Thirty years ago a friend took his now wife to a Jets game and some guy a few rows behind them peed in the stands
The Eagles used to have a jail cell in the stadium.
This behavior is not new.
I watch from home.
@SyrAlum -
Although I lived in the Bronx, I never went to a Yankees game until they played at Shea Stadium in the mid 70’s. All my friends and I (in HS) could afford were the $1.50 general admission seats in what’s now called the nosebleed sections. We were too young to drink but many of the other spectators weren’t and we saw some wild fights. One day, my friend and I were about to go to our seats when an elderly couple approached us and said that their granddaughters were unable to come that day and would we join them in their box seats. What a difference! Aside from the fact that we could actually see the players’ faces, the people were more polite and I didn’t get anything spilled or thrown at me.
S17 and I recently donated blood and were given vouchers for Mets tickets. My oldest and third sons are going next week with 2 friends, since S17 and I have no interest. I’m a Yankees fan and S17 just hates “sportsball” as he calls any type of athletics. The seats are in the nosebleed section so I will find out about the fighting. The last game they went to was with a friend whose dad has access to the uber boxes - they were given free food, drinks (at least the older ones were) and even nachos in a souvenir hat for free. They took the LIRR so it was ok for them to have a drink; my H picked them up at the station. I have told them that next week’s game will be a very different experience…
@tom1944:
The eagles fans are legendary, I don’t know about the new stadium, but the old vet was taking your life in your hands (I went with a friend, who was an Eagles fan, at an Eagles-Giants game). This is the fan base legendary for throwing snowballs at Santa, and yep, it was pretty rough. It isn’t so much that it didn’t happen in the ‘good old days’, it did, but IMO because of tailgating and a culture where that is primarily about getting wasted, I think it has gotten worse, bad behavior has always been there.
Whether it is the nature of baseball as a game, or because of the way they run the stadiums, baseball is a lot more mellow, though obviously people drink. They do cut off booze after I think the 7th inning, and at least here in NYC both the Yankees and Mets games are not what they once were, and I went to both teams a lot in the 1970’s and yep, it was much worse. Yankees-Red Sox games in the 1970’s at the Stadium and Fenway were pretty ugly, I was at a Yankees/Sox game earlier this year at Fenway (which if you have never been there, try and get there at least once if you happen to be in Boston, it is a throwback, the seats are narrow and tight, but fantastic place to see a game:)) and it was mellow, same at the Stadium. I can remember going to Yankees games with my dad as a teenager in the 70’s and at night games there would be all these drunk bozos in suits being obnoxious. I haven’t had that in recent years, like I said, I don’t know if it is because the nature of baseball, or if they have clamped down.
From my parents, I also heard about what it was like back in the real ‘good old days’ in the 1950’s, Giants-Dodgers games could be pretty rough, and in those days people used to bring their own beer with them, in bottles and they would throw them (these days, when I go to a stadium and get a bottle of water, they take the cap…
I think that when they stopped selling beer in the stands things may have improved. I’ve actually never seen a fight or really bad behavior at a ball park.
One time when I went to Yankee Stadium with a friend for an afternoon game, I discovered that I had left my wallet, as I thought, in the car. When we got back after the game, I found it on top of the car, untouched.
@techmom99 - The Mets played at Shea. Not the Yankees. Did they play at Shea when they rebuilt Yankee stadium?
When I went to Yankee games as a kid, there was a pole obstructing our view!! When I went to the opening day of Shea stadium, I was in the 5th grade. The commissioner of schools was in the row behind me. I thought I was going to get arrested for playing hookey!
I used to go to games at Yankee Stadium in the 70s, and the fans would be getting tanked at the bars across the street from the stadium before the gates opened. I went to a few Red Sox - Yankee games those days and you’d see a few fights, but nothing that got out of hand.
@jym626:
Well, except for several years in the 70’s when they were renovating Yankee stadium (I think it was 72 oe 73 to 75), then they shared Shea, which must have been a big letdown for Yankees fans, Shea (speaking as a Jets and Mets fan) was a piece of crap the day it was built, and by then it was the equivalent of a rundown public housing project.
@jym626:
Well, except for several years in the 70’s when they were renovating Yankee stadium (I think it was 72 oe 73 to 75), then they shared Shea, which must have been a big letdown for Yankees fans, Shea was a piece of crap when it was built, built cheaply and fast, and by the time we are talking about was the equivalent of a rundown housing project.
The Yankees played at Shea during the 73 and 74 season, I believe. Yankee Stadium reopened in the 75 season.
@musicprnt - I edited my post above- to mention the old Yankee stadium with poles blocking our view, and going to opening day of Shea when I was in elementary school. I have a friend who asked me to come to closing day too, but I didn’t have any interest in flying there to do so. That said, I don’t recall Shea being a dump 
Yankee Stadium (the original) was knocked down and replaced in mid/late 2000. The new one opened in ? 2009? When did the polo fields close and when did the Dodgers move to CA?
