, as well as Dennis Cook shutting out the Dodgers on Fan Appreciation Day; Pat and I also called the Giants sweeping a pair from the Cubs. The only loss we ever broadcast was at the hands of the Reds in 1989, and this one involved just Dave and me. Eric Davis hit a ninth-inning home run off Goose Gossage, and from there the broadcast degenerated into lots and lots and lots of swearing.

Over the years I've seen or experienced lots of great moments, or at least interesting ones: a triple play in 1997, Ernest Riles going deep for the Giants' 10,000th franchise home run, a player (Mel Rojas) being blindsided by a coach (Bob Brenly), the only inning Robby Thompson played shortstop in the major leagues, the time a pitcher pinch-hit for a position player, the first pinch-hit home run by a pitcher in 20 years (these were two different moments), Gary Park being booed for booting a grounder during the Miller Lite All-Star Game in 1984, Will Clark tripling off the wall for the Olympic team that same day, Tom Browning breaking his nose with his own foul ball and then staying in the game after being stitched while lying on the field, meeting Hank Greenwald a couple of times...I can't think of them all.

What's really made it for me, for the most part, is the company. I've been fortunate enough to attend games with friends and family, and two of my favorite occasions have involved alt.sports.baseball.sf-giants gatherings.

This is not to say that there have been no bad moments at the 'Stick, however. I watched both Joel Youngblood (1987) and Terry Mulholland (1988) break an arm; I've seen horrific defeats snatched not from the jaws, but from the stomach, of victory. But the worst moments have involved the park itself and, sometimes, the fans.

After the Giants won the pennant in 1989, it took me two and a half hours to get home to our place in San Francisco. The men's rooms would require days of expert maintenance and huge sums of public funds just to be upgraded to "revolting." (Don't these guys have mothers, for crying out loud? Criminy, this one time, the guy before me peed on all the paper toilet-seat covers, which are mounted about five feet off the ground. What the hell gets into people?)

I've dealt with amazingly snotty ushers, though that was many years ago; evidently they now have a "No Snotty Ushers" policy.

I've seen fights, and once or twice wasn't far from getting into fights. One time this guy had clearly commented on a woman's appearance, which resulted in her pummeling him like a lump of bread dough. I've seen drunken idiots beating the hell out of each other. I, a person who was last in a fistfight at age 9, almost went after one guy who kept hitting me in the back of the head with thrown peanuts and another guy for continually yelling in my ear during the playoffs. The mild-mannered Dave, who hadn't been beaten up in years, nearly clocked someone at a game against the Dodgers. These are pretty scary times, and, call me crazy, I do think you ought to be able to attend a ballgame without fearing for your personal safety.

Overall, though, I like the place. Granted, I've spent time in only four other major league ballparks, so my view is somewhat skewed, but for me, being at the 'Stick is what baseball's supposed to be like, especially when there's tremendous pro-Giants energy in a large crowd, and even more so when the Giants win.

On the other hand, at such time as I'll be permitted to buy tickets to attend games at Pacific Bell Park, I expect to truly enjoy it. I imagine it'll be beautiful, reasonably clean, and featuring mostly good seats. I'm not crazy about the idea of all the 1990s "perks," such as the many luxury-box seats I can't afford, the conference rooms, the museums, the restaurants...this is a baseball stadium, right? But I bet I'll enjoy the product on the field, and that it'll be a nice field on which to enjoy the product.

by Greg Lentz

My favorite Candlestick memory is the Tracy Jones game. Something like seven RBIs on two infield singles and a squibber into the outfield, all with two outs. Plus some really great fans in left field who were relentlessly heckling Kevin McReynolds. ("How does it feel to know you suck, Kevin?" "Don't drop it, Kevin!" I think he did miss one pop fly.)

Then, after he got waived and picked up by the Tigers, I was at an A's-Tigers game and Jones came up with two out and men on second and third. My friend and I turned knowingly to each other, then laughed our asses off when he drove them in.

My worst memory is a Dodgers doubleheader sweep. Not only did they get their asses kicked in both ends, but that game was directly responsible for beer sales stopping after the seventh inning for all games thereafter (which was not a big deal to me).

by Robert Ward

I must be one of the few lucky people to have thrown out a first pitch and played a solo National Anthem at Candlestick in the same season.

The Anthem: Since I play in the San Francisco Symphony, occasionally the PR department needs someone to promote an upcoming event, and they chose me to go and play my horn there before a game. I've been to numerous games, but never had the opportunity to go down on the field, so this was going to be a real treat. First, they give you preferred parking, which is reason enough to do it right there.

I arrived up in the Giants' offices and hooked up with Valerie McGuire, who was in charge of pregame events, and she gave me an office to warm up in. A few minutes before the performance, I went down next to the field and talked to the audio guy, who set up the microphone behind me, since I was playing my French horn, and at the appointed time, out I went to the mound.

As soon as I began to play, I was disconcerted to find that there was a delay of about one to two seconds until I heard myself on the PA system. So I had to try not to listen to myself, but play well at the same time. Very weird. Having heard countless National Anthems over the years, I know that the key to doing it and not frustrating the fans is to do it fast. So many singers dawdle and embellish it to death, and the fans only cheer because it's finally over. But, my plan was that I would hold the high note ("land of the freeeeeee") till they cheered. Which they did.

The First Pitch: This was not quite as successful, but it makes for a better story.

Once again the PR department came calling, and this time it was for a first pitch. Since I pitch on a coed softball league in Berkeley, I was just as opinionated about the many first pitches that I have seen as I was about National Anthems, but this got my brain spinning: what if I mastered a knuckler and faked out the catcher totally -- wouldn't that be great? How about a big old-fashioned overhand bender snapping in over the plate? Or a blazing fastball popping the mitt? Eventually I decided that there was way too much fantasy happening here, and I tried to set my goals a little lower:

1. I would throw it from the mound. None of this halfway-to-home-plate stuff.

2. The ball could not bounce on the way to the plate. It's just not studly to do that.

The moment of truth arrived. It was a night game, and the wind was howling in the stands, but as I walked out to the mound, I was stunned by the power of the hurricane force gale that was swirling around me. I was kind of in a daze, and I saw that it was not a catcher going behind the plate, it was Bud Black, who was on the disabled list. A bit disappointing, but hey, only a minor issue at that point.

I ascended the mound, thinking really of only one thing: Number 2 above; I was going to rip that ball into his glove. As I looked toward the plate, it was as if I were looking through the wrong end of a telescope; Bud looked a million miles away, which only reinforced my macho desire. So I wound up, stepped towards the plate and attempted to plant my foot.

Unfortunately, I stepped down and found only thin air, because I had totally forgotten that I was 12 inches above the field on a mound of dirt. Still, I was throwing as hard as I could and it was too late to stop, so the ball screamed 15 feet over Bud's head and all the way to the backstop. Silence. Then a massive cheer/laugh rose from the fans, and I sheepishly raised my hands in mock triumph and strode from the field.

As I walked back across the foul lines, Bud came over, gave me the ball, put his arm around my shoulder (he's almost a foot taller than me) and said, "Boy, I sure wish I had your fastball tonight."

I climbed back up through the stands, and a fan stuck his hand out to me with a twinkle in his eye and said, "Congratulations." Pause. "That was the worst first pitch I ever saw." I laughed and kept climbing up the aisle.

[A picture of Bob playing the National Anthem is at http://www.slip.net/~rnward/gallery.html]

by John Wyatt

Geez, Candlestick memories...

My first one is going to my first game in 1980, late in the year. Dale Murphy hit a grand slam in the first inning (setting a theme for years to come). I wondered why, although the Giants kept hitting the ball, they didn't get hits. I also wondered why we left in the ninth inning (there were 10 innings on the board!). I wasn't really knowledgeable about baseball (or anything else) back then. My cousin told me that Jack Clark was the best Giant and he drove in the Giants' only runs of the day. He would become my favorite Giant for years.

1981 was my first full season, and I was tracking every win and loss on the schedule, so, of course, they had a strike.

My next favorite memory was going to the final game of the 1982 season. We were only going for Fan Appreciation Day (we had the tickets before we knew the Giants would be in the race) and wound up seeing Joe Morgan's shot to eliminate the Dodgers (how come that never had a name?). I was sitting in upper reserved above the scoreboard, and I can still vividly see the home run coming off the front of what would one day be the Family Pavilion.

Another fave: the first time Croix de Candlesticks were handed out! A 10-inning game against the Dodgers which Valenzuela started. They tried to distribute the pins immediately after the game and there was mayhem! "GIMME MY DAMN PIN, BITCH!"

Another: standing on my seat chanting "We want Jack!" after Jack Clark beat Bruce Sutter on a home run for the second night in a row (he didn't come out).

