October 2, 1978: The Bucky Dent Game

October 2, 1978. I like to call it the Boston Tie Party. Boston Red Sox fans call it something else.

On July 20, the Sox led the American League Eastern Division by 9 1/2 games. The New York Yankees were 14 games back. But it wasn't over: The Yankees changed managers, allowing Billy Martin to claim a resignation and hiring Bob Lemon, and went on a tear.

On September 10, they completed a 4-game sweep of the Red Sox at Fenway Park, to tie them for 1st place. Outscoring them 42-9 over the 4 games, it became known as the Boston Massacre. By September 16, after taking 2 more games at Yankee Stadium, the Yankees were 3 1/2 games up.

But it wasn't over then, either: The Sox won the finale of that series, and 12 of their last 14, including their last 8 straight, and both teams ended with 99-63 records. A one-game Playoff would be necessary to decide the AL East title, won by the Sox in 1975 and the Yankees in 1976 and 1977.

So at the conclusion of play on October 1st, Lemon had a big decision to make. He had been in such a situation before, although as a piece of the decision, rather than as the decider: In 1948, he was a pitcher for the Cleveland Indians, and they had to go to Fenway Park and play the Red Sox in a one-game playoff for the Pennant.

Lou Boudreau, who was their manager, and also their shortstop, asked the players who they would pitch. To a man, they all said that whoever he chose would be fine with them. Given the dimensions of Fenway Park, Boudreau knew that picking a fastball pitcher like Bob Feller might be a bad idea. Lemon's out pitch was a slider, but he was only in his 3rd year as a full-time pitcher, so the possibility of his hanging a slider and having it sent over the Green Monster in left field made Boudreau back off.

So Boudreau went with a knuckleballer, Gene Bearden, who pitched well despite not much rest. Boudreau himself hit 2 home runs. The Indians won, stayed in Boston to begin the World Series against the Braves (this was the closest baseball would ever come to an all-Boston World Series), and won the Series in 6 games.

Thirty years later, Lemon really only had one choice: Ron Guidry, a lefthander with a 98-mile-per-hour fastball and a devastating slider. He stood at 24-3, with a 1.71 ERA. And the man known as "Louisiana Lightning" said, "Skip, give me the ball." And Lemon knew that he would be ready, even though he was only on 3 days rest.

Leaving Yankee Stadium on October 1, Guidry ran into the Yankees' owner, George Steinbrenner. George told Ron he was nervous. Ron said, "Boss, what are you so worried about?" And George whined about having to go up to Fenway and how strong the Red Sox were. Ron said, "Don't worry, Boss. I got this." George would later say that calmed him down a lot.

Red Sox manager Don Zimmer chose Mike Torrez as his starting pitcher. The year before, Torrez had been a Yankee, and went the distance in winning Games 3 and 6 of the World Series. But his contract ran out, and Steinbrenner, in the process of replacing Gabe Paul as general manager with Al Rosen, didn't make a move to re-sign Torrez.

So Torrez signed with the Red Sox, and went 16-12. Red Sox fans loved Luis Tiant and Bill Lee, but the truth was, that season, Torrez won more games than any Sox pitcher except Dennis Eckersley. (Lee had been terrible down the stretch, Tiant had pitched the day before, and Eckersley, who wouldn't be converted into one of the greatest relievers in the game's history, wasn't rested enough, either.)

In hindsight, lots of Red Sox fans bemoaned the selection of Torrez. But, at the time, many saw it as a good sign. Guidry had lost only 3 games all season long, and all 3 times, it was to an opposing pitcher named Mike: Caldwell of the Milwaukee Brewers, Flanagan of the Baltimore Orioles, and Willis of the Toronto Blue Jays. The problem with this theory was, all 3 of those were lefthanded, like Guidry. Torrez was righthanded.

Some Sox fans took comfort in the fact that Guidry was lefthanded, and Fenway was great for righthanded hitters, with its 37-foot-high left field wall, nicknamed the Green Monster, with a foul pole listed at just 315 feet from home plate. They would later relabel it as 310. Some people suspect that it may even be closer than that: A World War II bomber pilot, who studied reconnaissance photos, looked at an aerial shot, made some measurements, and said it was 304 feet. Some people have suggested it's even as close as 290. And it wasn't just the pole: That wall turned pop flies into home runs, and fly outs into singles and doubles.

Except Guidry had already pitched a 2-hit shutout there in Game 3 of the Massacre series. And Ron Guidry was not going to be intimidated. Not by Carl Yastrzemski, nor by Jim Rice, nor Carlton Fisk, or any of the other Sox hitters.

But neither would Torrez be intimidated by the Yankee hitters. After all, he knew them well.

*

These were the starting lineups. For the Yankees:

17 CF Mickey Rivers
15 C Thurman Munson
14 RF Lou Piniella
44 DH Reggie Jackson
9 3B Graig Nettles
10 1B Chris Chambliss
6 LF Roy White
25 2B Brian Doyle
20 SS Bucky Dent

Only Rivers and Dent were in their usual places in the order. The usual 2nd baseman, Number 30, Willie Randolph, was injured, and would miss the entire postseason if the Yankees made it. He usually batted 2nd. So Munson was moved up from 3rd to 2nd.

Piniella, usually either the left fielder or the designated hitter, was moved up from 5th to 3rd. Jackson was put in the DH slot, not because Lemon had little confidence in his fielding, the way Martin did, but because Reggie had injured his thumb attempting a catch off the wall a few days earlier, and it still hurt to put a glove on. This would prove to be a critical change later on, one of the few examples ever of a well-timed injury. It didn't stop him from hitting, though.

