Dear Cliff Hagan Stadium,
Goodbyes are always difficult, but your final farewell seems especially sorrowful. After nearly half a century of UK Baseball thrills, chills, and spills, you’re being patronizingly jilted for a sleeker and shinier home venue right up the hill. You’re older than your more famous cousins, Rupp Arena and Commonwealth Stadium, with undoubtedly as many indelible memories—but like many other citizens of BBN, I feel like I barely knew you. Playing third fiddle to basketball and football, tucked away in campus purgatory, and forever compared to your fellow SEC brethren can saddle even the grandest and most regal of baseball complexes with their own complex of shameful inferiority.
And yet, you persevered. With your 3,000 sun-splashed seats and iconic center field Cliff, you’ve gallantly stood your ground. Hundreds of wins, thousands of hits, and multiple coaching regimes are now all part of your lasting legacy. Over the years, names such as Doug Flynn, Jeff Abbott, Collin Cowgill, and A.J. Reed have become forever etched in your prominent lore. Just the other day, I shed a tear or two listening to legendary Coach Keith Madison wax nostalgically about Jim Leopold’s spectacular center field catch, Bill Sandry’s four homerun game, and the time his team swept number one ranked LSU—all within the confines of your stadium walls. Through it all, you’ve been the home to hundreds of players who have worked their tails off practicing on your hallowed grounds on their way to prestigious academic degrees, spectacular athletic careers, and lucrative professional contracts.
I still don’t understand why the powers that be have planned for your untimely demise. In my mind, you’re still good for another fifty years. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with your playing turf, scoreboards, or your left field bleachers. OK, your elevator is a bit slow, finding a parking spot can be brutal, and the press box perpetually smells of fried food, but your mortgage is paid and your plumbing still works. That’s more than can be said of most of us of similar age.
Rumor has it that you’re being unceremoniously put out to pasture in lieu of a spanking new tennis facility. Seems like such a cruel ending for having poured out so many thrilling moments and memories. Forty-nine million dollars lavished on the girl next door while a fraction of that amount could have given you a makeover of your dreams. Such is life in keeping up with the Joneses in the collegiate sports world. I’ll never understand it. Seems like such a waste.
Hopefully in the end, you’ll provide us with one final shining moment—perhaps an unlikely victory snatched from the jaws of defeat. As a fulfilling coronation to fifty years of faithful service, I’d love to order up a walk off series winning homerun. Whatever happens, as you march off this weekend to join all the other baseball stadiums in the sky, it’s only fitting that a grateful Big Blue Nation bids you a resounding adieu.
Thank You. Goodbye Cliff. We barely knew you.
John Huang is a columnist for Nolan Media Group. If you enjoy his writing, you can read more at www.huangswhinings.com or follow him on Twitter @KYHuangs.
Check out his most recent UK Sports coverage at http://www.themanchesterenterprise.com/category/uk-live-breathe-blue/
Check out his most recent Cincinnati Bengals and other professional sports coverage at http://www.bluegrasssportsnation.com/category/writers/john-huang
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