I haven’t been to Yankee Stadium since 1977.

I did, however, experience a unique baseball phenomenon the other night when the New York Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox 7-3 in New York.

You see, the broadcast – play-by-play, actually – came via a cell phone call from our oldest boy Scott, who is a student in the city and lives in Manhattan.

Scott is an ardent Red Sox fan, and I cautioned him to be judicious and less vociferous than usual in his cheering, considering where he was.

Oddly, Scott had a similar seat in right field to the one I had in 1977.

My first trip to the stadium saw me finding my seat in the right field bleachers, then just missing a Mickey Rivers home run, which landed three rows in front of me.

Scott’s experience was similar, as Jason Giambi plunked one three rows in front of him in almost the same spot.

The late Curt Gowdy, famed Red Sox broadcaster, used to say that Red Sox slugger Ted Williams could spit that far over the right-field stands. Williams was an infamous spitter. But that’s another column, another day.

In fact, the Sox and the Yankees talked a time or two about the possibilities of the right-handed hitting Bronx bomber Joe DiMaggio coming to play in Boston with its notorious short porch in left field in a swap for Ted Williams, who batted left-handed and could find the short porch in right field in New York with most of his routine fly balls.

I gave Scott a brief Yankee Stadium historical rundown before he boarded the train into the Bronx.

I especially encouraged him to take a walk through Monument Park beyond the centerfield wall, a place housing plaques for such noted Yankee heroes as Lou Gehrig, Babe Ruth, and Mickey Mantle.

Scott was struck by the history of the place, which opened officially in 1923, but he was taken back a bit by what he termed a rude crowd.

I reminded him that he was sitting in a hostile environment, and knowing Scott as well as I do, I’m guessing his affection for such sluggers as Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, and Trot Nixon couldn’t be kept at bay for any extended period of time.

Talking to Scotty during the game reminded me of our first trip together to Fenway Park to see Roger Clemens pitch.

I still have fond memories of Scott’s face when he caught a glimpse of the Green Monster in left field. My, oh, my, his eyes were huge with boyhood wonderment.

When we arrived back at our hotel that evening, he was still talking about how green the grass looked in the sunlight.

The journalist in me required a similar question to him about Yankee Stadium.

“The white facades,” he said awe struck. “The place is huge!”

Fathers, sons, and baseball.

My Dad took me to a Yankees/Red Sox game in Fenway – my first major league contest – in 1961, the magical year that Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle were chasing Babe Ruth’s seemingly untouchable homerun season record of 60.

I still remember my own first glimpse of the big wall in left and that spectacular, manicured grass. But it was the sight of Mantle and Maris that caught my eye, too.

They were larger than life to me then – they still are, really – and catching a glimpse of them up close was the stuff, well, of newspaper columns in adult years.

And, of course, former Sox leadoff man Johnny Damon’s presence in Yankee pinstripes begged a question from one lifelong Sox fan to his son.

“He doesn’t look comfortable, Dad,” Scott said, and then, true to his upbringing, he referred to him as “Johnny Paycheck.”

That’s my boy.

BDN columnist Ron Brown, a retired high school basketball coach, can be reached at bdnsports@bangordailynews.net