Nettles was moved up from 6th to 5th; Chambliss from 7th to 6th; and White from 8th, where he was frequently the DH, to 7th.

For the Red Sox:

7 SS Rick Burleson
2 2B Jerry Remy
14 RF Jim Rice
8 LF Carl Yastrzemski
27 C Carlton Fisk
19 CF Fred Lynn
4 DH Butch Hobson
5 1B George Scott
3 3B Jack Brohamer

Differences from the usual: Rice was moved from left field to right, filling in for the injured Dwight Evans; Yaz, at this point in his career, was the usual DH or 1st baseman, but moved back to his old position to fill in for the moved Rice; Hobson was usually the 3rd baseman and the 9th hitter, but an injured elbow took him out of the field; the slumping Scott was dropped from 7th to 8th; and Brohamer was an emergency backup, leading to Hobson being moved from 9th to 7th.

(Because of the bone chips in his elbow, Clell Lavern Hobson Jr., who once had good enough of an arm to be a backup quarterback for Bear Bryant at the University of Alabama, made 43 errors in 1978. No player has had as many in a season since.)

The starting pitchers were Ron Guidry for New York, Mike Torrez for Boston. The umpires were Don Denkinger behind home plate, Jim Evans at 1st base, Al Clark at 2nd, and Steve Palermo at 3rd. All good ones, regardless of what St. Louis fans would eventually think of Denkinger.

Game-time temperature was 68 degrees. No rain was forecast. Paid attendance was 32,925, and there may have been another 2,000 or so freebies inside Fenway. Getting tickets was a crapshoot, with or without scalpers, but face value for box seats was $5.75 -- about $25.78 in 2022 money.

Fenway Park, sometime between 1976 (new scoreboards)

and 1987 (before the club seating went up)

The game began at 2:30 PM, and I didn't get to see the start of it, because Bowne-Munro let out at 2:35. By the time I got home, it was already 1-0 Red Sox. Here's what I missed:

Top of the 1st: Torrez walked Rivers. Cliché Alert: Walks can kill you, especially the leadoff variety. And the last thing Torrez wanted to do was put Mick the Quick on 1st to start the game. Sure enough, Rivers stole 2nd. But Torrez struck Munson out, and got Piniella to ground to 3rd and Reggie to fly to left.

Bottom of the 1st: Guidry struck Burleson out, got Remy to fly to left, and struck Rice out. Top of the 2nd: Torrez got Nettles to pop to short, got Chambliss to pop to 1st, and struck White out.

Ron Guidry, in the bottom of the 1st

Bottom of the 2nd: Yaz led off with a home run, curling it around the right-field pole that would later be named for Johnny Pesky. The Fenway crowd went bananas over their 39-year-old Captain, the hero of the 1967 "Impossible Dream" Pennant, coming through again. But Guidry settled down, and got Fisk to fly to left, Lynn to fly to center, and Hobson to ground to 3rd. Still: Red Sox 1, Yankees 0.

Yaz shakes hands with Lynn, as Fisk looks on

Top of the 3rd: Torrez got Doyle to pop to 2nd and Dent to fly to right. Rivers hit a double to right, but Torrez Struck Munson out. Bottom of the 3rd: Scott doubled to center. Smelling blood, Zimmer had Brohamer bunt Scott over to 3rd. A fly ball would make it 2-0 Sox. But Guidry got Burleson to gound to 3rd, and the chubby Scott did not dare test Nettles, who threw Burleson out. Then Remy flew to left, ending the threat.

Top of the 4th, which is probably where the game was when I got home: Piniella, who seemed to be the biggest Red Sox killer of all, led off with a grounder to deep short, and Burleson couldn't quite throw him out. Despite Reggie's line, "Lou Piniella runs like a dump truck," Sweet Lou had an infield single. But it was in vain: Reggie flew to right, Nettles popped to short, and Chambliss grounded to short. Bottom of the 4th: Guidry got Rice to ground to short, struck Yaz out, and got Fisk to fly to center.

Top of the 5th: Torrez worked out of another leadoff walk situation, this time by White, but getting Doyle to ground to 2nd, Dent to pop to short, and Rivers to ground to 3rd, where Brohamer tagged out White, who was running because there were 2 outs. Bottom of the 5th: Lynn grounded back to Guidry, Hobson beat out a grounder to 3rd, and Guidry struck Scott out and got Brohamer to fly to left. Still 1-0 Red Sox.

Top of the 6th: Torrez struck Munson out, got Piniella to fly to center, and got Reggie to ground to 2nd. Bottom of the 6th: Burleson led off with a double. Remy bunted him over to 3rd. This time, it worked: Rice singled to center, bringing Burleson home. Yaz grounded to 1st. Fisk was intentionally walked. Lynn flew to right. End of 6: Red Sox 2, Yankees 0. Sox fans were getting very confident.

Think about it: Today, Torrez's manager would probably have told him he'd pitched a great game, and let the bullpen handle it from here. Although, to be fair, Sox fans generally don't blame Torrez for what happened next. They blame manager Don Zimmer, who left Torrez in.

Torrez got Nettles to fly to right, but allowed singles to Chambliss and White. Lemon, knowing he's short of players in the middle infield, rolled the dice, and sent Jim Spencer, a lefthanded power hitter and normally a 1st baseman, to pinch-hit for Doyle. Spencer flew to left. Two out.

