October 16, 2003: Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS. Pedro Martinez vs. Roger Clemens. In his 1st game at Yankee Stadium since he tried to kill Don Zimmer, Pedro gets the hell booed out of him – and that's a lot of hell. But the Sox take a 4-0 lead over the Yankees in the 4th, before Joe Torre lifts Clemens and brings in Mike Mussina. Making the 1st relief appearance of his career, Mussina stops the bleeding.
Jason Giambi hits 2 home runs to make it 4-2 in the 7th, but David Ortiz – not for the first time, and certainly not for the last (cough-steroids-cough) – hurts the Yankees by blasting a home run off David Wells. It's 5-2 Red Sox.
Pedro gets the 1st out in the bottom of the 8th, but then… Derek Jeter doubles. Then Bernie Williams singles, scoring Jeter to make it 5-3. Pedro is over the 100-pitch mark. From pitches 1 through 99, he throws like Sandy Koufax; from pitch 100 onward, he throws like Sandy Duncan. Red Sox manager Grady Little goes to the mound, but decides to leave Pedro in.
Big mistake. Hideki Matsui hits a ground-rule double down the right-field line, moving Bernie to third. Still, Little does not pull Pedro. Jorge Posada hits a looper into short center, scoring the tying runs. Just 5 outs from the Pennant, and the greatest victory the Red Sox would have since, oh, 1918, and they have choked yet again.
Mariano Rivera pitches the 9th, 10th and 11th for the Yankees. He pitches the top of the 11th pretty much on courage alone. The Yankees need to win it in the bottom of the 11th, because the bullpen situation doesn't look good.
Tim Wakefield, the knuckleballer who won Games 1 and 4 of this series, is on the mound. Leading off the inning is Aaron Boone, the Yankee 3rd baseman.
You know where I was at this moment? I was going from place to place watching the game, and I decided to get on the Subway and head up to The Stadium. Win or lose, I felt I had to be there. But the Subway was crawling, seeming to take forever. I forgot that it was after midnight. Frustrated, I
got off at the 50th Street station of the A train.
Next thing I know, I’m standing in front of 220 West 48th Street, the Longacre Theatre. Do you know who built (in 1912) and owned this theater? Harry Frazee. The very man who broke up the Red Sox and sold off so many of their players to the Yankees, including Babe Ruth. What a place to be standing in as the Yankees and Red Sox battled for the Pennant.
In 1935, Clifford Odets' play Waiting for Lefty debuted at the Longacre. Sox fans were still waiting for Alan Embree, the lefty that Little refused to bring in for Pedro.
It was 12:16 AM, actually October 17, 2003, but since the game started on the 16th, it goes down in history as October 16.
I had my headphones on, and on WCBS 880, I heard Charley Steiner say this:
There's a fly ball, deep to left! It’s on its way! There it goes! And the Yankees are going to the World Series! Aaron Boone has hit a home run! The Yankees go to the World Series for the 39th time in their remarkable history! Aaron Boone down the left field line, they are waiting for him at home plate, and now he dives into the scrum! The Yankees win it, 6-5!
The Longacre is at the northern end of Times Square. It sounded like a million car horns went off at once. People poured out of the restaurants and bars in the Square. People were slapping each other on the back, giving high five after high five.
By the time I finally got home at around 2 in the morning, my hair was soaked with sweat, my eyes were aching from being up too late, my voice was shot from screaming, my hands throbbed from shaking and high-fiving, my legs and feet throbbed from all the walking.
I've never felt better in my life.
Boone joined Tommy Henrich (1949 World Series vs. Brooklyn Dodgers), Mickey Mantle (1964 WS vs. St. Louis Cardinals), Chris Chambliss (1976 ALCS vs. Kansas City Royals), Jim Leyritz (1995 AL Division Series vs. Seattle Mariners), Bernie Williams (Game 1 of ALCS in both 1996 and 1999), Chad Curtis (1999 WS), Alfonso Soriano (2001 ALCS) and Jeter (2001 WS) as Yankees who have hit walkoff home runs in postseason play. (It's since been done by Mark Teixeira, 2009 ALDS; and Raúl Ibañez, 2012 ALDS.)