I went to the G-men's first Turn Back the Clock Day (the bastard Cubs refused to wear old unis) with the person sitting on the scoreboard and walking around on it changing the numbers. Very cool. Started to get a sense of the Giants' history around then. I remember predicting/wanting McGraw's and Mathewson's numbers to be retired (I didn't know they didn't wear numbers until later), and going nuts when both happened. I made it to both ceremonies to retire their unis. I also made it to a doubleheader against the Cubs when it was Juan Marichal Day between games. (His number had been retired long before -- was he named to the Hall that year?)

Yet another: Making it to a '87 NLCS game, in upper reserved, praying the G-men would mount a rally long enough to force Craig to pinch hit for Reuschel (whom I was tired of watching labor and struggle), and they did! WE'RE GOING TO THE SERIES! Well, maybe not. Grrrrr...we could have beaten the Twins in the World Series.

1989: In the parking lot during Game Three of the World Series, having just split a bottle of tequila at 5:04.

Sneaking gin into the family section and telling security it was water. Being thrown out of the family section and relocated to the more expensive lower reserved. Continued drinking gin.

1992: Ballpark terror; I got a free ticket to an A's-Blue Jays ALCS playoff game and heard about the George Shinn ownership group collapsing on my way to the game. I clearly had cursed the Giants into leaving by being disloyal and going to an A's playoff game in the Giants' time of need! I thought about leaving the game, but my friends told me I was crazy. I promised that if the Giants didn't move, I'd never skip another Opening Day again.

Didn't make it to the final home game against the Reds, but made it to the previous series against the Astros. No one showed up. No wonder they were moving....

1993: Opening Day! Tony Bennett! The Dead! Barry Bonds! I sat in the Pavilion and thought Barry's first-at-bat home run was going to hit me (it didn't).

That season had 13 Fridays and 13 other NL teams. The schedule was set up so that every team played on a Friday, so I got a partial plan that included all the Fridays, and for the first time I saw every NL team in one season. Watched the first Rockies game against the Giants in SF -- Robby Thompson hit a grand slam in a blowout. Watched Burkett and Swift effortlessly win back-to-back again and again. Beck saved everything! WE'RE GOING TO THE SERIES! (Oh no....) From nearly losing the team to 103 wins! Euphoria! (Until Salomon Torres got the nod at the end of the season.)

Sickened by the '94 strike...not sure if I wanted to go to Opening Day 1994, but my roommate was from Miami and had never seen a baseball game, so we went and saw the Marlins and G-men open the shortened season -- my Opening Day streak stayed alive (almost reluctantly). I remember booing the announcement on the scoreboard that G-men had signed Strawberry.

1995: What happened that year? I don't remember anything.

1996: Ugly year. Toward the end of summer I was laid off and killed time while looking for work by cashing all of my coupons and going to a lot of bad games (Barry and the Minor Leaguers). Claiming sections of lower reserved for myself ("Hey! Get lost! This is my section! You can have 18!"). I basically waited around to see how they would lose -- not touch a base, passed ball, how how HOW would they lose today?

1997: Division title! How did this happen? I was supposed to be angry that they traded Matt! I made it to both games against the Dodgers down the stretch -- Barry destroyed the Dodgers at night, and Brian Johnson hit his home run the following day. Also made it to the clinching game against the Padres. My mom hugged a stranger when Beck closed the game out! Just hung out in the lower deck for hours, soaking it in.

The sick, sick single playoff game. My friend was already planning how he was going to ask out the girls sitting in front of us during Game Three of the NLCS. No such luck. I remember the shock of Devon White's grand slam, and then briefly feeling hope in the next inning, just to feel sick again when Barry struck out into the double play. Such a feeling of feeling cheated. But they had come from behind all year...

1998: One of the funniest games I ever went to was when a drunken moron was offended by a Cubs fan waving his Cubs flag. He got pissed off and took the flag away and threw it several rows away. Right away his friend said, "You should burn that flag!" and the moron did! Security had to stomp the fire out and the moron was led off in handcuffs. This is the game in which Sosa hit two home runs and went ahead of McGwire.

by Ben Hitz

I can't be my bitter sarcastic self on this subject, but I do have fond Candlestick memories. These are in chronological order:

1. In the 1980 season (I was nine), I went to like 20 games, by myself or with my little (seven!) sister. We sat in the bleachers. I never caught anything, but I remember getting nearly squashed in the "pit" behind the fence chasing a dinger. To this day, I haven't seen as many games in a season as that summer of '80. Or was it '79? I get them confused because my "peak" in baseball cards was the '79 "card season" which must have been printed in 1980. I had about 1,200. Pretty sure Jerry Reuss no-hit us that season [That would be 1980, then. -- RB]. No, that is not a fond memory.

2. Going to a game as a park dept. activity (Day Street Park on 30th St. between Church and Sanchez, where my mom still lives -- on Sanchez, not in the park), sitting in the upper reserves behind the right-field foul pole, and barely missing a huge Willie Stargell home run that hit the walkway between upper reserved and upper box clean. Don't remember who won, but the Pirates had those goofy "three-stripe" hats. I'm thinking '80 or '81.

3. Sometime in the early-mid '80s, a Cincinnati-SF doubleheader in which PETE ROSE (we are talking the old and bad one) broke up...damn...Hammaker's? no-hitter in the top of the ninth of the opener. And then the Reds scored 10 in the first inning of the nightcap and coasted.

4. This is more recent, and by far my favorite: It was one of those "classic" C-stick nights. The fog was swirling into the stadium. There was a pelican circling around, and during the fifth inning field-grooming intermission, it flew down and landed on the field near first base. Bizarre.

by Richard Booroojian

Maybe more than most, I have always resented Candlestick Park for each of its many failings. I used to drive my wife crazy at games with my incessant complaints about the stupid incompetence of idiots like Horace Stoneham, who, I always mused, must have been blind drunk when he approved the location and design of the stadium. "Nice underground heating system that never worked," I would snap as we would freeze our butts off during a June night game. "Way to check those wind patterns," I would sneer as my hat would repeatedly blow off my head. "They should sell tickets for the right to push the handle on the detonator," I would repeat endlessly, because they could raise most of the money needed to build a new stadium just that way.

She learned to ignore me at those times (and eventually, I guess, at most times).

Still, I have many memories from my myriad visits there, most of them related to activities on the field, but a few of a more personal nature. I was there for the 1987 and 1989 playoff and World Series games, and for the madness of the 1993 pennant races and any number of other memorable games, but my clearest memories are the personal ones.

I went to my first game in 1968, driving up from Fresno with my dad and several older cousins. We sat in lower box seats about 10 rows up from the field and a section or two down the first base line from the Giants' dugout. Now, of course, you can't easily get those seats, but we did then with little fanfare. I have no idea if my dad bought them in advance or if he just bought them at the gate, but they were fabulous seats. The stadium was still open out in right field, and it was a brilliantly sunny day with just a bit of wind. The Giants won 8-0 (I think Mays and McCovey both homered, though it was long enough ago now that this memory might be more fantasy than reality), but by then I was already floating in the clouds.

Why? Well, before the game started, my cousin nudged me, pointed towards the Giants' dugout where Willie Mays was talking to someone in the stands, and said, "Why don't you go get his autograph?" I looked to my dad, who shrugged, and I didn't wait around for anyone else to talk me out of it. I ran over to the dugout carrying my program and a pen and asked him. I would like to think I was polite enough to wait for him to end his conversation, but sadly I probably wasn't.

He looked up at me, rolled his eyes, looked around for an usher to shoo me away and then reached for the pen and program. I don't remember him saying a word. He signed, handed the stuff back to me and turned away. I ran back to my seat, where my cousin laughed and said, "You were really lucky." I turned around and saw why; there must have been 20 kids rushing down toward the dugout and close to an equal number of ushers rushing to cut them off, and Willie was no longer anywhere to be seen. I had had a small window of opportunity and I had grabbed it, in a way that I rarely would as I got older.

I still have the autograph. It is certainly special; but later, as an adult, I realized how much more special it might have been if, instead of signing, he had talked to me for a moment, like he had been talking to that other person when I had interrupted.

And I have one other clear memory from that game. Someone hit a screaming liner into the stands near where I was sitting. A guy drinking a beer calmly reached up, cleanly grabbed the ball in his bare hand without spilling a drop, then took another drink of beer without even looking at the ball.

Years passed. I moved to San Jose upon graduating from college, and I finally started attending games more regularly. I took a job with a CPA firm which had a very strict no-dating rule amongst its staff. "No dating," as in you would be asked to leave the firm posthaste if you were caught doing so. Of course, I ignored that rule, though I was at least discreet enough to sneak around and not flaunt my actions. One relationship there was with a woman who also hailed from Fresno and who was (horrors!) a Dodger fan. I never took her to a game, and that one didn't last long.