And then up came shortstop Russell Earl "Bucky" Dent. Let's be clear about something: Bucky Dent was not some stiff who lucked into, as CBS' college basketball broadcasts would say, "one shining moment." He was a very good fielder. He was an occasional clutch hitter for contact. And he was a very good bunter. What he was not was a power hitter: He came into that game with only 4 home runs on the season. There was a reason he was 9th in the batting order every day, but there was also a reason he was in the batting order every day.

He took ball one. He fouled the next pitch off his foot for strike one. Yankee trainer Gene Monahan came out to tend to his injury.

This being an injury time-out, the pitcher was allowed to make as many warmup throws as he could fit in, until the injured player was ready to continue. Torrez chose to make none.

Rivers, the on-deck batter, noticed that Bucky's bat was broken. He took one of his own, given to him by White, and told the batboy, "Give this bat to Bucky. It has a home run in it."

It's worth noting that the wind had shifted: Where it had been blowing from left field to right, thus aiding Yaz's homer, it was now blowing the other way. With the building of the larger press box and club seats in 1988, the wind currents were changed, and what happened next might not have happened had it been in place 10 years earlier.

It was around 4:30 in the afternoon. I can't find a reference to an exact time, and I certainly wasn't looking at the clock back then. That would be a habit of mine later, and I can tell you that the 1996 World Series win was clinched at 10:53 PM, and Aaron Boone hit his home run at 12:16 AM. (And the New Jersey Devils won their 1st Stanley Cup at 11:09 PM on June 24, 1995. Don't bet me.)

Bucky got back into the box. Torrez delivered. Bucky swung. As Yankee broadcaster Bill White said on WPIX-Channel 11: "Deep to left, Yastrzemski will… not get it! It's a home run! A three-run home run for Bucky Dent, and now, the Yankees lead it by a score of 3-2!"

The ball landed in the netting atop the Green Monster, put up to protect businesses across Lansdowne Street (now Ted Williams Way) from home run balls. The netting is no longer there, replaced by the Green Monster Seats. I don't know where the netting or the ball are today. I hope the Baseball Hall of Fame has both of them.

White, Chambliss, Dent. Except for the Yankee Fan in the middle,

everybody else in this photo looks like they just lost their best friend.

Rattled, Torrez walked Rivers, and then Zimmer pulled him for Bob Stanley. Mick the Quick stole 2nd. Munson doubled him home, before Stanley finally ended the rally by getting Piniella to fly to right. Yankees 4, Red Sox 2.

Bottom of the 7th. Fred Stanley, known as "Chicken" because he's so skinny, and normally a shortstop, goes out to 2nd base. Guidry struck Hobson out, but Scott singled to right. Zimmer sent Bob Bailey up to pinch-hit for Brohamer.

Recognizing that Guidry was exhausted, Lemon took him out, and replaced him with Rich "Goose" Gossage. It seemed a little early for it, but there was no tomorrow until April if this game was lost. Gossage struck Bailey out, and got Burleson to ground to short.

Top of the 8th: Frank Duffy was sent in at 3rd to replace Brohamer. Reggie reminded everyone that he was Mr. October, and crushed a Stanley pitch to dead center field, almost hitting a TV camera set up in the corner of the Fenway bleachers, where that stand met the Green Monster. Zimmer removed Stanley and put in Andy Hassler, a lefthander who usually pitched very well against the Yankees. Hassler struck Nettles out, and got both Chambliss and White to ground to 2nd.

Still, it was 5-2 Yankees, and it seemed like the Red Sox season was ending not with a bang, but with a whimper.

Not so fast: Remy, who'd been a pain in the neck to the Yankees all season, opened the bottom of the 8th with a double to right. Rice flew to right. Yaz singled to center, scoring Remy. 5-3. Fisk singled to center. Lynn singled to right, scoring Yaz. 5-4.

The Goose was in trouble. But Lemon stuck with him, trusting him the way Billy Martin didn't. The Goose got Hobson to fly to right, and struck Scott out.

Top of the 9th: Hassler still pitching for Boston. Stanley grounded to 2nd. Dent struck out. Lemon sent Paul Blair, once the best defensive center fielder in baseball while with the Baltimore Orioles, but now mainly a defensive replacement in right field for Reggie (but not today, as Reggie was the DH -- which turned out to be crucial), to pinch-hit for Rivers, because Rivers and Hassler were both lefties and Blair was righthanded. Blair singled to left. Zimmer removed Hassler, and brought in Dick Drago. Earlier in the season, Drago had purposely beaned Munson. This time, he gets Munson to ground to short, producing an inning-ending force play at 2nd.

Bottom of the 9th. One of the tensest innings in each team's history. Lemon put Blair in center, and moved Gary Thomasson to left field in place of White. Zimmer sent Evans, still dealing with post-concussion symptoms from a beaning weeks earlier, up to pinch-hit for the weak Duffy. It doesn't work, as he flies to left. Two outs to go. But the Sox refuse to go quietly. Burleson draws a walk.

The next play summed up the entire season for these teams. Remy hit a fly ball to right. Had the 1988 press box and club seating been in place in 1978, that section of right field would have been shaded, and Piniella -- in right field because of Reggie's decline as a fielder -- would have caught the ball easily. But it wasn't, and Lou lost the ball in the Sun. As Bill White said on Channel 11, "Piniella... can't see the ball!"

The crowd sensed this, and roared their approval. Lou had no choice but to stick his arms out, and hope that the ball either bounced off his body or one of his arms, or, if he was lucky, landed in his outstretched left-hand glove like a hockey goaltender.

And that's almost exactly what happened: It landed right in front of him, he realized it would go to his left, and he lunged, caught it on the next hop, turned, and threw it back to the infield.