And he joined Enos Slaughter (1946 Cardinals), Lou Boudreau (1948 Cleveland Indians), Bob Gibson (1967 Cardinals), Joe Morgan (1975 Cincinnati Reds), and, collectively, the 1978 Yankees (especially Bucky Dent) and the 1986 Mets as Red Sox postseason tormentors.
Jeter said, "We've got some ghosts in this Stadium."
In 2009, it sure looked like they'd made the trip across the street. Now, I'm not so sure.
Perhaps the most amazing thing about this series was that it had Joe West and Ángel Hernández, generally regarded as the 2 worst umpires in baseball (still) as umpires -- at left and right field, respectively, in Game 7 -- and the Red Sox were the opponents, and the Yankees still won it.
Clemens, Wells, and pitching coach Mel Stottlemyre walk out to the Babe Ruth Monument, and offer the Big Fella some champagne. Clemens slaps the plaque on the tablet, and says, "He's smiling! He's smiling! He's smiling, Mel!"
Grady Little was not smiling. He was fired as Sox manager within days.
The next day's Daily News headline read, "THE CURSE LIVES." For the Sox… once again, it was "Wait Till Next Year."
No, no. Really. They meant it this time.
Boone got hurt in the off-season, leading the Yankees to trade for Alex Rodriguez. Injuries and a heart ailment ended his career after the 2009 regular season, after which he was an analyst on Fox’ postseason broadcasts as the Yankees won their first Pennant since his walkoff. He now works for ESPN.
A lot can change in 18 years. We have now seen Aaron Boone become the Yankees' manager, and get them into the Playoffs 4 straight times, including a birth in an ALCS. Of course, among the less pleasant things, we have seen the Red Sox win 4 World Series, breaking the Curse of the Bambino. And we have now seen them beat the Yankees in not one, but two postseason series.
But we have also seen them exposed as dirty rotten cheaters, and continue to lie about it, meaning we can no longer chant, "NINE-teen-EIGHT-teen! (Clap, clap, clap-clap-clap)."
But we can still write "1918*."
Following the Yankees' losses to the Houston Astros in the 2019 ALCS and the Tampa Bay Rays in the 2020 ALDS, many fans have demanded that Boone be fired for the managerial mistakes that he made, especially his handling of the pitching, both starting and relief. Those demands have intensified in the wake of the Yankees' loss to the Red Sox in the 2021 AL Wild Card Game.
Since their 2007 title *, the Red Sox have rebuilt and won the 2013 title *, rebuilt again and won the 2018 title *, and have now rebuilt again, and are 4 wins from another Pennant. (The Houston Astros beat them 5-4 in Game 1 of the ALCS.) They are ready for another few good years.
Between them, the Red Sox and the Tampa Bay Rays have won 5 of the last 6 AL Eastern Division titles. The Toronto Blue Jays have a hellacious lineup and some good pitching. And the Astros have not only been a Playoff team since 2015, but have embarrassed the Yankees in the Playoffs in 2015, 2017 and 2019.
That's 4 teams the Yankees have fallen behind precipitously. Or, as someone else put it: From 2010 onward, the Yankees are 7-0 in postseason games against the Minnesota Twins, and 21-31 against all other teams.
Under Boone, from 2018 onward, they are 11-11 in postseason games. For comparison's sake: Under his immediate predecessor, Joe Girardi, from 2008 (well, 2009) to 2017, they were 27-21 -- although you can drop that to 16-17 if you don't count the title season of 2009. Still, Boone has been just half a game better than that.
But Boone has, essentially, just been following the orders of his general manager, Brian Cashman. Holding Boone responsible for what's happened to the Yankees in the last 2 (3, really) postseasons is like blaming President John F. Kennedy's death on William Greer, the Secret Service Agent who was driving his limousine at the time.
Boone's contract runs out at the end of this month. Theoretically, Cashman doesn't have to lift a finger to fire him. He doesn't have to fire him at all. He can just wait until November 1, and hire a new manager.
But he won't. He will sign Boone to a new contract. And even if he doesn't, whoever he does sign will be just another yes-man.
