Addressing the fallacy of sport's 'abandoned' past (cont'd)

Baseball and football teams build new stadiums that try to mimic the vintage feel of older arenas. NASCAR uses the real thing every season. Aside from Martinsville, there's Darlington, opened in 1950. There's Richmond, opened in 1953. There's Daytona, opened in 1959. There are Atlanta and Charlotte, opened in 1960. Of the 22 tracks in use today on the Sprint Cup tour, 14 of them -- a hefty 63 percent -- were built prior to 1970. Granted, not all of those facilities have hosted NASCAR for that long. But if you can't feel the sense of motorsports history in places like Indianapolis (opened 1909), Watkins Glen (opened 1953) or Phoenix (opened in 1964), then you need your pulse checked. Listening to the purists grumble, you'd think every race was held at a California-style track built in the late 1990s, which simply isn't the case.

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In other sports, it's much more difficult to find active venues with as many decades of use. Of the 30 stadiums that will host NFL teams this upcoming season, just six -- Lambeau Field, Soldier Field, Giants Stadium, Qualcomm Stadium, Oakland Coliseum and Candlestick Park -- opened prior to 1970. In Major League Baseball, which in contrast to NASCAR draws glowing raves from traditionalists about its attachment to its history, there are only five -- Fenway Park, Wrigley Field, Anaheim Stadium, Dodger Stadium and (again) Oakland Coliseum. In the NBA, there's just one. The current edition of Madison Square Garden, opened in 1968, is the only arena in the league that comes anywhere close to classic.

Granted, many of the older NASCAR tracks have been upgraded and reconfigured through the years, but with few exceptions, that happens in every sport. The Solider Field of today looks nothing like the stadium the Chicago Bears played in during the 1950s, or even the 1980s for that matter, and Ted Williams didn't homer over box seats atop the Green Monster in Boston. Some would say NASCAR fans haven't been demanding enough, that for too long they've been content sitting on aluminum bench seats and eating lower-quality concession food, instead of demanding the kind of amenities that in many other sports arenas have become commonplace. But in another way, they're fortunate. Many of the race tracks they grew up with are still active, allowing experiences to be handed down from one generation to the next.

Not every sports fan has that luxury. I think back to all the great arenas I remember visiting or watching on television as a youth, places like Boston Garden and the Spectrum and Reynolds Coliseum and even beloved old Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. Today they're gone, or have been left behind for splashier new digs. Two years ago while in Los Angeles for the California race, I stumbled across a directional sign for the Forum. A few turns through dicey neighborhoods later, there it was, the home of Kareem and Magic, the "Fabulous" Forum in all its columned glory. It was surrounded by a vast, empty parking lot. The Lakers have long since moved on, selling the place to a church that uses the building for worship services. Now "Showtime" happens on Sunday mornings.

But the grandfather who decades ago watched a No. 43 car race at Martinsville Speedway can take his grandson to see the same thing. The pavements and track lengths and grandstand seating arrangements may have changed, but it's still Darlington, the place where Johnny Mantz won the sport's first 500-mile race in 1950. It's still Indianapolis, the place that made A.J. Foyt famous. It's still Bristol, the place where Darrell Waltrip won seven consecutive times. It's still Daytona, the place where Cale Yarborough and the Allison brothers rumbled in the infield. No question, some venues are gone. But almost every week there's still an abundance of history, the kind too many erroneously believe has disappeared.

The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.