Burleson was watching him, and might have been the one guy in Fenway Park who didn't realize that Lou couldn't see the ball in the Sun. He had to hold up between 1st and 2nd, for fear of being doubled off 1st to end the game. Because of his hesitation, he only got to 2nd, not to 3rd. This turned out to be critical, because Rice flew to right, where Piniella again lost the ball for a moment, but caught it, and a tagging Burleson could only go from 2nd to 3rd, not from 3rd to score a tying run.

The batter was Carl Yastrzemski, against Rich Gossage. Here was Yaz, one of the best fastball hitters of all time, against the Goose, one of the fastest pitchers who ever lived, but not yet renowned as a big-game pitcher.

If you were a Red Sox fan at the time, this was the guy you wanted up -- never mind that he had made the last out of the 1975 World Series, with the tying run on base and serving as the potential winning run. If you were a Yankee Fan, this was the last guy you wanted to see, and your confidence in the Goose was not as high as it would soon become.

The Goose threw one low and in. Ball 1. Then he threw one right over the plate, figuring Yaz wouldn't take it, but might swing and miss. Yaz didn't miss...

Yaz hit 452 home runs in his career. This was not one of them.

...but he did get jammed by the Goose's fastball, and popped it up by the 3rd base foul line. Nettles got under it, and caught it for the final out.

Nettles and Gossage

For the Yankees: 5 runs, 8 hits, no errors, and 6 men left on base. For the Red Sox: 4 runs, 11 hits, no errors, 9 men left on base. The winning pitcher: Ron Guidry, 25-3. The save: Rich Gossage, his 27th -- on his way to becoming the 1st man ever to get the final out of a Division clincher, a Pennant clincher, and a World Series clincher all in one season. The losing pitcher: Mike Torrez, 16-13.

The attendance was 32,925, with a TV audience -- on WPIX-Channel 11, WSBK-Channel 38 in Boston, and nationally on ABC (WABC-Channel 7 in New York and WCVB-Channel 5 in Boston) -- of over 20 million, despite it being a weekday afternoon.

And the time of the game, as later Yankee broadcaster Michael Kay would say, a manageable 2 hours and 52 minutes, meaning it lasted from 2:30 to 5:22 in the afternoon.

*

The difference between this Sox loss to the Yankees and the one 25 years later is stark. When Nettles caught Yaz's popup for the final out, the Sox, as can be seen on the videotape, sort of slink back into their dugout, looking as if they were thinking, "If we couldn't do it this time, we'll never be able to do it." And, sure enough, the next time they got close, in 1986, only 8 years later, only 3 players were left from '77 and '78: Rice, Evans and Stanley. And only Rice and Evans were still there from the '75 World Series.

They had won 196 games in 2 seasons -- just as they had won 192 in 1948 and 1949 -- and, as in that 1940s instance, they hadn't even made baseball's official postseason, partly because they'd lost a one-game playoff at home.

On July 20, the Sox led the American League Eastern Division by 9 1/2 games. The Yankees were 14 games back. This time, the Sox finished with 99 wins, and they didn't even make the Playoffs. The Yankees? They went on to win their 22nd World Championship, all since the Sox won their last, 60 years earlier.

That night, Billy Joel, a Yankee Fan born in The Bronx and raised on Long Island, played the Boston Garden, home of the NBA's Celtics and the NHL's Bruins. I wonder if he played "New York State of Mind." I wonder if he played "Miami 2017," a dark fantasy about the destruction of New York. I wonder if the Bostonians cheered. I wonder if they booed the line about an aircraft carrier picking the Yankees up for free.

"Ah, but sooner or later, you sleep in your own space.

Either way, it's okay: You wake up with yourself."

It was also on October 2, 1978 that Tim Allen -- later to star in the TV sitcoms Home Improvement and Last Man Standing, and in the Santa Clause films and in the Toy Story films as the voice of Buzz Lightyear -- was arrested at the airport in his hometown of Kalamazoo, Michigan, for possession of over 1.4 pounds of cocaine.

To avoid spending the rest of his life in prison he decided to plead guilty, and provide all the names he had of dealers in the area. In exchange, he was sentenced 3 to 7 years. He was paroled after serving less than 2 1/2 years.

To this day, even after their team has finally cheated its way to 4 World Series wins, October 2, 1978 still bothers Sox fans. Let it.

As for Bucky, he is approaching his 71st birthday, and still runs his baseball school in Delray Beach, Florida. He lives in Lake Worth. His wife Marianne died in 2015. They had 4 children, including daughter Caitlin, who played softball at North Carolina State University and coached it at Hofstra University; and son Cody, who played baseball at the University of Florida.

A recent photo of Bucky at Fenway

Russell Earl O'Dey. That was his birth name. Legally, he is Russell Earl Dent. Professionally, he is Bucky Dent. Red Sox fans call him "Bucky Fucking Dent." Sometimes written as "Bucky Bleeping Dent" or "Bucky F. Dent." It's been suggested that his name sounds like a profanity: As comedian and Cambridge, Massachusetts native Lenny Clarke would say, "You buckydent bastard!"

Check it out. A Boston newspaper (I can't seem to track down which one, it might have been one in the suburbs) had the headline, "Destiny 5, Red Sox 4."

You fools, don't you know DESTINY ends with NY?

In 1981, baseball historian John Thorn published Baseball's 10 Greatest Games. He included this game as, at the time, the most recent of them. In 2010, the MLB Network listed this game at 11th on their list of MLB's 20 Greatest Games -- limited in scope, due to the availability of surviving videotape, to 1975 onward. Due to the timing -- 1975 to 1980 -- along with the Bucky Dent Game, it was 1 of 2 games to make both lists.