Eventually, though, I met my wife-to-be there, and we began sneaking around in an appropriate fashion. We started doing everything together, always looking for places to go where we wouldn't be likely to be seen by someone from work. A weekday night game at Candlestick seemed ideal (hell, even romantic if it ended up being cold and windy, since I only brought one blanket). So, even though my wife-to-be had never attended a game and had no interest in baseball at that time, she willingly agreed to go.

Attendance was, of course, pretty light at Giants games back then, and we figured the chances of actually seeing someone we knew were remote at best. Imagine how mortified I was, therefore, when I turned around while we were waiting in the snack line before the game and saw two guys from work standing directly behind us. We hadn't even been in the damn park 10 minutes and our carefully constructed secret relationship was completely blown. They smiled and tried to make some conversation, but all I could think of was that I would be unemployed within 24 hours. Needless to say, the game was pretty much ruined, and I don't even remember what happened on the field that night.

It's at moments like that when you find out whom you can really trust, and we lucked out in this case. Neither of them ever ratted, so that when we finally announced our engagement later in the year, everyone else in our office was completely surprised. Both of them ended up being friends for many years after we had all stopped working there.

In fact, one of them was with us during what was probably my favorite day at Candlestick in all of these last 30-plus years. It was at a very warm Sunday doubleheader in June 1986 against the front-running Astros. The Giants won the first game, and they put up a message on the scoreboard saying "Look who's in first place," with standings showing that the Giants were now, amazingly, a half game in front of Houston. The whole stadium (over 47,000 were there) just erupted, because after the disasters of 1984 and 1985, it just didn't seem possible that the Giants were really doing this. Then they won the second game to sweep the twin bill and the whole four-game series, with the last out coming on a leaping grab by Mike Aldrete at first. Again they posted the message on the scoreboard, with the updated standings. People were hugging in the stands. It was a wonderful moment, the type that keeps you going back for many years afterward.

I worked South of Market in San Francisco for two years, right around the time that the new ballpark was finally approved. In fact, my office window overlooked the property that is now being converted into Pac Bell Park, and I used to park my car by an abandoned warehouse that sat on that very same land. (For a while my truck had a pretty bad oil leak that surely dotted the pavement in that lot, so I used to feel a little guilty about the toxic cleanup there, figuring that I had contributed a small amount to the problem.)

Anyway, I used to leave my office around 6 p.m. Usually I came out into a nice warm evening, perhaps with a slight breeze. As I drove south on Highway 101, I would look toward Candlestick Park, where a cloud of fog would hang like an ominous, avenging fist of doom. As I got within about a half mile of the 'Stick turnoff, the wind would pick up and start pushing my truck around on the freeway. It wouldn't let up until I was about a mile south of the park, at which point the fog and wind would disappear and the day would be warm and sunny again. Candlestick was right in the path of the worst stretch of weather in the whole Bay Area.

But Pac Bell Park is in a much better spot, and fans will be happier there. Hopefully, my kids will have some interesting experiences there, and will do so without having to risk their health. Fifty years from now, when Pac Bell Park is finally reaching the end of its stretch as the Giants' home field, I hope they will be able to look back happily on those times as we now look back on our times at Candlestick.

by Mario Rubio

I can't remember the year, but I know I was sitting on the left field side about five rows up. I was about 10 or 11 and I had five cousins with me. Well, the Giants were giving the Reds a serious ass-whooping and Garrelts was tossing a no-hitter into the ninth. Anyway, as the ass-whooping continued; it came time for the Reds to bring in Dibble. My cousins and I let out the worst barrage of insults you could imagine from pre-teens. He responded with a kind "F*** YOU, YOU LITTLE S***S." Rallying behind us, the crowd pelted Dibble with peanuts, cups, wrappers, etc. He was then blown off the mound by the Giants' bats.

by Carlos Francisco Gomez

Hello, I am a San Francisco Giants fan. In L.A. What that means depends on who you are. For me, being a Giants fan at Fodger Stadium means being patient and hopeful until My Boys have gotten the last out. When you're 5'4" and 130 pounds like me, you can't really show your colors until you have already won the game. Otherwise, you're an easy mark for a beer shower.

The only game I had ever seen at the 'Stick was around 1973, when I was eight years old. We lived in Sunnyvale back then. All I remember was that the Giants were trailing (the Astros?) in the late innings while trying to mount a comeback. A Giant (was it McCovey?) had just hit a triple and was on third. It was typically bitter cold, and my parents, being L.A. bred, took us home early, so I never knew the outcome of the game. In my dreams, the Giants came back and won, but I'll never know for sure.

I distinctly remember one guy who had been swearing in the stands near us. He was as bitter about the Giants' fortunes as the wind. As we were passing the "prison tower" in the parking lot on the way to our car, I remember someone running past me. While I will never be able to prove it, I think it was him. The question is, would you run to your car if you were happy after a win, or would you run to your car in disgust after a loss? I choose the former.

In 1982 I had seen Little Joe gun it, but I was still in high school, so I couldn't do anything but watch the enemy broadcast on TeeVee in L.A. 1997 was a different story. I had a young healthy car, a division title within reach, and an old friend visiting San Francisco. In other words, more than enough excuses to drive up and see My Boys play in their Mecca on September 26th, 1997.

The great thing about driving up the coast is the radio. Slowly but surely the Fodger radio station fades away to be replaced by the voices of the true believers. For the first time in my life, I was hearing Giant radio announcers talking to real live Giant fans. It felt sooooo good as each mile ticked away on my trip to the promised land.

Still, there were prices to pay. I was running late and game 160 was starting just as I got into the parking lot. Since I didn't know what I was doing, I just followed the other cars in until someone pointed me into a dirt lot that seemed to be part of a day care center. I knew about the infamous Candlestick winds, but I didn't know that they blew outside of the stadium. The cash that I had pulled out to pay for parking was still in my lap. When I opened the door, the money went WOOOOOSH! and into the lot. I jumped out and saved maybe 40 bucks, but I think I lost $60 to the Wind. I intuitively knew that this was a sacrifice to the Gods of Baseball. In return for a Giants' win, it was a small price to pay.

As I was heading into the stadium, I saw the "Prison Tower" again. An old friend. When I got into the will-call line, I pulled out my ID, only to realize I'd been messed with again. No VISA. No MasterCard. No ATM cards. Gone. Don't panic...This is just another test from the Baseball Gods... think...there's a good chance that they fell out of my wallet and into the car... or the parking lot... not good... don't think that... welllllll, I can mooch off of my friend tomorrow... the game is more important... call the banks and put a hold on my cards until I know that they are safe... OK, I know what to do.

While I was calling the credit card companies, Estes gave up a run in the first. Rats. Kent set my mind at ease in the bottom of the first with a three-run dinger of his own. Life was good.

Now for food. It's pretty obvious that the 'Stick was not well designed, at least along the narrow hallway where I went to get some eats. But it didn't matter, because even though it was a capacity crowd and even though the food lines were slow and long, I was among my people. Orange and black everywhere. Giants-pin-encrusted hats and jackets all around me. They didn't know it, but I was just pleased as punch to stand in line, finally among the Giant faithful.

By the time I sat down it was the fifth inning. Our Boys were slaughtering the Pods, and I was sitting in an ultimate nosebleed seat. I was just about directly behind Barry Bonds' right shoulder, all the way back to the top row of the bowl. It was beautiful. With hot dog in hand I finally relaxed and enjoyed the game. No stress. No nail biting over a close game. Just a nice and easy 17-4 win. How sweet it was.

When the game was over, I slowly went to my car, just drinking in the ambiance of happy Giant fans. Later that night I found my credit cards safe and sound in my car as I had suspected. Faith, again, had been rewarded.

Oh yeah, the next day I met my friend at the airport and we went back to the 'Stick and watched the Giants win the division.

by Julie Nichols

As an adult I haven't had the chance to get to Candlestick particularly often, so my most vivid memories of watching the Giants don't actually involve being there. I always seemed to be either listening to the radio or watching the games somewhere other than San Francisco.

I became a Giants fan in the mid-'70s. Because I grew up in Sacramento, I have really fond memories of the day-long trips to San Francisco to see Sunday doubleheaders. (Three-hour games or no, I wish they still had doubleheaders.)

For some reason, the players and management of that era don't stick out in my mind that much. I do remember being a Montefusco fan and being underwhelmed by Joe Altobelli, though. Most vivid in my memory are the really ugly uniforms, the even worse artificial turf, and the Dixieland jazz foursome that used to play on top of the first-base dugout. Just being there was its own reward for me, win or lose.

The worst memory? Well, doubleheaders weren't too much fun when the Giants lost both games. But the worst memory had to be the afternoon that some guy sitting right behind me in upper reserved got sick from too much beer. (One drawback of those long doubleheaders, I guess.)

