Sports

Illinois Teen Makes Replica Wrigley Field In His Backyard

(Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Nicholas Elias Contributor
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A Palatine, Illinois, teenager has spent his quarantine time finishing a fully-equipped replica of the Chicago Cubs’ Wrigley Field.


The backyard ballpark is meant for wiffle ball and comes equipped with a replica scoreboard, flags, and a painted Cubs logo, per a Monday Daily Herald report. The field also has real bases, a pitching rubber, chalked foul lines, ivy covered green walls and flood lights for night games. (RELATED: San Francisco Giants Will Have Cardboard Fans In The Stands)

“I just started it, it was a spot for me and my friends to come back here and play every summer,” said D.J. Dick to ABC 7, “And this summer with everything and quarantine and COVID-19, I thought I could just make it into something that I really wanted to, cuz I’ve been a Cubs fan my whole life.” Dick is an incoming junior at Palatine High School and plays baseball, basketball and golf.

“As a parent, there’s a lot worse things that a kid could be asking his parents to buy as a 16-year-old,” said D.J.’s mom, Jen Dick, to the Daily Herald. Jen also said that the project has been a good way of combining D.J.’s artistic abilities with his athletic ability. “I have to say, I wasn’t on board at first with the ivy because he had to paint my fence, and change the look of our backyard, but I will say it is absolutely cool now that it’s up,” said Jen to ABC7.

“Our neighbors have been great about it,” said David Dick, D.J.’s dad, to ABC7 “And some of them even come in and play. So it’s been very communal in terms of how everybody approaches the field itself.” 

The MLB and the Chicago Cubs will return to play for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic July 23, per MLB.