Tiger Stadium will be demolished
Tiger Stadium will be demolished to make way for homes and stores under a plan that will save parts of the historic baseball venue.
A portion of the field will be kept as a Little League diamond along with part of the stadium.
“I think it’s something everybody will enjoy and love,” Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick said Friday.
The decision to demolish the stadium follows years of intense efforts to find a developer who would refurbish it or convert it to other uses.
The stadium has been largely vacant since the Detroit Tigers moved out in 1999 in favor of the new downtown Comerica Park.
“Nobody was interested in the site with a stadium on it,” Kilpatrick said following a dedication ceremony for a church-sponsored housing development project that will include 150 to 300 homes and retail space.
The cost of demolition will be anywhere from $2 million to $6 million, said Peter Zeiler, an aide to Jackson. It will be offset by the value of the stadium as scrap and as a treasure chest of sports memorabilia, which could include seats and signs.
He said the city hopes to find a salvage contractor familiar with marketing sports memorabilia that can begin offering pieces of the stadium to the public by October.
The Tigers began playing at the site near downtown late in the 19th century and moved into Tiger Stadium in 1912.
Pujols expects early return
Albert Pujols, who’s eligible to come off the 15-day disabled list early next week, was optimistic that he’d return from a strained side muscle much sooner than St. Louis officials had predicted.
The Cardinals slugger was on the field for drills at first base several hours before Friday night’s game against Colorado, contorting his body to get to balls bounced his way by third base coach Jose Oquendo. After the workout, last year’s National League MVP said he felt surprisingly good.
“I’m pretty excited,” Pujols said. And he said team medical personnel were “real excited, but I don’t want to talk too quick until I get out there in the field and hopefully play for a week and I don’t feel it at all.”
Pujols was hoping to get clearance to take some batting practice today, the next step in the process.
“I still need to hit and I still need to do some things, and we’ll see how I feel,” Pujols said. “I can’t wait until I start to get some hacks, and we’ll go from there.”
The encouraging development with Pujols came on a day when the Cardinals had to make do without another starter. Shortstop David Eckstein, the leadoff man, was scratched from the lineup with a minor concussion sustained breaking up a double play on Thursday.
Pujols, who remains the major league leader with 25 homers and 65 RBIs, was hurt chasing a foul popup June 3 and placed on the DL the following day.
Around the majors
Pitching for the Triple-A Round Rock (Texas) Express in the final tuneup before his return to Houston, seven-time Cy Young Award winner Roger Clemens pitched 5 2/3 innings with five strikeouts, five hits and three walks. … Former major league catcher Randy Knorr was hired as the bullpen coach of the Washington Nationals, replacing John Wetteland. … Former Negro League player Charles Johnson has died. He was 96. Johnson, a pitcher and outfielder for the Chicago American Giants in the 1930s, died last Saturday of complications from prostate cancer, the Chicago Tribune reported.