Is Boone satisfied with being a yes-man? The Mets, the St. Louis Cardinals and the San Diego Padres currently have their managerial jobs vacant. More vacancies could follow. Boone could take one of them. Or, he could go back to broadcasting in some form: Play-by-play, color commentary, studio punditry, supplementary interviews.
Aaron Boone has not exactly been heroic in his 4 years as Yankee manager. But he is still a Yankee Hero.
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October 16, 1793: Marie Antoinette, former Queen of France, is guillotined in Paris, at what's now the Place de la Concorde, 9 months after the same fate befell her husband, King Louis XVI. The former
Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna von Habsburg-Lothringen, Archduchess of Austria, was 37, but her troubles had prematurely aged her.
She was a patsy, not a villain. She never did anything to harm the people of France. She never said, "Let them eat cake." And if she had, it would have been through obliviousness, not malice.
But the French Revolution wasn't interested in making sense. They weren't even interested in governing or properly serving the people who had once been so oppressed by the House of Bourbon. They just wanted revenge. Revenge and blood. And they got it. Think about that the next time you consider that the Tea Party might have a point.
She's been played in movies by, among others, Norma Shearer, Jane Seymour (who named herself after a Queen of England, the 3rd wife of King Henry VIII), Joely Richardson, Kirsten Dunst and Diane Kruger.
What does she have to do with sports? Nothing, as far as I know, except as a warning: Don't believe everything you hear, and don't be so quick to chop someone's head off for a perceived slight. Although, in the Final of the 2006 World Cup, Zinedine Zidane would replace her and her husband as having the most famous head in France.
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October 16, 1861, 160 years ago: At the Atlantic Grounds on Bedford‚ Long Island (now part of Brooklyn)‚ a crowd of 8‚000 sees the host Atlantics score a record 26 runs in the 2nd inning to beat the Manhattan-based Mutuals‚ 52-27 in 6 innings. Because the 3rd game in the series will not be played‚ the Atlantics retain the "whip-pennant" for 1861.
Flying such a flag over your ground the season after winning a championship is the origin of the word "Pennant." It originated a few years earlier.
No, baseball (still all-amateur at this point -- at least, officially) did not stop for the American Civil War. On the contrary: Soldiers, North and South, got exposed to the game in the East, and took it home with them, helping to spread the game. It had already been first referred to as "the national pastime" as early as in 1856, but the Civil War made that term a lot more practical.
Also on this day, Richard Dudley Sears is born in Boston. He won the 1st 7 titles in the U.S. Open men's tennis tournament, 1881 to 1887 -- and then retired. He died in 1943.
October 16, 1886: David Grün is born in Płońsk, Poland. As David Ben-Gurion, he is the founding father of the State of Israel, serving as its 1st Prime Minister from 1948 to 1954, and again from 1955 to 1963. He died in 1973, at 87.
As far as I know, he wasn't an athlete, although the Maccabiah Games, a.k.a. "the Jewish Olympics," have been held in Israel since 1932, before independence. Many Jewish Americans have taken part, including some natives of my hometown of East Brunswick, New Jersey. They will next be held in July 2017.
October 16, 1890: Michael Collins (no middle name) is born in Woodfield, County Cork, Ireland. Here, sports led to larger history: While living in London, he was a member of the London County Board of the Gaelic Athletic Association, the governing body for traditional Irish sports. This brought him into contact with rebels trying to establish Irish independence from Britain.
The executions of the Easter Rising of 1916 did not include him, aiding his rise through the ranks. His background, working in banks in the Irish communities of London and New York, led to his appointment as the Minister for Finance in the early Republic of Ireland. He became Adjutant General for the Irish Volunteers, and became renowned for his guerrilla warfare strategy.
Sent to London to negotiate peace terms, he was offered a treaty that would establish the Irish Free State with an Oath of Allegiance to the Crown. He accepted this compromise. Some in the Provisional Government did not, and the end of the Irish War of Independence led to the beginning of the Irish Civil War.
"The Big Fellow" was named Chairman of the Provisional Government and commander-in-chief of the National Army. On August 22, 1922, on a visit to Cork City, a rebel stronghold not far from his hometown, his convoy was ambushed. He was the only one killed. He was only 31 years old.
