Field of Dreams turned reality delivered and then some

Major League Baseball hit a home run with the long-awaited Field of Dreams experience. The game was great too.

Chicago White Sox 9. New York Yankees 8.

White Sox fans will remember Tim Anderson hitting Zack Britton’s first pitch into the right-field-corn-night for a long time. New York Yankees fans will remember it too with less joy.

The game itself though was not the point of this past Thursday night in Iowa.

Baseball fans who were in attendance, some of whom paid over $1000 dollars for a ticket on the secondary market, were there to say they were there. They were also there searching for something of meaning with their son, daughter, Dad, Mom, friend. A moment, day, time to cherish.

The parking lot was already 75 percent filled when I arrived over two hours before first pitch. Families soaked up the pregame moments doing everything you are supposed to do at the Field of Dreams. They played catch, waited in line to take pictures with movie props, stared at the corn, ate delicious apple pie hot dogs. 

Fans waited in hour long lines before, during and after the game to buy $45 dollar T-shirts and other memorabilia with no complaints. Everyone seemed to want a memento that they indeed had attended the Field of Dreams baseball game. If you build it, they will pay exuberant prices to remember it.

MLB hits a home run with Field of Dreams game

Even on your way out of the ballpark there were multiple people/investors asking to buy your ticket stub.

There is something about Field of Dreams that we all want to hang onto, even though it has now been made very real with an actual game. Maybe it is that time somehow lasts forever. We can always come back and play baseball. You and your Dad, son or daughter can finally have that connection that was missing and finally it feels right.

It is why people come to Dyersville, Iowa in droves every year to visit the movie site before there was a major league baseball game on-site. Over one million have reportedly visited.

Now there has been an actual game with more to come. Major League Baseball  commissioner Rob Manfred confirmed as much with rumors already flying the Chicago Cubs will be a part of the 2022 game.

It will not matter who plays the game. Keeping the game alive going forward makes logical, financial and even emotional sense. There is something about the Field of Dreams turned reality that will always be worth tapping into.