Topless Midget Wrestling Controversy Rocks Sleepy Illinois Community

When we allow the government to take away our right to watch tiny ladies wrestle topless, what's next? Will they take away our right to vote? To breathe? It happened in Canton, Illinois: as police were shocked to discover that a recent "midget wrestling event" took place at the Outskirts Bar & Grill, which included topless female wrestlers. As a result, the establishment had its liquor license suspended for 60 days.

From the Peoria Journal Star:

The penalty is substantial, Mayor Kevin Meade said after the city liquor commission voted unanimously Wednesday to suspend the license for Outskirts Bar and Grill at 725 W. Locust St. "It's meant to send a message to other businesses in town that this won't be tolerated," Meade said.

Outskirts owner Kim Scott cried after the vote. "I'm not being treated like any other business," she said. "Don't tell me I am, because I'm not." Scott said she had a contract with the group for male wrestlers to perform. When the group arrived, Scott said, two women in oil were wrestling topless while she was outside smoking.

As one might imagine, this has caused much activity on the Peoria Journal Star message boards. A sampling:

• I agree wholeheartedly with Jim Beam, for once, lol. What's the big deal! — JD

• JUST BECAUSE SHE LOST HER LIQUOR LICENSE , DOES THAT MEAN SHE CAN'T STILL BE A RESTAURANT??? — cg

• A Canton bar had naked midget wrestling. Just think about that for a second. — Barrak

• Dang it. What are we going to do for the next 8 Saturday nights? — RegalBeagle

• Classic Canton logic. It's a good thing Creve Coeur exists. — admin

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Reality of finale sets in for Yankees

By Bryan Hoch / MLB.com

"I can't envision myself going over to the new stadium yet," Derek Jeter said. (Eve Roytshteyn/MLB.com)

NEW YORK -- It finally happened. The long-unimaginable reality of Yankee Stadium's finale hit Derek Jeter on a sunny Sunday afternoon, as he navigated New York's thoroughfares and made a sharp left turn into the players' parking lot for the last time.

"Just driving in, I think it really starts to hit you," Jeter said. "This is the last time I'm driving to Yankee Stadium to play a game."

Jeter made his walk across Ruppert Place for the final time as a member of the Yankees' starting lineup at approximately 2 p.m. ET, dressed in a navy blue suit, a white shirt and a blue tie. Accompanied by director Spike Lee, Jeter's oft-repeated claim that playing at Yankee Stadium is a lot like appearing on Broadway seemed appropriate.

So, too, did the attire -- with a Red Sox victory earlier in the day, the Yankees have business to attend to if they wish to avoid remembering Yankee Stadium's finale as also the day they were eliminated from the postseason.

"The last couple of days, I've been looking around," Jeter said. "It's pretty special. Those are the moments that are going to stick with you forever.

"This is a special place. I've been here for parts of 14 years. I still can't envision myself going over to the new stadium yet. This place is pretty comfortable playing here. It's an old stadium, but it's in pretty good condition. I just enjoy coming here every day. I'm going to miss it."

Many of his Yankees teammates knew the feeling. The afternoon has been a difficult one for catcher Jorge Posada, who is on the disabled list and will be unable to appear in Sunday's game.

Posada said that there had been no discussion of activating him so he might at least be able to appear in the contest, saying, "It doesn't make sense." Thus, Posada had a different perspective than most who traveled to Yankee Stadium on Sunday, already missing something.

"I was looking forward to seeing the guys and to be a part of this special day, and hopefully the Yankees win and everybody can take that last memory," Posada said. "But emotionally, when you're not playing, it's tough."

In the Yankees' clubhouse an hour before game time, a cross-section of Yankees past and present took place. David Wells sat at Posada's locker in full uniform and Bernie Williams passed through, wearing the pinstripes as he had hoped as an active player in 2007.

First-base coach Tony Pena eyeballed Yogi Berra wearing a vintage crème uniform and playfully untucked the foreign material, leaving Yogi to grin his Yogi grin and shove Pena playfully. Reggie Jackson brought out his old-school, circa-1977 stirrups to commemorate the occasion.

Phil Coke, a Yankee for less than a month, celebrated the early afternoon in his own special way.

"I pushed my grandmother up all of the ramps because I didn't know where the elevator was," Coke said. "I pushed her all the way up to look down on the field. You want to talk about something amazing? That was amazing."

Coke was one of the first players to wander onto the field as fans roamed the warning track, circling around the storied field after visiting Monument Park.

"Everybody was almost misty-eyed," Coke said. "I was walking in just watching people, and there were saying, 'This is amazing -- I'm on the field!' I thought, 'You're not kidding. I'm lucky enough to do it every day.'"