One of my best memories of the Giants, dating back to my early days of fandom, is of listening to Lon Simmons do play-by-play while I helped my dad do yard work. What a picture Lon could paint back then. "Tell it goodbye," indeed. In my mind, anyway, I was at the 'Stick -- in the very best seat. And the wind wasn't even blowing.

by Marie Cannon

When I was very young, my dad used to listen to Giants games on the radio while he worked around the house or out in the yard. The first I ever heard of Candlestick Park was from Lon Simmons. It wasn't that Lon talked about the park a lot, but I can remember him saying the name just as clearly as if I'd heard it yesterday.

I had this image in my 6-year-old mind that Candlestick Park looked just like Anton Stadium, the 3,000-seat wooden ballpark in my hometown. Except, of course, Candlestick Park had huge candlesticks mounted on top of the fences. For night games, I guess!

When I was 16 I pestered my parents into taking me to a game, using the argument that they had never been either, and wouldn't my dad like to see a big league game in person? We left early one Sunday morning, June 11, 1972. Dad said we were going to the San Francisco Airport to look at some new planes and then maybe to Fisherman's Wharf for dinner. I suspected what was going on, but I said nothing until we were within a mile of the 'Stick; I didn't want to spoil his fun!

I still have my ticket stub from that game. Lower Box Section 21, Box 3G, Seat 8. Ticket price: $4.50. Way back then in those low-tech days, they didn't use computer ticketing. There was a ticket printed for every seat, for every game. The ticket sellers kept them in a rack in the ticket booth, and picked through them to find what you wanted.

My first and most lasting impression came when I went through those double doors and saw the diamond for the first time... it literally took my breath away. Years later, when I saw Bull Durham for the first time and Crash Davis said "... and the ballparks are like cathedrals...," I knew what he was talking about. It was the 'Stick, the home of my beloved Giants, and therefore the most beautiful place on earth. Later on in life, I would never tolerate any criticism of the 'Stick... those complainers just didn't get it!

I remember there were real box seats then, no more than four seats across, so you didn't have people crawling over you all through the game. There were still beer vendors in those days, big husky older men calling out "Beer here, cold beer!" We had Polish sausages with Gulden's Brown Mustard, the "Official Mustard of Candlestick Park!"

It was Cap Day, a doubleheader with the Chicago Cubs. Rick Reuschel made his major league debut. Juan Marichal started the first game, Willie McCovey started at first. Bobby Bonds and Garry Maddox were in the outfield, Tito Fuentes and Chris Speier turned double plays. The crowd was only 16,000, a paltry crowd by today's standards, but impressive to me since the population of Ukiah, my home town, was only 10,000.

I have been there a couple of hundred times since then, the last time in September of 1993, the last home game of that wonderful season. I saw a lot of baseball, and a lot of memorable moments; at least they were memorable for me.

I was there among tiny crowds, and packed houses. I saw Willie Mays hit a homer as a N.Y. Met. I saw Johnny Bench and the Big Red Machine and Steve Carlton and Tom Seaver in their prime. In 1975 I saw Ed Halicki's no-hitter. I spent the Bicentennial Day, July 4, 1976, at the ballpark, pregnant with my son. I remember taking him there as a baby, and later as a small child he'd sit on my lap and keep me warm!

I saw Vida Blue's wedding in 1989. I saw Ernest Riles hit a grand slam off Dwight Gooden in 1990 (or was it 1991?), the first slam Doc had ever given up in his career. I saw Mike Remlinger's shutout in his major league debut, a great day that turned out to be false hope. I watched the Giants knock the Dodgers out of the postseason in 1991. I wonder if I'd have cheered as hard had I known then what jerks the Braves would turn out to be.

I remember the last game of 1992, when we didn't know if we'd have a team in 1993. No one wanted to leave the park; we just all sat there -- in denial, I suppose.

Opening Day 1993... what a blast. Where else would you ever have heard Tony Bennett and the Grateful Dead sing on the same day?

I remember cold nights, freezing winds, fog on the field, and the swirling hot dog wrappers. I remember walking through those same double doors that gave me my first view of the playing field 20 years earlier and receiving a slap of wind that blew the whipped cream off my cafe mocha and onto my white sweatshirt. I remember my son as a teenager eating ice cream on those nights to prove how manly he was. I remember a man in the front row catching a foul ball in one hand while holding his ice cream cone in the other!

I remember afternoon games when it was so hot I thought I was broiling in my seat. I remember bad burgers, great hot dogs, cold Cokes and beers, and chocolate malts. I remember taking my mom and dad, treating them to a game, and drinking beer in front of Dad for the first time... I was 35.

I know I'll miss the 'Stick; I already do. I'll make my final pilgrimage in September, flying in solely for the occasion, indulging in the MVP Seats and remembering the joy my father, who passed away last September, had in taking me there for the first time.

I'm sure I'll visit Pac Bell Park sometime, but I don't have any overwhelming urge to fly in on a special trip. I've been inside Bank One Ballpark in Phoenix, and marveled at the technological wonder of the modern ballpark, but it just isn't the same.

I guess it's true. You never forget your first love.

by Ben Fong

My younger sister is usually a quiet person. I would bring her to Giant games when I did not feel like going alone. She would just sit in her seat watching the game no matter what would be going on. One day after an exciting game I asked her, "Wasn't that a great game?" She said it was okay. I asked, "Just okay?" She said, ''Yeah. Just okay." She told me she could not get excited during the games because she was expecting to see home runs. After thinking about it, I realized that in all the games had I taken her to, she had never seen a home run hit.

One day she came home with a pair of tickets she won during the day from her high school. I said "Great, a free game vs. the Astros." Well, Nolan Ryan happened to pitch, and he was shutting out the Giants after five innings. Jose Cruz hit a majestic homer into the upper decks that silenced the crowd. I looked at my sister and she said, "It's not a Giants home run." After five innings the Astros took out Ryan for some reason with a 5-0 lead.

Chili Davis came to bat and hit a solo home run. My sister jumped up screaming, clapping and waving her hands in the air. I was in total shock! This was not my sister. Well, in the following innings the Giants hit four other solo home runs (Davis again, Reggie Smith, Darrell Evans, and her favorite, Jack Clark). Each time she jumped up screaming and waving her hands. The Giants ended up winning 7-6 in the bottom of the ninth on an Evans single off Randy Moffitt. I have never seen her happier. Now when I visit her at work (she is a vice president of her company), it is hard to picture her jumping out of her chair screaming and waving her hands. I still laugh about it when I think about it.

by Ken Kubey

My top 12 Candlestick memories:

12. 1980: I witnessed Willie McCovey's last hit. It was a very sunny day. I saw McCovey swing and I saw him run to first, but I didn't actually see the ball come off the bat. Willie is my favorite baseball player. A couple of days later, McCovey took his last swing at Dodger Stadium. He hit a sacrifice fly to help the Giants beat the Dodgers in his final game.

11. Probably 1978: The Giants were leading in the top of the ninth. Up came an evil Dodger batter by the name of Dusty Baker. Baker hit a deep liner to right center. Larry Herndon and Jack Clark had a bead on it as they raced toward each other. Herndon caught the ball a few hundredths of a second before colliding with Clark at full speed. They collapsed onto the turf. The ball trickled out of Herndon's glove. The umpire (I now believe correctly) ruled "no catch." Dusty circled the bases for an inside-the-park home run. For the first time that I can remember, a chant of "Bullshit! Bullshit!" rose up at Candlestick. The Giants came back to win the game.

10. July 29th, 1990: Scott Garrelts was pitching for the Giants against the Reds. Scott looked good early. After just two innings, we started talking about a no-hitter. The Giants scratched out a run on offense and Garrelts was on fire. No hits through five. No hits through seven. No hits through eight. The Giants scored three more to up the lead to 4-0. Garrelts looked to be tiring, but he managed to get two outs in the ninth. The next batter hit a absolutely clean line single to left to end the no-hit bid. Garrelts rallied to get the next batter to complete the one-hitter. We gave him a long standing ovation. Still the best pitching performance I've seen at Candlestick Park.

9. June 21st, 1978: Ed Halicki was pitching against Tom Seaver. Seaver had pitched a no-hitter in his previous start. This was my first night game at Candlestick. I showed up in a light sweat jacket and bought a ticket in section 61. The only time I ever remember being any colder in my life was while being stuck on a stopped ski lift during a storm. It was cold. Seaver gave up a hit pretty early. A guy nearby yelled out "No no-no tonight, Seaver!" Big Ed pitched a great game. Between shivers, I was having a good time calling balls and strikes from section 61. Giants won the game 3-0. I learned a lesson about what to wear.

