MPR’s Jim Bickal visits the giant marshmallow, a.k.a. the Metrodome, to record some of the sights and sounds that come with a ticket to the ballgame. Bickal interviews some of the individuals responsible for them.
MPR’s Jim Bickal visits the giant marshmallow, a.k.a. the Metrodome, to record some of the sights and sounds that come with a ticket to the ballgame. Bickal interviews some of the individuals responsible for them.
[MUSIC PLAYING] [INAUDIBLE]
JIM BICKAL: Ronnie Newman has been the organ player for the Twins for 11 years. The ballpark organ is a baseball tradition, but now it's just part of the audio environment. Newman plays only between certain innings.
SPEAKER: What kind of stuff do you-- what songs do you especially enjoy playing?
RONNIE NEWMAN: Anything that's requested. [LAUGHS]
SPEAKER: You have an Unlimited repertoire?
RONNIE NEWMAN: Well, somewhat. I suppose I know probably 1,500, 2,000 songs or so. They can pick from that. If they pick something, I don't know, then I give them 40 drops of [INAUDIBLE] [LAUGHS]
JIM BICKAL: Music Director John Lang is also in the audio booth. He's in charge of the rest of the sound that includes commercials, sound effects, and recorded music. Those songs are now on tape. But Lang says when they first moved into the Metrodome, he played actual records.
JOHN LANG: I had a wonderful experience. One time, I had cued up a record, put it out over the sound system and turned to grab another record, and my elbow accidentally hit the-- [LAUGHS] hit the needle and the thing skipped right across the record, just like Johnny Fever on WKRP. And it made one hellacious noise, and I got a big round of applause.
JIM BICKAL: Lang says part of his role is to be a cheerleader when the fans seem to need encouragement.
JOHN LANG: I don't want to call it cueing the fans, but that's kind of what it ends up to be. The fans are getting a lot better. Since the Twins have been in the race here, fans generate their own enthusiasm. We don't have to prompt them anymore like we did four or five years ago.
JIM BICKAL: In a booth right below Lang and Newman, four people operate the scoreboard. Director Dick Davis decides what goes up on the board. He says he has to be careful about showing replays of close calls.
DICK DAVIS: It depends on the umpiring crew. Some of them will tell you that it's all right to show close calls, if the call goes for the home team. If it goes against the visiting team, some of them don't mind. Some of them do mind. And so basically, what I do normally when a new umpiring crew comes in, I'll go down and introduce myself and talk to them about it before the first game.
JIM BICKAL: Davis says one person on his crew is just in charge of keeping track of balls and strikes.
DICK DAVIS: It's a boring job. And you can't look away for a minute. And I have found that most of the times that you have problems are probably after the seventh inning, then you really have to bear down and concentrate.
And another thing that makes it very difficult is that all the umpires have a different motion for balls and strikes. Some do it fast. Some do it slow. So we have to wait until we're sure whether it's a ball or a strike or what the call was.
JIM BICKAL: Davis says his job will be a lot different next year when the Metrodome installs a brand new color scoreboard. I'm Jim Bickal reporting.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
[LAUGHS]
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