* The Frank Sinatra Songbook and Yankees baseball

With Gene Kelly (right) in "Take Me Out to the Ball Game"

I wonder if, instead of the traditional rendition of “New York, New York” — the “sign off” at Yankee’s home games — we’ll be treated Ol’ Blue Eyes crooning “My Way.”

“And now, the end is near, and so I face the final curtain…”

In addition to Tom Verducci’s “first stadium” account of the end of the landmark in this week’s Sports Illustrated, NY Times sports columnist George Vecsey offers his personal take, including a sentiment I keep hearing:

This is not the same Yankee Stadium where, as a youngster, I saw a dying Babe Ruth in 1947, or, as a young reporter, covered Mickey Mantle’s shot off Barney Schultz in the 1964 World Series. But it is the same renovated Stadium, on the same site, where I covered the Yankees of Williams, Rivera, Jeter, Pettitte, Posada — and [Joe] Torre.

Other stadiums go through renovations, but you don’t hear anybody talking about “It’s not the same ballpark anymore.” I guess they’d be happier with leaky plumbing, poor views, and the other inconveniences for the sake of history. Could you even call these people “purists?” It may not be the same Yankee Stadium to them, but it’s still the place where I saw my first big league game.

Here’s another take from a New York-area ex-pat, Pat Borzi, who used to write for the Newark Star-Ledger before emigrating to Minnesota.

For those of us who measure our memories in brick, mortar and alabaster, these are the final days of a certain era of baseball in New York City. It saw the Yankees return to prominence and universal hatred, while the upstart Mets wrestled them for the city’s affections. So please indulge me. If you bleed Twins, you may be doing some of this yourself, very soon.

To paraphrase that philosopher, John McEnroe, you cannot be serious to compare the Metrodome to The House that Ruth built, can you?