8. Probably 1989: Cold night game in the bleachers. It was a close game all the way. The game went to the bottom of the 10th. Will Clark came up to bat. I yelled out, "Send us home, Will." A couple of pitches later, Will sent us home with a deep home run to right. I got my first Croix de Candlestick on the way out.

7. April 18th, 1993: Ball Day! Many thousands of fans received baseballs on the way into Candlestick. The Giants fell behind by five to the Braves early and a few fans showed their feelings by tossing baseballs onto the field. The Giants rallied to take a lead in the middle innings. Our pitchers threw some more gasoline on the fire, though, and we were again down by five runs a couple of innings later. This time an absolute hail of baseballs came flying down onto the field. Again the Giants mounted a comeback. Matt Williams hit a big homer over the bleachers in left and somehow the Giants escaped with a 13-12 win in 11 innings.

6. September 18th, 1997: I had gone to the game the night before. I had told my boss that I would have to take the 18th off if the Giants won on the 17th. Rueter had pitched a great game and made Barry Bonds' two-run homer stand up as the Giants closed in on the Dodgers.

The game on the 18th was not pretty. Rod Beck came in in the 10th with the game tied at five. He promptly gave up three solid line singles to load the bases. Only some very conservative baserunning kept the Dodgers from scoring on three hits. People around me were booing. Sure, I wanted Beck killed at that moment, but he was still our pitcher and no one had scored yet. I wasn't going to boo him.

Eddie Murray came up to hit. Murray is one of the all-time best hitters in major league history with the bases loaded. Beck summoned up some luck as he got Murray to bounce a ball to Kent, who threw home to cut off the lead run. Somehow, Brian Johnson still had time to throw to first to complete the double play. Beck got the next guy and we went berserk in the stands. I hugged a complete stranger. The song being played between innings was the one that goes, "I don't want to work, I just want to bang on the drum all day." We were all clapping along. There is no doubt in my mind that the Giants would not have won the game or the division if Rod Beck didn't get out of that jam.

Beck pitched through the 11th and 12th. We were worn out. Brian Johnson stepped up to lead off the bottom of the 12th. He lined one deep to left-center. It found its way into the stands and we had won, 6-5. I was absolutely exhausted.

5. July 9th, 1988: I was sitting with my friends in the bleachers. We were playing the Cardinals. The Giants had hit 9,996 home runs in their history at the start of play. The Giants had their hitting shoes on that day as they burst out to a big lead. Ernest Riles hit number 10,000 off the facing of the upper deck in right. [Actually, the Giants started with 9,995, then hit five that day. -- GP] Chris Speier had hit a single, double and homer as he batted late in the game. Amazingly, he hit an absolute rope down the right field line. Old Chris chugged around the bases, and you knew he was going for third no matter what. The throw came in; Speier slid. Safe at third. Speier hit for the cycle.

Final score: SF 21, StL 2.

4. October 1989 NLCS: These games kind of blur together now in my mind. The weather was wonderful. Probably 70 degrees, no wind at all. Robby Thompson had a big home run. Matt Williams had the best at-bat of his career. He fouled off pitch after pitch after pitch. You could almost see the tide turn as Williams seemed to gain confidence with each swing. Finally, Matt hit a big home run down the left field line.

Ninth inning of Game Five. Steve Bedrosian came on to pitch. Bedrosian had been great all year, but he didn't seem to have it this night. He struggled to get two outs and had a couple of men on base. Ryne Sandberg came up to bat. This is not the guy you wanted to face with the game on the line and your pitcher running out of gas. Somehow, Bedrosian got Sandberg to hit a weak grounder to Thompson, who made a very good pick-up and throw to Will Clark. The Giants were National League Champions.

I guess I should also mention the earthquake. We were pumped up for the game when the earthquake hit. Most of the crowd cheered when it was over. We had no idea that it was a major quake or that the game would have to be canceled. A few minutes later, we saw the collapsed section of the Bay Bridge on a fan's portable TV. Much later, police used bullhorns to tell us that the game was called off.

3. July 25, 1978: It was a night game. Vida Blue had pitched a masterpiece and was holding a 1-0 lead going into the ninth. The other team struck for two runs in the top of the ninth. Vida finished to get the complete game, but had to feel awful walking off the mound. The Giants came up to bat. First batter made an out. Larry Herndon lined a single. Up came Mike Ivie to pinch hit. The crowd was buzzing. Ivie hit one deep to left. This was when I first learned to watch the fielder to determine if the ball is fair or foul. The left fielder leapt at the wall about eight feet into fair territory. The ball sailed well above his glove. The Giants and Vida Blue won 3-2. On the way home we heard Vida on the radio. He was like a little kid on Christmas Day.

2. September 27th, 1997: We had pounded the Padres the night before, 17-4. The Dodgers were still lingering around. Alvarez pitched a nice game for us. We had a big lead going into the ninth (6-1), but there was no doubt about who should be on the mound. Rod Beck came in to finish off the Padres and also put the last nail in the Dodgers' 1997 coffin. Beck struck out the last batter and all of us Giants fans were delirious with joy. The Giants were Western Division Champions.

1. May 28th, 1978: I was 16 years old. The Dodgers were in town for an important series. I had never been to a Giants game, but I decided to go to this game. None of my friends wanted to go, so I went by myself. Looking back, I'm amazed that I would do something like that. The game was sold out! I bought a $5 ticket from a scalper for $10. I got a Giants windbreaker as I entered Candlestick Park for the first time. The Dodgers had a two-run lead in the middle innings. The Giants got some runners on base. Mike Ivie came up to pinch hit. He hit one deep to left. The ball sailed about 10 feet over the wall and about 10 feet fair. The crowd erupted. The Giants went on to win the game. I am a Giants fan for life.

by Elizabeth Fleming

My dad practically raised me at the 'Stick, so I am kinda sad to see it go but am extremely excited about the new park!

One of my worst and best 'Stick experiences happened at the same time -- actually, it's more of a 'Stick parking lot adventure. The bad part was that my new-ish car got totally trounced upon by drunken louts during a night game in May '97 (the Giants got trounced too!), which of course, was really distressing. The good part was that the three guys who witnessed the vandalism, which happened during the sixth inning, were all 'Stick workers (peanut and dog men!) who stuck around in the freezing cold for over an hour waiting for the owner (me) to return to my poor car. Coolness! Restored my faith in humanity. (Giants fans, and workers, are the best!) We all went out for a drink after the police report was done (another hour!) and I came away from the game not feeling too bad.

Random memories:

• Having my first baseball crush at age eight or nine, on Jack Clark (me-ow!). Missing half the game just watching him out in left field. Baseball Crushing continues to this day. (Latest: Trevor! Woe is me...)

• Taking a German guy to his very first baseball game when the Giants won the NL West pennant, September 1997. As everyone went nuts, in broken English he asked if every game was this fun! I tried to explain the significance of this particular game, but words failed... and I told him yes, every game was this good. The images spoke volumes: Barry Bonds on the dugout, high-fiving fans, pumping the whole park up... people kissing and hugging friends and strangers... the roar was deafening... the celebration lasted forever. God, that was so awesome. And it was this guy's first baseball game! Gosh, the Giants made a fan there for life.

by David Beck

Stuff that I have fond memories of:

• The mere Candlestick look--the orangish-red color motif, the asymmetrical stadium design, the big hill to the west of the park--just the look....

• Kenny G's music, played an hour before the game when few people were at the park. It really helped make the most acute pastoral feeling of the whole baseball experience, even though Kenny G's music is otherwise really pretty annoying. It just made you feel that authentic enchantment that you were in the best place in the world at that time.

• Doing the "Candlestick Run" after some games, then after others just hanging around for as long as you could--sometimes even going down and joining all the toadying fans to watch the players leave in their $100,000 cars.

• Walking all the way out to Section 62 and watching the game with binoculars; it was a great simulation of the center-field camera shot you always saw on TV.

• The names and uniform numbers of the Giants' greats on the fence. (Sorry, but even though it was nobly politically correct and all, the addition of the "42" just looked dorky.)

• Watching all those dudes leap into the open area behind the left field fence and try to kill each other to get a home run hit there. They closed all that off a number of years ago, but it was still a crack-up to watch.

• Getting to sit in one of those huge boxes with all of Gregg Pearlman's family to watch the Giants kick the Astros' butts.

• Visiting the Giants' VIP lounge or club or restaurant or whatever they called it. I once got a ticket to get in from some promotion or something, but it was just a pass and didn't cover anything you bought. So, because everything was way too expensive, I merely went in, looked at all the cool pictures and articles all over the walls, and left.

• Kidnapping Tommy Lasorda before a game and taking him to the upper deck, tying a rope around his ankle, tossing him over the ledge, and demanding that he yell as loud as he could, "I'm a great big doodyhead." Actually, it was fun that the visiting clubhouse door was all the way out in right field foul ground. Whenever Lasorda came out, he had to walk all the way across the field to get to the visitors' dugout and he could be booed unmercifully for a tremendously long period of time. He played it up like it didn't bother him, but it did.

