Newcomer says Smokies’ move to Old City ‘sounds like fun’
By Steve Williams
A lot can happen in 25 years. Good and bad. Funny and sad.
The Smokies’ baseball move back to Knoxville next spring will be bittersweet; a treat for Knoxvillians, but a bummer for some of the folks in Kodak and their Sevier County neighbors.
But it’s just 22 miles. It could be much worse. Think of some of the cities in the past that lost their baseball team.
This move is nothing like the Dodgers leaving Brooklyn to go to Los Angeles in 1958.
The Smokies’ first name will change again – from Tennessee to Knoxville. That’s no big deal. Most fans just call them the Smokies.
This reporter made a trip to Smokies Stadium during the final homestand last week to ask some questions about the move. I spoke to fans and ushers; all the way up to longtime PA guy George Yardley and Tennessee Smokies President Chris Allen.
And I took some pictures, too. Who knows what’s going to be on this infield and outfield ground another quarter of century from now?
When I walked into the stadium on Wednesday night I noticed an older man sitting on the back row by himself with a good view of the right side of the infield as the Smokies played the Birmingham Barons. After a few minutes, I introduced myself and asked if I could come back and get his take on the Smokies moving away, after I took some pictures while I still had daylight. He said sure.
It turned out he was a perfect choice to offer an unbiased opinion.
James Wikstrom and his wife, who had family in the area, had “downsized” and moved south to Dandridge, a small town in Jefferson County not far at all from Smokies Stadium. Wikstrom said he had lived in Minnesota for 50 some years and watched a lot of Twins’ games. And from there he had lived east of Cincinnati for 18 years and went to a lot of Reds’ games.
“My personal feeling is I’m okay with the move,” he said. “It appears that the powers that be, the people with the finances, decided that they wanted to move back to the roots of the Knoxville Smokies and I will be one who will go to games there. Some people who are out in this area (Kodak) seem a little hesitant – ‘Well, I don’t want to drive into Knoxville,’ etcetera. But it’s not that far and I’m a baseball fan, so a new venue in an interesting area – the Old City of Knoxville – sounds like fun to me.”
Wikstrom has already been down to Knoxville to scout it out.
“I’ve been down there several times watching the field as it’s constructed,” he said. “It’s convenient to the Old City and I think it will be a place where, if you choose to go to an evening game, you can go down early, spend some time in the Old City, and go to a ball game. It sounds like a good time to me.”
What about the parking?
“Well, yes there’s been some speculation about parking, but with the amount of money that’s being invested, I’m sure they have studied parking and apparently there are existing lots that will service the stadium. Who knows, maybe there will be some lots that have a shuttle service. It remains to be seen.”
Wikstrom also saw on a newscast that the new stadium will have a retractable pitcher’s mound.
“So that being a multiple-use stadium when it’s not being used for baseball, the mound will drop below the playing service and not be an obstruction of soccer games and other events that they have there,” he said. “I thought that was an interesting tweak on the new stadium.”
The Knoxville baseball team played at Bill Meyer Stadium for many years before making the move to Kodak. The old stadium, which was located in East Knoxville just a couple of blocks north of Magnolia Avenue, was in need of much repair.
On the lighter side of my trip to Smokies Stadium last week, I asked one usher where Homer the Hound (the Smokies’ friendly mascot) was? “Oh, he had to go to the veterinarian tonight.”
This usher also told me he had been working in “Guest Relations” for the Tennessee Smokies for 15 years, and I asked him if he recalled any special or unusual moments over the years.
“I remember the game when there was a streaker,” he said.
I mentioned that to another usher, and he laughed and said, “I’m glad I wasn’t here that night.”
I spotted Mike Wyatt in the stands. The former teacher and basketball coach at Carter Middle School, who lives in Kodak, was an usher the first 10 years of the ball park.
“I was (Smokies manager) Ryne Sandberg’s bodyguard,” said Mike, remembering the many people who wanted to get an autograph of the former great Chicago Cubs second baseman. “He would tell me to let them know he would get with them after the game.”
Allen said Bryan Webster, current Assistant General Manager of Stadium Operations, has been the longest employee at Smokies Stadium.
“He was an intern at Bill Meyer Stadium and has been here and seen it all through the 25 seasons.”
Yardley started as Knoxville’s public address announcer at Bill Meyer in 1998 and has missed only one season at Smokies Stadium. He said the working conditions and technology have been the biggest changes over the years.
One example of that is Yardley had to climb a fire-escape to get on top of the roof at Bill Meyer Stadium to get to where he and others in the media worked.
