WHILE retaining its old-world charm, including the iconic scoreboard and the wall where Major League Baseball greats Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig’s homerun hits are inscribed, the heritage-rich Rizal Memorial ballpark will undergo a major a facelift.
“We will spend around P100 million in renovating the bleachers alone. We intend to extend the wall facing the bleachers by a few more feet,” Philippine Sports Commission chairman Richard Bachmann said in a recent interview.
Bachmann said the groundbreaking for the renovation of the ballpark, which opened in 1934 and where Major League All-Stars bannered by Ruth and Gehrig of the New York Yankees played an exhibition match against the Philippine squad that captured the Far Eastern Games men’s baseball crown, would be held next month.
He discussed the development during a meeting at his PSC office last Tuesday with officials of the Philippine Amateur Baseball Association led by PABA president Chito Loyzaga.
He said the old baseball scoreboard, where scores were posted manually by ballpark scorekeepers inside its cramped and cold structure, would be converted into a digital scoreboard with the same design and configuration.
The wall overlooking the bleachers would also be extended, but the markings where Ruth and Gehrig hit their homeruns against the PH team would be kept intact.
