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The NHL’s Winter Classic, played at Wrigley Field on New Year’s Day, turned out to be a real game, better than almost anyone could have expected, but the play was perhaps too rooted in reality — and the dominant Detroit Red Wings’ precision team play — while the setting was magical to the point of being ridiculous. As expected, the seats closest to the action in baseball tended to have the worst view of the hockey rink. The first several rows couldn’t see over the boards to find the puck, so those fans stood throughout, meaning all those behind them in the lower grandstand had to stand as well to see over them. The only exceptions were the privileged nabobs and high muckety mucks in what would usually be the best seats in the house, behind home plate. They sat down throughout. Yet everyone else was standing and shouting, and the upper deck, which allowed perhaps the best view of the action and the ever-shifting patterns of hockey, was rapt, as were the bleachers. That was the event in a nutshell: a little bit kooky, a bit of a square peg in a round hole (make that a rectangular rink in a baseball diamond), but the fans were engaged regardless for the sheer novelty. I scooted from empty seat to empty seat, when there were any from people going to the beer stand or the bathroom, and I heard intelligent hockey talk everywhere — not just about the Blackhawks and Red Wings, but about national teams and coming stars. For all the novelty appeal, this was very much a crowd of aficionados.
“It’s tough for us to sit up here and say how good the Wings are,” said the Hawks’ Patrick Sharp afterward, “but they’re the best team in the league, I think.”
