Cecil Fielder takes a gingerly stroll on the roof of Tiger Stadium in 1993.
According to former Tiger Stadium groundskeeper Frank Feneckit, it took almost a howitzer to send a ball over the left-field grandstand at The Corner.
The roof was 94 feet high and the left-field fence was 340 feet from home plate, making roof shots in that direction one of the most challenging feats in baseball during the years the Tigers called Tiger Stadium home.
“Climb up to the roof and look around,” Fenecksaid in 1999, the Tigers’ final summer at The Corner, “and you won’t believe how high and hard they have to hit the ball to do that.”
Through 1990, only two players had cleared the roof in left. Minnesota’s Harmon Killebrew had been the first in 1962, followed six years later by Washington’s Frank Howard. But on August 25, 1990, during a Saturday game against Oakland, Tigers first baseman Cecil Fielder joined the exclusive circle of sluggers. In the fourth inning, with Alan Trammell on first base and two out, Fielder powered a 3-1 fastball from righthander Dave Stewart toward the roof in left. It bounced twice before plopping over the edge and onto the street.
“That’s the longest home run I’ve had hit off me,” said Stewart, who had surrendered an upper-deck shot to Fielder in the first inning. “I’d have a chance to send my family to Paris on that one.”
The 1990 season was Fielder’s first in Detroit after wearing a Toronto uniform for four seasons and then playing in Japan. That year, “Big Daddy” captured the country’s attention with an eye-popping 51 home runs and 132 RBI, both best in the majors.
Coincidentally, Fielder’s counterpart at first base that day was Mark McGwire, who had hit his very first major league tater exactly four years earlier. On August 25, 1986, McGwire had lined a Walt Terrell pitch into the centerfield bleachers at Tiger Stadium, the first of 583 round-trippers the controversial slugger would wind up hitting in his career. Before leaving Oakland for St. Louis, McGwire would become the fourth and final player to homer over the left-field roof at Tiger Stadium, connecting off Brian Moehler on April 21, 1997.
May 12, 2012 10:00 PM
In September 1990, I was making the trip from Traverse City down to Toledo, Ohio, to visit my grandmother. I had Ernie on the radio listening to the game. Cecil was on 49, and I veered my car onto the exit to downtown Detroit and snatched up a ticket. I sat myself in the upper deck left seats and waited for the big guy to hit #50, to join George Foster, who I had cheered for since mt Dad was a Reds fan. Fielder didn’t hit his 50th that night, but it remains one of my more memorable spontaneous moments.
I was there. I,my son and two friends were sitting on the first base side in the upper deck when he hit that one, it went up so high I thought it wasn’t coming down until it disappeared over the edge of the roof, Jose Cansenco hit on into center field at the flag pole that game too.
I was in the stands the day that Mr. McGwire hit his shot over the roof in left. I was a bit too far up the stands behind home plate to see it go out (the upper deck blocked my view), but I knew something had happened. It just shows that, when you buy a ticket to a game, you just might witness a bit of history.
That’s so true, every game can be legendary.