October 9, 1986: The Fox Network Premieres

October 9, 1986: The Fox television network premieres. The sitcom Married... with Children becomes its signature program, full of stereotyping and gross-out humor. This would be followed by many animated shows that upped that ante, although it's hard to say that Homer Simpson of The Simpsons and Peter Griffin of Family Guy were less cartoonish than MWC's Al Bundy. Certainly, when it came to height of hair, MWC's Peg Bundy gave Marge Simpson of The Simpsons a run for her money.

In 1994, Fox Sports was developed. Although its Fox NFL Sunday pregame, halftime and postgame shows will be a lot of fun, their baseball broadcasting has always been terrible, and their hockey experiment flopped, in part due to a special effect called the "glow-puck." It was supposed to make the puck easier to find on the TV screen, but it backfired: Grownups found it distracting, and kids would wonder why the puck wasn't glowing when they were taken to live games.

In 1996, Fox News began, with a Sunday-morning program to compete with those of the big three (ABC, CBS and NBC) and CNN, a 24-hours news channel to compete with CNN, and the perennial dual lie that it was "fair and balanced."

The network claimed to stand for conservative values and traditional morality. And yet, it broadcast shows like Married... with Children and Temptation Island; and had news personalities like Bill O'Reilly and Tucker Carlson. 

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October 9, 1986 was a Thursday. Football was in midweek. It was too soon for the NBA and NHL seasons to begin. And the American League Championship Series was on a travel day. The Boston Red Sox would beat the California Angels in 7 games.

So there was only 1 score on this historic day, and that was in Game 2 of the National League Championship Series, at the Astrodome in Houston. The New York Mets beat the Houston Astros, 5-1. Bob Ojeda outpitched Nolan Ryan.

After the Mets had foolishly traded him away after the 1971 season, Ryan put together one of the greatest careers any pitcher has ever had. Yet, after helping the Mets win the 1969 World Series, his postseason record was not very good, and this game was another example. The Mets would win the series in 6 games, and then the World Series over the Red Sox in 7.