UPDATE: The Red Sox have a team Hall of Fame. From their 1977 and 1978 near-misses, they have inducted: left fielder Carl Yastrzemski, catcher Carlton Fisk, 1st baseman George Scott, 2nd baseman Jerry Remy, shortstop Rick Burleson, left fielder Jim Rice, center fielder Fred Lynn, right fielder Dwight Evans; pitchers Luis Tiant, Bill Lee, Bob Stanley and Dennis Eckersley; owner Jean Yawkey, manager Don Zimmer, executive Haywood Sullivan, farm system director Ben Mondor, scout George Digby, executives Edward Kenney and Dick Bresciani, groundskeeper Joe Mooney, guest relations director Al Green, broadcasters Ken Coleman and Ned Martin, and longtime vendor Arthur D'Angelo.

*

October 2, 1978 was a Monday. This was the only baseball game played that day. It was too early in the year for the NBA and NHL seasons to begin. There was 1 NFL game, on ABC Monday Night Football: The Washington Redskins beat their arch-rivals, the Dallas Cowboys, by the unusual score of 9-5. Mark Moseley kicked 3 field goals for Washington. For Dallas, Rafael Septién kicked 1, and Randy White scored a safety when he sacked Joe Theismann in the end zone in the 4th quarter.

September 29, 1954: Willie Mays Makes The Catch

September 29, 1954: Willie Mays makes the most famous defensive play in the history of sports, remembered as simply The Catch -- Capital T, Capital C.

It was Game 1 of the World Series. The New York Giants had won the National League Pennant, beating out their crosstown rivals, the Brooklyn Dodgers. The Cleveland Indians had won the American League Pennant, winning League record 111 games to beat out the Yankees, who had won the last 5 World Series. Indeed, the last 8 AL Pennants had been won by the Indians (1948 & '54) and the Yankees (1947, '49, '50, '51, '52 & '53).

Game 1 was played at the Polo Grounds in New York. The game was tied 2-2 in the top of the 8th, but the Indians got Larry Doby on 2nd base and Al Rosen on 1st with nobody out. Giant manager Leo Durocher pulled starting pitcher Sal Maglie, and brought in Don Liddle, a lefthander, to face the lefty slugger Vic Wertz, and only Wertz.

Liddle pitched, and Wertz swung, and drove the ball out to center field. The Polo Grounds was shaped more like a football stadium, so its foul poles were incredibly close: 279 feet to left field and 257 to right. In addition, the upper deck overhung the field a little, so the distances were actually even closer. But if you didn't pull the ball, it was going to stay in play. Most of the center field fence was 425 feet from home plate. A recess in center field, leading to a blockhouse that served as both teams' clubhouses -- why they were in center field, instead of under the stands, connected to the dugouts, is a mystery a long-dead architect will have to answer -- was 483 feet away.

Mays, at this point in his career, was already a big star. Just 23 years old, he had won that season's NL batting title. He had been NL Rookie of the Year in 1951, but had missed most of the 1952 season and all of 1953 serving in the U.S. Army, having been drafted into service in the Korean War. He had become known for playing stickball in the streets of Harlem with local boys in the morning, and then going off to the Polo Grounds to play real baseball in the afternoon. This raised his profile, and made him an accessible figure to City kids. His cap flying off as he ran around the bases, his defensive wizardry, and his yelling of, "Say hey!" endeared him to Giant fans.

While he made the "basket catch" nationally popular, he didn't invent it. In fact, he wasn't even the 1st Giant to use it, as 3rd baseman Bill Rigney, who would succeed Durocher as manager in 1956, was using it in the 1940s.

Even so, the days when the Giants were the team in New York sports were long gone, this week's events notwithstanding. At this moment, Mays was, in the public consciousness, where Babe Ruth was in May 1920, where Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams were in May 1941, where Mickey Mantle was in May 1956, where Reggie Jackson was in September 1977, where Roger Clemens was in April 1986, where Derek Jeter was in September 1996, where David Ortiz was in September 2004: A star, well-known and popular, but not yet a legend.

Mays ran back to try to catch the ball. In mid-stride, he thumped his fist into his mitt. His teammates, who had seen this gesture before, knew that this meant that he thought he would catch it. But most fans, who didn't watch him every day, didn't know this. Watching on television (NBC, Channel 4 in New York), they figured the ball would go over his head, scoring Doby and Rosen, and that Wertz, not exactly fleet of foot, had a chance at a triple, or even an inside-the-park home run.

Willie has said many times that he was already thinking of the throw back to the infield, hoping to hold Doby to only 3rd base. With his back to the ball all the way, he caught the ball over his head, stopped, pivoted, and threw the ball back to the infield. Doby did get only to 3rd.

The announcers were Jack Brickhouse, who normally did the home games for both of Chicago's teams, the Cubs and the White Sox, but was the lead announcer for NBC in this Series; and Russ Hodges, the usual Giants announcer, made nationally famous 3 years earlier when Bobby Thomson's home run made him yell, "The Giants win the Pennant!" over and over again.

Brickhouse: "There's a long drive, way back in center field, way back, back, it is... Oh, what a catch by Mays! The runner on second, Doby, is able to tag and go to third. Willie Mays just brought this crowd to its feet with a catch which must have been an optical illusion to a lot of people. Boy! See where that 483-foot mark is in center field? The ball itself... Russ, you know this ballpark better than anyone else I know. Had to go about 460, didn't it?"

Hodges: "It certainly did, and I don't know how Willie did it, but he's been doing it all year."