• Crazy Crab, the greatest mascot there ever was in any sport--mostly because it was designed to be the anti-mascot. It is too bad that there are actually -- sad to say -- idiot Giants fans who just didn't get it.

• The TV commercial series for Giants' games. Even though this isn't an actual Candlestick thing, the whole Croix de Candlestick TV thing was hilarious. The Croix de Candlestick itself was great because it helped make you proud to see a game in a stadium that required an Arctic explorer mentality to enjoy night games.

• The simple fact that after the strike of '94, the Giants were the only team that I saw show behind home plate the number to call for free tickets to the games. I think it was for kids only, but still....

• The sunshine. Oh yeah, there was the wind, that notorious wind, but that actually became a badge of honor when Roger Craig directed Our Boys to never mind it and in fact to use it to the Giants' advantage. It worked--it really did. It was great. But there was something about the sunshine that made you feel good even when the games would get to three, four o'clock and the wind would be going good... that sun would still be out....

Honorable Mention games:

• 1985: 15-inning affair against the Cubs that was 0-0 until Manny Trillo knocked in Rob Deer with the winning run. Garrelts pitched something like four or five innings of relief.

• Any of the games we saw in which Mike Scott or Nolan Ryan got beat; pretty sure we saw at least one of each in 1988.

• 1987: Night game win in September over Orel Hershiser and the Dodgers.

• 1988: Fan Appreciation Day. Dennis Cook shut out the Dodgers 2-0 and we called the game on our little tape recorder.

• 1988: With the Mets, Darryl Strawberry lazily went after a fly ball and dropped it. For virtually every second of the rest of the game, he was ridden unmercifully to the tune of "DARRR-ULLLLLLL!" over and over. At one point he raised both his hands in mock encouragement. Classic. We also won.

• 1988: Mike LaCoss always seemed to be the guy we got to see pitch when we went to games; in a game against the Expos he actually did well and hit a homer and a double, I think. [No homer. I think he doubled off the wall two or three times and singled. Also, he gave up three runs in the first and later drove in four. But no homer. I've never seen a Giants pitcher homer at the 'Stick, unless you count Don Robinson, who did it as a pinch-hitter in 1991 -- the first time a pitcher had accomplished this feat in 20 years.-- GP]
• 1993: The last game I ever saw at the 'Stick. Barry Bonds homered to help beat the Reds.

The Top 10:

10. Friday, August 11, 1989: The last game I saw at the 'Stick before moving down to SoCal. It was wonderful because we were on our way to the division title, we were playing the Dodgers, and the game was over in the first inning. We were up like 7-0 with the help of a Matt Williams grand slam, so the rest of the evening was just pure pleasure.

9. Gregg and I went to the fourth game of the 1984 season and I was overly excited about this particular year. I don't know why, because they really sucked that year, and we had already lost our first three games. Just-called-up-from-Double-A Jeff Robinson was given the start and we went on to smear the Cardinals, 11-0. (For some wild coincidence, a full six of my top 10 games involve the Cardinals, and with the exception of two of them, they are all for entirely different reasons.)

8. In 1973, my dad took my brother and me up to the 'Stick to see the Giants play the Dodgers, and before the game he asked each of us, "Okay, predict the score of the game." I picked 3-2, and sure enough, we won by that score.

7. After we returned to SFO from our annual vacation in Colorado, my dad took us all out to Candlestick Park to see the Giants play the Cardinals. I had never been before -- this was my first time -- and as all newcomers say, all the colors and images were 10 times more brilliant and real than they are on TV. It was like stepping into some paradise.

6. In June of 1986, the Phillies released Steve Carlton and the Giants had picked him up. There was a tremendous excitement surrounding his first start with the team, and we went. It was terrific, even though Carlton got, well, rocked by the Cardinal batters. We did end up winning the game in exciting fashion, so it was a great time.

5. In July 1988 we went to see -- yes -- the Cardinals, in a Sunday game in which the Giants absolutely annihilated them 21-2. Two major terrific things happened in that game as well: Chris Speier hit for the cycle, and Ernest Riles hit the fifth home run of the day for the Giants -- which also happened to be the Giants' franchise 10,000th.

4. Fan Appreciation Day, 1986, against the Dodgers. This game had to be one of the craziest games in baseball history. Oh, sure, many were certainly crazier, but this was unbelievable in its own right. Extra innings, all kinds of people playing out of position, pitchers pinch-hitting for position players, being down two in the 14th inning and then scoring two to tie it in the bottom frame, and then eventually winning on a base hit by Bob Brenly, which scored Greg Minton from second.

3. and 2. Games 4 and 5 of the 1987 NLCS.

1. The return of Dave Dravecky, August 10, 1989. He beat the Reds 4-3, and it might have been a shutout if he had not given up a three-run homer to Luis Quiñones, of all people.

by Andrew Keller

Best memory:

Gee, I have so many memories; let's see, probably the time I hooked up with a girl in the bleachers (whose name I won't mention) back in '90 .... oh, what fun; that was the only time that's ever happened to me at the 'Stick. I'll always have fond memories of the 'Stick. (I have the biggest cheese-eating grin right now that I just can't get rid of.)

Worst memory:

That is hard to say as well (so many to choose from, you know). I'll go with this as a low point: the big three-game series with Atlanta back in '93. I remember being so excited about these games because of the crowd and the sheer excitement and all that. But we all know what happened that series. I was feeling really deflated afterward.

And though I only watched on TV, I'd say the '89 World Series, specifically the quake and seeing the A's clinch at the 'Stick. Barf.....

Funniest:

Well, in this year's home opener, I was laughing so hard watching this one guy chasing Shawn Estes' Giants jacket all the way to center field. Every time he stooped down to pick it up, the wind carried the jacket away a little further. Hilarious; it was like the old "bait a sucker by tying money to a string and jerking it away as the sucker tries to pick it up" gag!

I remember going to a Bay Bridge Series game back in 1990. Before leaving the house, I had set my VCR to record the game. When I got home, I rewound the tape and started watching the game. Lo and behold, I saw myself and my friends when they panned over into the Pavilion with the camera. The funny thing about this was that my dumb-assed friend was picking his nose when the cameras panned over to us. Ha, ha. I still have the tape somewhere around my house, to be used at a later date!

Here are some random funnies that I recall, though not the details of them (like who the Giants played or what year), in games I went to:

• One time my friends and I were tailgating and we slapped some dogs on the ol' Weber. Unbelievably, the dogs jumped off the grill and started rolling away! I said, "F' this," and started chasing them. I caught up to them and poured water on them, then threw them back on the grill! I was hungry!

• One time I took a date to a game back in, oh, about '90. We were sitting in the Pavilion seats and there were hardly any fans that day. Well, she saw a drumstick dude and wanted to buy a ice cream drumstick. Well, the ice cream dude started making his way toward us. Instead of going between the aisles and up the proper steps, he decided to be "Mr. Joe Cool" and show off by climbing up to us, seat by seat. Well, let's just say he did not make it. All I remember is, as he was doing his "I'm the coolest vendor at Candlestick" routine, I had already diverted my attention away from him and back on the game. I kinda wish I hadn't, because what I recall seeing out of the corners of my eyes was his bag going left, all his ice cream going straight up in the air and the bottom of his shoes sticking out from between a row of aisles.

• I have a strange one. This one is short and to the point: we went to a Dodger game and felt a 5.0 quake and an aftershock. Right after the two quakes, a bird took a dump on my friend's head!

by Paul Lujan

It's hard for me to provide concrete memories of Candlestick; even though I've been a Giants fan all my life, it's still a relatively short life by the standards of most of people. I have vague memories of going to Giants (and A's) games as a kid, but I don't really remember going to many games as a teenager; and, paradoxically, it wasn't until I left for college that I really became fanatically devoted to the Giants. Consequently, my memories are all from the past couple of years, because that's when I've seen 90% of my games, and all of them in person.

If I had to choose one memory to typify Candlestick, it would be this one (and I feel kind of badly that it's a negative memory, but it seems somehow appropriate). Last summer, my parents and I went to an evening game against the Phillies (I think Schilling was pitching, though I'm not entirely sure; I went to several games in that homestand). It had been a back-and-forth game, but the Giants had clawed their way back and were down by one in the bottom of the ninth. It was freezing cold even by Candlestick standards, and we were quite chilled in the upper reserve (where we normally sit). But when we saw Mark Leiter come in for the Phillies, we knew we had a chance, so we decided to sneak down to the lower deck (the crowd being pretty small to begin with).

