Stuck in elevator at Yankee Stadium, we survive

NEW YORK — I’m 57 years old and I’d never been stuck for even a minute in an elevator, until today. It happened in the press elevator at the new Yankee Stadium. Myself and six colleagues were on our way to the Twins off-day media conference this morning when the elevator hit a bump, bounced like it had struck an iceberg, and stopped dead just above the clubhouse level.

Three of us from MLB.com were in the group: myself, Kelly Thesier, the Twins beat writer, and Scott Merkin, who covers the White Sox, and is on our terrific team blanketing the Yanks and Twins in their American League Division Series.

We were stuck in the elevator for 25 minutes, cracking jokes all along the way. It wasn’t a tragic experience. The press conference started without us and when Twins manager Ron Gardenhire was told about it, he quipped: “What are they doing, chewing their arms and legs off?” That sounds about right for a group of sportswriters.

I felt sorry for the elevator operator. He had switched with another guy just as we boarded on the press level. It was less than a minute later when we came to that bumpy halt. I have to thank the Yankees service people, who worked quickly to spring us out. The elevator halted about six feet above the clubhouse level and when the front door was finally pried open from the outside we all had to step on low wrungs of a wooden ladder to get out. This was hardly the Titanic.

But as I said, I’ll be 58 on Oct. 26 and this is something I’d never experienced. So now I can add it to my resume: stuck in an elevator, in the new Yankee Stadium, of all places; 10 minutes from the apartment where I grew up in the north Bronx and my parents still live, and survived.