The first is The Original Hot Dog Shop, affectionately known as The O. It's right in the middle of the Pitt campus and serves some tasty treats.
I met my friend Bill and his son Mike, two hard-core Philadelphia Flyers fans who drove here from south Jersey for the
2017 Coors Light Stadium Series
against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; NBC, SN, TVA Sports 2, NHL.TV) at Heinz Field.
We ordered a few hot dogs, and when we asked about fries, the guy behind the counter said a medium order should be big enough for the three of us. He wasn't kidding. As you can see, the medium order could probably feed an entire hockey team.
The fries were plentiful and very tasty. The O offers quite a large beer selection, but since it was a work day for me and my guests had a late night on Friday, we stuck to water and soda.
After lunch we went to look at a brick wall. OK, it wasn't just any brick wall; it was part of the outfield fence at Forbes Field, the home of the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1909-70. It was razed in 1972, but part of the outfield wall still remains. It must have been quite a park. Dead center field, according to the marking on the wall, was 475 feet from home plate. There is also a flagpole in front of the wall.
Across the street, where the left field would have been, there's a plaque in the sidewalk marking the spot where Bill Mazeroski's World Series-winning home run in 1960 went over the left field wall.
It's really a cool, out-of-the-way spot. There are no signs telling you how to get there, and when I asked a Pitt student for directions, he had no idea what I was talking about, even though we were a block away.
He must have hockey, not baseball, on is mind.
Plenty of Flyers fans in town for the game on Saturday night. Should be fun.