It has been argued by many, including Bob Feller, the pitching legend sitting on the Indians' bench that day, that the reason so much is made of this catch is that it was in New York, it was in the World Series, and it was on television. "It was far from the best catch I've ever seen," Feller said. Mays himself would say he'd made better catches. But none more consequential.

Durocher yanked Liddle, and brought in Marv Grissom. Upon reaching the Giant dugout, Liddle told his teammates, "Well, I got my man." Yeah, Don. You got him. As Jim Bouton, then a 15-year-old Giant fan who'd recently moved from Rochelle Park, Bergen County, New Jersey to the Chicago suburb of Chicago Heights, Illinois, would later say, "Yeah, surrrre!"

Grissom walked Dale Mitchell to load the bases with only 1 out. But he struck out Dave Pope, and got Jim Hegan to fly out, to end the threat. When the Giants got back to the dugout, they told Willie what a hard catch it was. He said, "You kiddin'? I had that one all the way."

The game went to extra innings. Future Hall-of-Famer Bob Lemon went the distance for the Tribe, but in the bottom of the 10th, he walked Mays, who stole 2nd. Then he intentionally walked Hank Thompson to set up an inning-ending double play. It didn't happen: Durocher sent Dusty Rhodes up to pinch-hit for left fielder Monte Irvin, and Rhodes hit the ball down the right-field line. It just sort of squeaked into the stands.

On the film, it looks a little like a fan reached out, and it bounced off his hand. A proto-Jeffrey Maier? To this day, no one has seriously argued that the call should be overturned.

The game was over: Giants 5, Indians 2. The Indians, heavily favored to win the Series, never recovered, and the Giants swept. The Series ended on October 2, tied with 1932 for the 2nd-earliest end to a World Series. (In 1918, the season was shortened due to World War I, and ended on September 11.)

Victor Woodrow Wertz, a native of Reading, Pennsylvania, was a right fielder and 1st baseman. He made his name with the Detroit Tigers, hit 266 home runs in his career, had 5 100-plus RBI seasons, and made 4 All-Star Teams. He went 4-for-5 with 2 RBIs in this game. He should be remembered as more than a man who hit a 460-foot (or so) drive that was caught, while another guy in the same game hit a 260-foot drive that won the game as a home run. He died in 1983, aged only 58.

Willie Howard Mays Jr., a native of Fairfield, Alabama, outside Birmingham, became one of baseball's greatest legends. He hit 660 home runs, collected 3,283 hits, made 24 All-Star Games (there were 2 every season from 1959 to 1962), won a Gold Glove the 1st 12 seasons it was given out (1957 to 1968), won the 1954 and 1965 NL Most Valuable Player awards, and played on 4 Pennant winners -- but 1954 would be his only title.

The Giants, with whom he moved to San Francisco in 1958, retired his Number 24, dedicated a statue to him outside AT&T Park, and made its official address 24 Willie Mays Plaza. He played with the Giants until 1972, when he was traded to the Mets, going back to New York at age 41. He retired in 1973, and the Mets have rarely given out Number 24 since.

He was elected to the Hall of Fame in his 1st year of eligibility, 1979. In 1999, he was named to the Major League Baseball All-Century Team, and The Sporting News put him at Number 2 on its list of the 100 Greatest Baseball Players -- 2nd only to the long-dead Babe Ruth, so Willie was tops among living players. No player has since come along to suggest otherwise -- not later Giant Barry Bonds, not Derek Jeter.

Willie is 91 years old. He is the last active player from this game; the last active former New York Giant, playing until 1973; and the last living player from this game, 68 years later. (UPDATE: He died on June 18, 2024, at the age of 93, not quite making it to the game's 70th Anniversary.)

UPDATE: The team now known as the Cleveland Guardians have a team Hall of Fame. From their 1954 American League Champions, they have honored Bob Feller, Bob Lemon, Early Wynn, Mike Garcia, Larry Doby, Al Rosen, Jim Hegan, Dale Mitchell, manager Al Lopez, scout Cy Slapnicka, and broadcaster Jimmy Dudley. Feller and 1st baseman Luke Easter have also been elected to the Greater Cleveland Sports Hall of Fame.

*

September 29, 1954 was a Wednesday. This was the only baseball game played that day. It was midweek, so there were no football games. And it was too early for the NBA or the NHL to start their seasons. So there were no other scores on this historic day.

But there is one other historical note: It was a great day for movies. This was also the day on which the Judy Garland version of the film A Star Is Born premiered. It had previously been filmed in 1937 with Janet Gaynor; and has since been filmed in 1976 with Barbra Streisand and 2018 with Lady Gaga.

And The Barefoot Contessa premiered, starring Ava Gardner and Humphrey Bogart.

September 12, 1954: Cleveland's Yankee Sweep Before 84,587

September 12, 1954: A crowd of 84,587 files into Cleveland Municipal Stadium for a doubleheader between the host Cleveland Indians and the New York Yankees. It remains the largest single-day crowd in regular-season Major League Baseball history.

(UPDATE: In 2025, the MLB Speedway Classic was held at Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tennessee. It set a new regular-season attendance record, with 91,032 fans.)

The Yankees have won the last 5 American League Pennants and World Series. But the Indians are ready for them. In the opener, Bob Lemon outpitches Allie Reynolds, who retires after the season due to a back injury. The Indians score 2 runs in the 7th and 1 in the 8th to win it, 4-1.