Much to my shock, there were these kids a couple of rows in front of us, loudly cheering, with their shirts off! I was very impressed. Lo and behold, the Giants loaded the bases with one out, and then Brian Johnson was hit by a pitch to score the tying run. (It was a painful-looking HBP, too.) The crowd booed heartily, but we were all filled with hope -- until Rey Sanchez weakly flied out to center. The Giants ended up losing in the 10th on Mueller's throwing error. (I still remember, however, the kids cheering for Nen to strike out everyone.)

Other miscellaneous memories (oddly, these all seem to be neatly categorizable):

• The Power of Earnest Ragging: I spent some time last summer working at Stanford. One Saturday, some of my friends and I decided to go up to the game against the Rangers, on a whim. We ended up arriving late, and so missed J.T. Snow hitting a grand slam. "But on the other hand," I told my friends, "Mark Gardner is pitching, and he's pretty bad, so I don't know how well they'll do." Of course, Gardner ended up pitching a complete game shutout, and the Giants won 7-0. And the weather was nice.

• Longest Time I've Been At Candlestick: In '97, some other friends and I went to watch a doubleheader with the Pirates. The first game lasted a whopping 13 innings, with the Giants finally winning it through some clutch hitting. But then, in the second game, the weather turned cold and the Giants fell behind something like 9-3. Not even the fact that we were able to move into better seats was enough to induce us to stay after something like 4-1/2 hours of baseball. Of course, the Giants ended up coming back in the ninth, only to just barely lose.

• Obligatory "Fun in the Bleachers" Moment: Last year, we went to go see a game against the Reds one weekend. Unfortunately for us, this game happened to be the dreaded (Unofficial) Beanie Bag Baby Day. So, all of the reserved seats were sold out and we ended up in the bleachers. J.T. hit another grand slam (it seems that my presence always induces J.T. and Estes to play well), and we spent most of our time heckling the Reds' center fielder, Mike Frank. Unfortunately, the Giants lost (this seems to be a recurring theme), but not before Barry Bonds hit a dramatic pinch-hit ground-rule double in the bottom of the ninth only a few rows below where we were. Alas.

by Tim Irvin

I have some memories of a game I attended in the '70s, probably around '77, when I recall a heckler in the stands. Oh, he was a Giants fan, or so it seemed, but he wasn't shy about yelling out his thoughts concerning the play of the Orange and Black that day. He and several of his Buds (as in the beer, back in the days when there were beer vendors) were heckling Giants players from the lower-deck box seats near third base. And he was really loud, too.

At one point, the Giants were leading something like 2-1 in perhaps the fourth or fifth inning. The opposing leadoff batter walked and stole second on a horrible (weak and off-target) throw from catcher Marc Hill. The guy gets up and yells, "Hill, you throw like Plunkett!" (At the time, Plunkett was a QB with the 49ers, back in their pre-Montana and pre-DeBerg days.)

Laughter in several sections around the guy.

Later in that inning, Giant pitcher John Montefusco had given up two runs and was still laboring. The next batter ripped a base hit to score another run, and the Giants were trailing 4-2.

The guy almost popped a blood vessel. "Don't keep it close, Count!" he cried out loudly as the runner on third turned toward the stands. Pausing (perhaps for dramatic effect or perhaps in a drunken stupor), he continued, "We don't want a traffic jam!"

The runner on third almost bowled over, laughing his butt off. People were cracking up despite themselves -- they wanted to be mad at a Giants fan ragging the Giants, but all day, the guy was coming up with some choice lines.

by Anson Kwan

Most people seem to have vivid memories of their first game, but not me. I don't recall the opponent, the score, or even the year. I only recall it was a win, because I remember I used to brag about how my record (in the games I attended) never fell below .500. That was not easy, considering it was the early '80s. Anyway, my first game was in either '81 or '82, and I went by myself because I couldn't convince my friends to go. And for about six or seven years the only place I'd sat was in the bleachers. $2.50 for the tix, $.25 for the bus fare each way. Without purchasing any food at the Stick, it only cost me $3 to enjoy an afternoon at the 'Stick. Can't beat that!

Well, actually I did sit in the upper reserved at my second game, but only because it was free (courtesy of the Giants). Our entire English class went that day. We sat right above the right field corner, and my first thought was: "Man, these seats are worse than the bleachers! We can barely see the batters! And they cost $7?"

But I do remember a little more from that game, because on our way back, our teacher kept complaining about how the Giants blew a suicide squeeze with the bases loaded and one out in the fourth or fifth. Forgot who blew the play, but LeMaster must have been involved somewhere, because my teacher kept yelling his name. They had another bases-loaded inning later on without scoring, and a runner on third in the ninth without scoring, and they lost 3-2 to, I think, the Astros. Those were the good old days.

That was the only time I fell to .500, though I never went way above .500 either (until recently). After 1986 or '87 I lost track of my record, but that was when they started winning, and I'm very certain I'm still over .500. But I'm ashamed to admit (well, not really) during those early years the Giants were not my first motivation to attend games; rather, it was the stuff they handed out. My friends and I picked up our share of Giants bats, batting gloves, baseball cards, Willie Mays posters and even baseball gloves (though I think they weren't real leather). Oh, and who could forget the baseball shirts we proudly wore, with the word "Giants" across the chest and "JCPenney" across the back.

Then there was one game in the middle to late '80s. I got off the 153rd Muni and was walking to the park when a car drove by and a guy in his 50s or 60s asked, "Are you going to the game? We have an extra ticket." I said, "Sure!" Unbelievably, I don't recall any detail about that game. Not even the opposing team or the score, or even the guy's name or his family members that I met.

What I remember was I could put my feet up on the railings where the dugout should be. Yep, I was sitting in the first row on the third base side, right on top of the dugout. Having been nowhere closer than the bleachers in all my life, my thought was, "Oh, the expensive seats are kinda cool! This must be the lower reserved or something."

Not until years later did I realize I probably can't even buy tickets for those seats. Now I know I'll never have seats like that again. The family likely had been long-time season ticket holders to obtain front row seats. We exchanged our numbers, but I lost theirs soon afterward. I felt sorry for not even having had the courtesy to call them back and thank them.

It must be because of my weak memory that I hardly remember any details of the games I went to (besides the ones in the last two years). I do recall bits and pieces, like a big Mitchell homer in the eighth to tie a game in around '89 or '90, or a bases-clearing, pinch-hit double in the seventh by Maldonado (forgot the year). And then, for some reason, from around '91 to '96 I attended no more than three games total. It was not until '97 that I started going to games again, so I guess I've been a bandwagon fan recently. But I'm proud to brag about my 4-0 record in '97 and 4-1 in '98.

Well, of the games that I could remember, two of the best were definitely the Friday night game (when they clinched a tie) and the Saturday game (clinched the division) in '97. I went by myself on Friday night, and Estes got his 19th win and they won 16 or 17-4 (I lost track after the sixth or seventh when half the regulars were pulled).

I was so thrilled that I decided to go to the next game also. Although it was great to see them clinch on that Saturday, I regret going with my stupid friends who insisted on leaving right after Beck struck out the final Padre, just because they had to go to a casual dinner with some friends. They're certainly not real fans (one of them had a cell phone; he could've called to cancel or delay the dinner). I was kinda pissed for missing the post-game celebration, especially the Barry act on top of the dugout. By the way, those were the first back-to-back games I've ever attended (not counting doubleheaders).

In '98 I'll never forget the St. Louis game. Actually, I mean what happened before the game. I've never seen so many people showing up at 5 p.m. for a 7:30 game, and the number of cameras and media surrounding the batting cage was unbelievable. After the entire Giants team hit two balls out in batting practice, McGwire hit 13 out by himself; some of them went way over the bleachers. And he hit none during the game, just the way I wanted, though the Giants lost anyway.

And then there was the final home game of '98 against Pittsburgh, in the middle of the most amazing week of baseball I can remember. Nothing special about that game, except for the fact that my friend (no, not the stupid ones I mentioned above) and I decided to go at the last minute, at around 12 p.m., while she was at work in the South Bay. (She told her boss she felt sick.) The game was at 12:35 and we didn't get there until 1 p.m., so we missed the Bonds home run in the first inning. I guess it was the spontaneity plus the excitement of that entire week that made that game special to me.

As far as statistics go, nothing beats the game against L.A. five days earlier, in which the Giants absolutely killed the Dodgers with two grand slams. I felt so lucky that day! Two grand slams by your team does not exactly happen once a week, and to catch it live! Man, I regret not buying a lottery ticket after that game.

Anyway, we also enjoyed sitting next to two slightly overweight ladies who we noticed had brought a L.A. flag (yeah, a flag! and not a small one either) rolled up in their bag. We didn't actually say anything to them, but you can imagine the jokes my friend and I were sharing.

by John Broesamle

I guess I'm a little embarrassed that, for as long as I've been a Giants fan and have been attending games at Candlestick Park, I can't say that I have all that many really remarkable memories. I'm not even sure when I attended my first game. I only know it was against the Cubs, and that the Giants won 6-3 or something. I think it may have been '63.

