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The Yankees stave off elimination for one more game. Molina, of all people, hits the last HR in The Yankee Stadium. Mariano Rivera throws the last pitch there, just as he'd "prayed to God" to do.

“It was more the people than the stadium,” Williams said. “You talk about the magic and the aura, but what really made the Stadium was the fans. Concrete doesn’t talk back to you. Chairs don’t talk back to you. It’s the people that are there, that root for you day in and day out. That’s what makes this place magical.”

The legacy of Yankee Stadium, it turns out, was never the title fights or the N.F.L. championships, the papal visits or the World Series. It was the fans. In its final season, the Yankees set a record for attendance, 4,298,543. At the end, the fans were drawn to Ruth’s house in ways he never could have dreamed.

It was a hell of a run.