The “Original” Yankee stadium was completely redone after the 72 season and reopened in 75. It was then demolished in 2009(?) and the new stadium built alongside the old one. Same thing when Citifield was built next to Shea to replace it.
The New Yankee Stadium was opened in 2009, the renovated "old stadium) was torn down after the 2008 season, same with Shea, it was torn down after the 2008 Season and citifield took over (just in time for the Mets to turn into a minor market team with the Wilpon’s having run the team due to the Madoff Ponzi scheme returns).
The Dodgers and Giants left NY after the 1957 season. Ebbets Field was torn down soon after (the home of the Dodgers), the Polo Grounds (where the Giants played) was used for a variety of things, and then when the Jets (nee Titans) started in 1960 I believe, they played there, then the Mets played there in 1962 and 1963, In 1964 Shea opened up and both teams went there (jets/mets) and the Polo Grounds like Ebbets field became housing projects.
Shea was a poorly built stadium, it was built really rapidly, they cut corners on building it, where it was built was once landfill and reputedly (if my uncle, who is a civil engineer and was in the construction business for many years, starting around that time, was right) they cut corners with sinking piles for the foundation so the building had a tendency to sink which caused all kinds of cracking. The plumbing likewise was poorly done, and by the 1970’s it was routine to have bathrooms out of service, problems with leaking pipes, in winter for the Jets pipes would freeze. It got much worse in the 1970’s, Shea was owned by the city, and this was when NYC was coming close to going under financially, so they didn’t exactly keep up with the maintenance, and the team certainly wasn’t going to do anything (by then, the team was controlled by M.Donald Grant, who his name alone tells you the way he ran the team, basically ran it into the ground. It was only later, when the city recovered and then the team was sold to Doubleday and the Wilpons, that they started fixing it up, the seats were replaced, they renovated plumbing and electrical , painted the place, the field was redone, the walls, they did what they could with it. The fact that it lasted almost another 30 years testifies to the work they did on it, that it could last that long.
@jym626 -
The Yankees played at Shea in the mid 70’s while Yankee Stadium was being renovated.
I have friends who are tailgating pros. They had children attend Tenn, S. Carolina, and Ole Miss. They live in Atlanta so have been to GaTech and UGA. They have lived in Michigan and St. Louis and Chicago. Yep, have done their fair share of tailgating for college football and pro, and a lot of baseball too.
Hands down, they say, the crown goes to Ole Miss.
jym - I don’t recall Shea as a dump either! Perhaps it was just the magical feeling of attending a pro baseball game for the first time as a kid… in fact, I know it was. The good old days - half the seats were empty (and Tom Seaver was pitching)!
I’ve been to lots of pro and college big game events. Sheepishly, I must admit to avoiding the deplorable behavior by paying premium price most times for excellent seats, but that doesn’t always shield you (or being invited to corporate seating events – living the high life, that’s usually pretty safe). NoVADad - Army/Navy games the best! (Go ARMY)!
A lot of baseball stadiums now have “family friendly” seating where no alcohol (and no degenerates) are allowed I don’t know about football though.
I loved Shea, but Citi is clearly a better venue both in amenities and in fieldviews. @techmom99 --I have not seen bad behavior at Mets games, so hopefully you’ll have a good time!
The Mets have the most friendly “organized” fan group I’ve ever seen --the 7 Line Army. They travel to many other parks, and attend about a tenth (?) of the home games, always with matching T-shirts. The folks in charge work very hard to keep the group family-friendly and positive. It’s become a huge phenomenon; I don’t think there’s anything else like it in MLB. I really want to attend a 7-line outing one of these days.
Mets games are pretty sedate,thought like any good NY team they will get on the players when they play crappily, and yell things at them. I remember when the Mets were really bad, when they had one of the lower payrolls in baseball after 2008, and they were playing the Phillies, lot of Phillies fans came to the game, and they were laughing at the Mets fans and the way they were trashing the team, Sandy Alderson and the Wilpons, for putting such crappy teams on the field.
After they renovated Shea in the early 1980’s it was a lot better, they spent a lot of money fixing it up, fixing all the deficient things. It doesn’t compare to Citifield, but Citifield also cost a lot more to build, and also was meant for baseball only (multi use stadiums don’t work well for either football or baseball.
I have good memories of Shea and going to Mets games in the 70s when they were terrible. I could get great box seats for $5 and spend the whole day at double headers. Not anymore.
@novadad99:
Yep, when I came of age in the late 70’s, you could get tickets behind home plate during the week for pretty cheap, and also we would buy cheaper seats, then move down, and no one bothered us (they don’t allow that any more), they were desperate enough for fans they actually care if you went:). Same was true at Yankee stadium during the week. The stadiums are physically a lot nicer, Citified has much better viewing, but they aren’t as friendly in some ways to the fans as they once were, lot more expensive for one thing.