WHEN I was a kid, if I had completed my week’s worth of chores, my dad had a reward for me. He’d wake me up at 6 a.m. on Sunday and say: “Good work this week. Get in the car.” We’d pack the cooler, turn the radio to KMOX and drive the two-plus hours from central Illinois to the old Busch Stadium in St. Louis. Then we would wait in line.
The old Busch Stadium — a massive concrete AstroTurf-ed monolith, just as charming as its current successor, the “new” Busch Stadium — had a policy: General-admission tickets to the bleachers were sold two hours before first pitch, and they cost only six bucks.