The Yankees stake Tommy Byrne to a 2-0 lead in the 1st inning of the 2nd game, thanks to a home run by Yogi Berra. But the Indians take the lead in the 5th on 4 straight hits with 2 outs: Singles by pitcher Early Wynn, Tommy Smith and Bobby Ávila, and a double by Wally Westlake. The Indians win, 3-2. Over the 2 games, Mickey Mantle went 1-for-7 with a walk.

Early Wynn

The doubleheader sweep puts the Indians 8 1/2 games ahead of the Yankees in the American League with 10 games to go. The Yankees end up winning 103 games, the only 100-win season of Casey Stengel's managerial career. But the Indians won 111, breaking the 1927 Yankees' AL record of 110, setting a record that lasts for 44 years. The Indians clinched the Pennant on September 18. However, another New York team, the Giants, swept them in the World Series. The Indians didn't win another Pennant for 41 years.

Why did the Indians break through in 1954, the way they didn't in the rest of the decade, when they were still good enough to get close? Yankee pitcher Whitey Ford had a theory. Catcher Lawrence "Yogi" Berra was from St. Louis, and when the Yankees made roadtrips to play the St. Louis Browns, he would bring teammates over for Sunday dinner. The Yankees won the Pennant in 1947, just missed it in 1948, then won again in 1949, '50, '51, '52 and '53.

But with the Browns having moved, there was no trip to St. Louis -- like St. Louis, Baltimore had a large Italian community, and still does, but the Berras didn't live there -- and the Yankees didn't win the Pennant: They won 103 games, the most the franchise would win between 1942 and 1963, but finished 8 games behind the Indians.

Whitey later said, "You know, we didn't win the Pennant in 1954, even though we had one of our best teams. And after the season, when we were fishing around for a reason why we didn't win, some of us would say it was because we didn't get to eat at the Berras' house."

*

September 12, 1954 was a Sunday. This was also the day the TV show Lassie premiered. I have a separate entry for that event.

These other baseball games were played that day:

* The New York Giants lost to the St. Louis Cardinals, 4-3 at the Polo Grounds. Stan Musial went 2-for-4 with a home run, a walk and 3 RBIs. Willie Mays went 0-for-3 with a walk.

* The Brooklyn Dodgers swept the Chicago Cubs, 4-2 and 4-3 at Ebbets Field. Jackie Robinson did not play in either game. Duke Snider went 1-for-10 with a walk. For the Cubs, Ralph Kiner went 1-for-8 with 2 walks, and Ernie Banks went 2-for-10 with 2 RBIs.

* A doubleheader was split at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. The Philadelphia Phillies won the 1st game, 5-2. Murry Dickson outpitched Warren Spahn. The Milwaukee Braves won the 2nd game, 2-1. Lew Burdette outpitched Robin Roberts. Rookie Hank Aaron was injured on September 5, ending his season, so he didn't play in either game.

* There was a split doubleheader at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore. The Baltimore Orioles won the 1st game, 4-3. The Philadelphia Athletics won the 2nd game, 5-4.

* The Cincinnati Reds swept the Pittsburgh Pirates, 11-5 and 13-2 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh.

* The Detroit Tigers swept the Washington Senators, 5-0 and 8-3 at Briggs Stadium in Detroit. (The ballpark was renamed Tiger Stadium in 1961.) Steve Gromek pitched a 6-hit shutout in the 1st game. Al Kaline went 1-for-8 with a walk and an RBI.

* And the Chicago White Sox swept the Boston Red Sox, 5-3 and 7-5 at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Ted Williams went 1-for-8 with a home run, a walk and 2 RBIs.

April 19, 1979: The Fight That Sidetracked a Yankee Dynasty

Cliff Johnson

April 19, 1979: The New York Yankees have a fight in their locker room. It's not the only thing that derails their bid for a 4th straight American League Pennant and a 3rd straight World Series win, but it is a big reason why they didn't even come close to the Playoffs that season.

Cliff Johnson was a catcher from San Antonio, and when the Houston Astros arrived while he was in high school, they became the closest thing he'd ever had to a home team in Major League Baseball. They drafted him in 1966, and he made his major league debut with them in 1972.

At the trading deadline in 1977, the Yankees sent Mike Fischlin, Randy Niemann, and a player to be named later (who, after the season, turned out to be Dave Bergman) to the Astros to get him. This turned out to be a very good trade, as he became a backup to Thurman Munson, and provided some pop as a righthanded pinch-hitter and designated hitter, batting a career-high .297, hitting a career-high (but eventually matched) 22 home runs, and had 54 RBIs.

Johnson did not hit as well in 1978, and when Munson got hurt again, Mike Heath seemed to become the Yankees' catcher of the future. Although Johnson had been a key figure in the 1977 postseason, especially in the AL Championship Series, he only had 3 at-bats in the 1978 postseason, even if the AL East Playoff against the Boston Red Sox is included.

Going into the Yankees' game of April 19, 1979, he had played only 5 games, going 4-for-16 with no homers and just 1 RBI. He was looking more and more like trade bait. He did not play in that night's 6-3 loss to the Baltimore Orioles at Yankee Stadium, in which Jim Palmer outpitched newly-acquired veteran Luis Tiant and rookie Paul Mirabella.

Doug DeCinces hit a home run for the O's, and Eddie Murray went 1-for-3 with a walk and 2 RBIs. Mickey Rivers and Chris Chambliss each had 2 hits, but the rest of the Yankees combined only had 4. Reggie Jackson went 0-for-3. And with Munson aching, and Heath having been part of the trade that sent Sparky Lyle to the Texas Rangers to get Mirabella and Dave Righetti, manager Bob Lemon trusted the catching start to rookie Jerry Narron, not the veteran Johnson.

