Bill Papa’s playground was Yankee Stadium.
As a kid in the Bronx, he and his neighborhood friends played stickball in the lot where players parked their cars every day. Nearby was the Concourse Plaza Hotel, the social epicenter of an era that spanned from Babe Ruth to Mickey Mantle and Frank Gifford.
His uncle Bobby got a job on the grounds crew and would let Bill come onto the field for games. That’s how he ended up standing by the goal posts in the snowstorm when Pat Summerall kicked his 49-yard game-winning field goal in the 1958 regular season finale, propelling the Giants to a 13-10 victory over the Cleveland Browns and eventually to “The Greatest Game Ever Played.