I guess I do have a list of various memories tied in with Candlestick Park:

• A doubleheader shutout sweep of Montreal in '74 (Jim Barr and John D'Acquisto)
• John Tamargo hitting a homer to win the '79 home opener vs. the Padres
• Attending a game on my honeymoon in '86 (and we're still married!)
• Willie Mays tying Jimmie Foxx (534 home runs) on the all-time list
• Barry Bonds hitting three home runs against the Reds in '94 (Giants still lost)
• Bittersweet: coming home from a doubleheader sweep over the Mets in '80 to find my beloved dog dead in the garage
• My favorite: the clinching of the NL West game in '97

But for some reason, Jack Clark keeps popping up in my mind (and striking out...) when I ponder my memories of Candlestick. For one thing, to me Jack Clark is kind of the quintessential Giant. He had great talent and accomplished some nice things while a Giant (the 26-game hitting streak, 46 doubles in '78). He was also, in my opinion, one of the Giants' finest clutch hitters, which was all the more remarkable given the pathetic lineups Clark found himself stuck in year after year. But Clark was also a disappointment in many ways, from his constant carping to his injuries to his ever-worsening defense and baserunning. And, as is so often the case with any great Giants' icon, Clark was traded away for much lesser value and went on to achieve bigger and better things with other teams.

Maybe I think of them together because Jack Clark, like the 'Stick, was blustery, changeable, sometimes exciting, sometimes infuriating, sometimes pleasant, sometimes in a fog. Maybe it's because I went from thinking in my youth that both Clark and the 'Stick were great and fine to realizing as I grew older that both were quite flawed, to now thinking that maybe they were okay after all. I guess the difference between them, though, is that I never wanted the Giants to trade Jack Clark and I was very unhappy to see him go. I can't honestly say the same about Candlestick Park. I can say, though, that there have been great memories, and some not-so-great ones, associated with both.

Favorite "Candlestick Clark" Memory: Jack Clark once connected on a pitch from Nolan Ryan that was hit harder than any ball I've ever seen hit, and it left the ballpark (over the center-field fence) quicker than any home run I've ever seen hit. The ball seemingly never went higher than 25 feet at its apex and it smashed into the base of the center field stands below the scoreboard. I've seen longer and more dramatic homers, but never have I seen another ball, home run or not, that was hit that hard or moved that fast out of the ballpark.

Worst "Candlestick Clark" Memory: Can't remember which year, but it was a weekend day game against the Reds, with the Giants holding on to a 1-0 or 2-1 lead in the eighth or ninth inning, with runners on and two outs. Johnny Bench hit a lazy fly ball up into the right field sky. Clark lost the battle with the high sky and his own defensive inadequacies and dropped the ball, and two runs scored and the Giants lost. It was the most crushing, spirit-deflating loss I've ever witnessed in person at Candlestick Park. Funny thing, though; I remember not being all that surprised when Clark dropped the ball.

by Jim Jividen

I have a confession to make.

No, not that. Why does everyone always assume I'm gonna say that?

I finished third grade in the spring of '79; now, I don't know which year of school you consider your favorite -- maybe 11th grade when you lost your virginity after the junior prom...or your sophomore year in college when you lost your virginity after a particularly inspired coffeehouse reading of "Sailing to Byzantium"...or maybe it was the morning you were supposed to defend your doctoral thesis on civil disobedience ("I Don't Believe In Beatles, I Just Believe In Me"), but instead drove to Tijuana and lost your virginity in a back alley to a nine-dollar transsexual Latina hooker who kept screeching, "Chu better pay me, Yim Yividen!!"

Me, my favorite year of school was third grade. Feel free to draw your own conclusions.

I'm not really sure why; my teacher, Mr. Callan, gave us candy for good grades and I still have a weathered certificate as evidence of a victorious class election; but that really doesn't explain why, as I walked home after the last day of school with the sing-song sounds of my classmates...

No more pencils/No more books
No more teacher's dirty looks

... ringing in my ears, I began to weep uncontrollably. As I reached my house I was stopped by my grandfather:

"What's the matter?"

"Third grade is...gone."

I was just about start the third grade when I went to my first game at Candlestick Park in the fall of 1978. My grandfather took me as would he throughout the season. Giants vs. Reds! Knepper on the mound! Hot dog in my hand! Cap on my head! Blanket across my lap! We lost 5 to 2!

I vividly remember a McCovey pinch-double and, earlier, my absolute shock at seeing a man in a Cincinnati cap shout with joy, "The Reds are runnin'!" as the not-as-Big-as-they-used-to-be-but-still-Bigger-than-us Red Machine strung together a few extra-base hits.

I thought everyone was a Giants fan. Well, every adult, anyway; I didn't really have any friends who were Giants fans (and I was the only 'Niners fan in four counties, so a little perspective is a good thing). My grandfather said that was because my friends were just kids and their skulls hadn't fully hardened yet.

But, you know, despite this epiphany, my first visit to the yard is neither my "Candlestick Memory" nor the reason why I so loved the third grade. In fact, although I would attend a number of games over the subsequent couple of years and even more during one lost season nearly two decades later, none of my physical appearances at the Park Formerly Known as Candlestick really captures the essence of my feeling toward the place and its soon to be ex-occupants.

I'm an expatriate. Left my ancestral Bay Area homeland at the age of 11.

When Joe Morgan thrilled the sold-out faithful on the last day of the '82 season, I danced in a room filled with cardboard boxes in our new house in central Ohio.

When Hack Leonard hit his fourth NLCS homer in 1987's Game Four, I stood screaming 2,000 miles away, waving another one of my 17-page teenaged love letters which I was writing to win the heart (okay, what I wanted was near the heart) of the junior varsity cheerleading captain.

I would, by the way.

And then lose it. Breaks of the game.

When Will drove one through the box in the bottom of the eighth to send us to the Classic in 1989, I was listening to the roar of the Candlestick crowd via my car radio while sitting in a parking lot at my Ohio undergraduate school. I could have watched the game in the dormitory lounge, but I didn't want anyone to see me cry if we were somehow able to win.

And I did, by the way. As am I right now.

I was acting in a John Guare play during the earthquake. Four years later, I was studying every waking minute as the 103-win 1993 fell during my second year of law school.

People thought I was praying to get a high enough grade point average to keep my academic scholarship; actually, I was asking for one more inning out of Rod Beck's right arm. But I did so from across the continent.

I just wasn't ever there.

No Stu Miller, Johnny Roseboro, or even Reggie Smith.

I never cheered a Mays catch, or got hit by a hot dog wrapper, or leaped from the left field grandstand to chase a home run ball.

I was away. But, in being away, I became that guy in the Reds cap whom I saw in '78. I was the outsider, the champion of the foreign team. Not just at the ballpark but in every aspect of my life. As I struggled to come of age and become... something different... in rural Ohio, what I chose to be was the poster boy for all things San Francisco; the Giants the archetypes of my idealized past, and Candlestick Park my holy ground. I created my own mythology, as do all of us, and embedded within was my love for the San Francisco Giants. It marked me special, foreign... distinct in a very particularized way when distinction was the most precious substance I could possess.

Even later, as I developed my own reasons to be considered special, my status as Ohio's number one Giants fan was a core part of my identity; I can say with certainty that every friend whom I've ever had and every woman who has passed through my life has left with, if nothing else, a sense of my deep commitment to my baseball team. I've never had any friends who themselves felt loyalty to the Giants, yet, as I reflect, it is astonishing the numbers of people, from those with whom I could not have been more intimate to the most casual of acquaintances, who have shared with me the joys and the sorrows of a previous night's game. The knowledge that my fellow man has that degree of understanding about who I am and how I feel comforts me in a way I find difficult to articulate.

Candlestick Park isn't just a place that I've visited....

It's home.

And I'm gonna miss the place. For my visits there and for the times that I was elsewhere, I'm gonna miss the place. For Darrell Evans and Robby T. and Caveman Robinson and Captain Hank, I'm gonna miss the place. For the Giants gone and the Giants yet to come, I'm gonna miss the place. I'm gonna miss Candlestick for the same reason I miss my grandfather and I'm gonna miss Candlestick for the same reason I miss third grade.

Because it will be gone.

Go out strong, guys. The 'Stick deserves it.

EEEEEE! Contributing Editor Richard Booroojian dreams of your first kiss and then he feels upon your lips again a taste of honey, tasting much sweeter than wine.

Every little thing Julie Nichols does, she does for EEEEEE!, yeah; and you know the thing she does, she does for EEEEEE!, woo-oo.

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