After the game, Reggie did something he probably came to regret. He started kidding Johnson about his inability to hit reliever Rich "Goose" Gossage. While Johnson was showering, Gossage insisted to Jackson that he struck out Johnson all the time when he used to face him, and that he was terrible at the plate: "He either homers or strikes out." He had previously given Johnson the nickname "Breeze," in reference to how his big swing kept Gossage cool on the pitcher’s mound in hot weather.

When Jackson relayed this information to Johnson upon his return to the locker room, all the players assembled, egged on by Jackson, started laughing at him, and, in unison, loudly called him "Breeze" with some waving their arms and hands before doubling over. This infuriated Johnson, and a fight started between he and Gossage.

Johnson won the fight. Gossage tore ligaments in his right thumb, his pitching hand, and missed 3 months of the season, not returning until July 12. Suddenly, having traded Lyle, the 1977 AL Cy Young Award winner, instead of 2 great closers, now, the Yankees had no closer at all.

Ron Guidry, the 1978 AL Cy Young winner, offered to go to the bullpen. Lemon tried it twice, and Guidry ended up with a win and a save. But the man who'd put together the best pitching season in Yankee history the year before was too good to keep out of the rotation. Guidry made only 11 more relief appearances over the rest of his career.

Newly-acquired pitcher Tommy John called Gossage's completely unnecessary injury "a demoralizing blow to the team." The Yankees were 7-5 at the time, so it's not like they were doing great. During his absence, they went 41-35, not appreciably better. But 7 of those losses were what would now be called "walkoffs," and 10 others were by 1 run. If, in those 17 games, the Yankees had simply gone 1 game over .500, 9-8, they would have stayed in the AL East race for most of the season.

Also during that absence, on June 15, 2 years to the day after they got Johnson, they got rid of him, sending him to the Cleveland Indians for pitcher Don Hood, which not only served to be "addition by subtraction" -- Johnson really wasn't doing anything for them -- but also gave them a closer until the Goose returned.

But there had already been a cloud over the season. Just a few weeks after the previous season's World Series, Jerry Lemon, the manager's son, had been killed in a car crash. Bob's mind simply wasn't on baseball in 1979.

Team owner George Steinbrenner's original plan, the previous July, was that he would remove Billy Martin as manager, let Bob be the manager for the rest of 1978 and all of 1979, then, for 1980, make Bob the general manager, and bring Billy back as field manager. But, on June 18, George met with Bob, and it was agreed that Bob would remain in the Yankee organization, but not as manager. George liked to say, "I never really fired anybody," and he had a point: Pretty much anybody he fired, as manager, coach, GM, whatever, he usually offered another job in the organization. And Billy was brought back early.

Aside from Reggie, who never got along with Billy, everybody seemed to think it was the right thing to do. But there were no issues between the for the rest of the season. The team responded to Billy: From his return until August 1, they went 24-17. Although they were 14 games behind the Orioles in the AL East, they had been the sane number behind the Boston Red Sox on the previous season's July 20, and had come all the way back. Maybe, just maybe, they could do it again.

But on August 2, Munson was killed in a plane crash. Now, Narron was the only catcher on the major league roster, and he was batting .188. Suddenly, Cliff Johnson was no longer surplus to requirements, but he was also no longer there. And he was batting .287 at the time.

The Yankees went just 31-27 the rest of the way, finishing in 4th place, 13 1/2 games behind the O's. It was the only season between 1976 and 1981 that the Yankees didn't win the AL East.

The change of scenery did Johnson some good: The rest of the '79 season, he batted .271 for the Indians, hitting 18 home runs with 61 RBIs. After splitting 1980 between the Indians and the Chicago Cubs, he returned to the American League, spending 1981 and '82 with the Oakland Athletics, 1983 and '84 with the Toronto Blue Jays, most of '85 with the Texas Rangers, and the rest of '85 and all of '86 back with the Jays. He always seemed to hit well against the Yankees.

He retired after the '86 season, with a .258 batting average and 196 home runs, including 20 pinch-hit home runs, a record that stood until 2010, broken by Matt Stairs. In spite of the way he left the Yankees, he attended several Old-Timers Days at Yankee Stadium.

*

April 19, 1979 was a Thursday. Actress Kate Hudson, daughter of actors Goldie Hawn and Oliver Hudson, was born.

Football was out of season. The NBA, the NHL and the WHA were all into their Playoffs, but no games were scheduled for this day. But these 5 other Major League Baseball games were played that day:

* The Boston Red Sox beat the Milwaukee Brewers, 5-3 at Fenway Park in Boston. Carl Yastzremski went 2-for-3 with a walk. For the Brewers, Cecil Cooper hit a home run, Robin Yount went 0-for-3 with a walk, and Paul Molitor went 1-for-4.

* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Atlanta Braves, 2-0 at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. Tom Seaver pitched a 2-hit shutout, outpitching Phil Niekro. Johnny Bench did not play for the Reds in this game.

* The Chicago Cubs beat their arch-rivals, the St. Louis Cardinals, 3-2 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Lou Brock went 2-for-4 with a stolen base and an RBI.

* The California Angels beat the Minnesota Twins, 6-4 at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. Rod Carew went 1-for-4 with a walk for the Angels against the team he left in the previous off-season.

* And the San Francisco Giants beat the San Diego Padres, 14-10 at San Diego Stadium (later Jack Murphy Stadium and Qualcomm Stadium). Yes, that's a baseball game, not a football game. Vida Blue outpitched Mickey Lolich. Marc Hill (who homered) and Terry Whitfield each had 4 RBIs for the Giants. Dave Winfield went 2-for-5.