Jeter has been reluctant to give in to the avalanche of memories that have preceded Sunday's finale, though he has secretly picked out what memorabilia he'd like to bring home. He refuses to say, knowing that as soon as he does so, someone else will pluck that item from its spot.

"I've got to get it before I can actually tell you what it is," Jeter said.

The nostalgia began to steep as Jeter watched television before leaving for the stadium. He saw highlights of the fifth game of the 2001 World Series and Game 7 of the 2003 American League Championship Series against the Red Sox, and the sentimentality began coming back.

"My parents told me about a week ago to make sure I enjoy this," Jeter said. "You don't want to look back and wish you'd done something differently."

It was in the ninth inning of Saturday's game, and Jeter took a little extra time before stepping into the batter's box, knowing that it was one of his final opportunities to do so. He looked around and, as he said with a smile, promptly was hit on the left hand with a fastball. Add another memory to the list.

But as Jeter dressed at his locker late Saturday afternoon, Jackson stopped by to offer words of wisdom, already in the nostalgic mood as his presence was felt all week. What he said resounded with Jeter.

"Reggie came by and said that he doesn't feel sad -- he feels proud to be part of history here," Jeter said. "I don't think anybody could have put it any better."

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Yankees Don’t Want Fans to Be Doing the Demolition

Librado Romero/The New York Times

Give It an ‘S’ Yes, they really are serious about it: workers on Friday were busy installing the sign that will adorn the new Yankee Stadium.

By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT

After a game last month, a husky man clutched a large framed poster of Mariano Rivera as he boarded a subway outside Yankee Stadium. Grinning, he proclaimed that he had ripped the frame off a wall at the Stadium and had evaded security guards. He said he could not wait to tell his children what he had done.

On Saturday and Sunday, for what almost certainly will be the final games at Yankee Stadium, the Yankees have arranged to have 2,000 security workers on hand — roughly 1,600 more than usual — to prevent any similar thefts. They will include city police officers, private security, federal authorities and members of the Bronx district attorney’s office.

“Our promotion for this weekend is that if you have a ticket to get in, we will have a police officer with you,” Lonn A. Trost, chief operating officer for the Yankees, said somewhat tongue in cheek in a telephone interview. “Nobody is going to get in here with a crowbar.”

Yankees officials are trying to protect profits and prevent chaos. After a final ceremony is held in November to commemorate the Stadium, which will be razed in the coming months, some pieces will be sold to fans and memorabilia collectors. Everything else will be carted away to landfills. The proceeds will probably be split between the city, which owns the Stadium, and the team.

The Mets, who will have Shea Stadium demolished shortly after the season ends, have already been taking orders for seats from Shea, asking $869 a pair, not including tax.

The task of protecting Yankee Stadium will be daunting on Sunday. Fans will be allowed into the park at 1 p.m., more than seven hours before the scheduled first pitch at 8:15. And even that is probably an estimate; farewell ceremonies are scheduled to start at 7:05.

For the first three hours after they are allowed into the Stadium, fans will be allowed to walk on the warning track and through Monument Park. Security guards will be as vigilant about protecting the field’s dirt as they will be of its seats.

“We are going to try and tell you to show your hands,” Trost said, alluding to fans who might try to take dirt or grass from the field. “We hope to have the warning track at least for the game.”

Concession stands will begin selling alcohol at 6 p.m.

“Sunday’s going to be a long day,” said Ann Cincotta, who 27 years ago was the first woman ticket-taker at the Stadium. “I don’t know what to expect. I assume many people will be crying.”

Already this season, wrenches have been confiscated from fans. Some have been prosecuted for trying to take seats, and even cup holders.

“I wouldn’t want to give you a list of what people have tried to take because innocent people may think of things,” Trost said.

Neither Yankee Stadium nor Shea will be imploded, or demolished the way Ebbets Field and the Polo Grounds were. Instead, workers will take the stadiums apart piece by piece over three months. The Yankee Stadium field will remain and will be surrounded by two more fields and 12,000 trees.

Shea will become a parking lot.

Yankees officials remember the chaos at the Stadium on Sept. 30, 1973, the final game before the Stadium was shut down for two years of renovations. That day, fans descended on the field after the game, and used crowbars to separate seats from the concrete.

Several fans interviewed at the Stadium on Friday said they had little interest in trying to take a piece of the ballpark.

“There were three things I wanted to do: get a beer across the street, get my picture taken at Mickey Mantle’s monument here and see a ballgame,” said Gerry Butler, 60, of Dayton, Ohio. “So far I’ve done two out of three.”

Security at the Stadium will be looser than it was soon after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, when President Bush, wearing a bulletproof vest under a New York Fire Department jacket, threw out the first pitch before Game 3 of the World Series.

“We aren’t going to have snipers,” Trost said.

Joshua Robinson contributed reporting.

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