He was played by Brendan Gleeson in the 1991 made-for-TV film The Treaty, by Liam Neeson in the 1996 film Michael Collins, and by Gavin Drea in the 2019 film Resistance.
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October 16, 1900: Leon Allen Goslin is born in Salem, New Jersey. A .316 lifetime hitter, "Goose" is the only native of South Jersey to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame. (Mike Trout of Millville has built a career that some people think should already qualify him, but it's far from certain.)
He played in the World Series for the Washington Senators in 1933 and for the Detroit Tigers in 1934 and 1935, the last of these being his only World Championship. He and Tiger teammates Hank Greenberg and Charlie Gehringer became known as the "G-Men" in those early days of the FBI. His bottom-of-the-9th single scored Mickey Cochrane to win Game 6 and the Series in '35, for the Tigers' 1st World Championship. He lived until 1971.
October 16, 1901, 120 years ago: Fresh off the publication of his memoir Up from Slavery, Booker T. Washington, leader of what is now Tuskegee University in Alabama, is invited by President Theodore Roosevelt to have dinner with him at the White House.
The South was outraged. The Memphis Scimitar called it "the most damnable outrage which has ever been perpetrated by any citizen of the United States." Senator Benjamin Tillman of South Carolina -- known as Pitchfork Ben for his declaration as Governor that, while Grover Cleveland was President, Cleveland "is an old bag of beef, and I am going to Washington with a pitchfork and prod him in his old fat ribs" -- said, "We shall have to kill a thousand (N-word)s to get them back in their places!"
Today, outside of their respective home States, Theodore Roosevelt and Booker T. Washington are remembered, while Ben Tillman is not. And if the Memphis Scimitar, and its successor the Memphis Press-Scimitar, are remembered today, it is for the August 17, 1977 headline, "A Lonely Life Ends on Elvis Presley Boulevard." the combined paper folded in 1983.
October 16, 1909: Rookie Charles "Babe" Adams comes through with a 6-hit shutout as the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Detroit Tigers, 8-0. It is his 3rd complete-game World Series victory, and gives the Pirates their 1st World Series win -- if not, technically, their 1st World Championship.
October 16, 1909: Rookie Charles "Babe" Adams comes through with a 6-hit shutout as the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Detroit Tigers, 8-0. It is his 3rd complete-game World Series victory, and gives the Pirates their 1st World Series win -- if not, technically, their 1st World Championship.
Since there was no World Series in 1901 and 1902, and the NL was widely considered the better League, the present-day Bucs could claim "world championships" for those seasons, the way the New York Giants always did for 1904. However, they do not.
The Pirates and Tigers combine for 34 errors‚ with Detroit contributing 19. Both of these figures remain World Series records. In the battle between the 2 best players in baseball, Pittsburgh's Honus Wanger excels much more than Detroit's Ty Cobb. Adams would be the only Pirate player still on the team when they won their next Pennant and Series, in 1925, 16 years later. By the time the Tigers won another Pennant, in 1934, 25 years later, none would be left.
Adams was the only rookie in the 20th Century to win a Game 7 in the World Series. The next to do it was John Lackey of the Anaheim Angels in 2002. Frank "Spec" Shea in 1947 and Mel Stottlemyre in 1964 would be rookies starting Game 7s for the Yankees, but Mel would lose, and while the Yankees did win in '47, Shea would not be the winning pitcher. Billy Martin was planning on using Ron Guidry had the 1977 Series gone to a Game 7, but the Yankees won Game 6 on Reggie Jackson's 3 home runs and Mike Torrez's complete game.
The last survivors of this World Series? For the Pirates, pitcher Albert "Lefty" Leifield, who lived until 1970; for the Tigers, left fielder Davy Jones, who lived until 1972 -- beating out, by just 2 days, shortstop Owen "Donie" Bush. Ironically, Bush would be the manager of the next Pirate title team. He was also the namesake of the ballpark in his hometown of Indianapolis, home of one of the great teams of Triple-A ball, the Indianapolis Indians, whom he would serve as manager for many years.
October 16, 1912: Game 8 of the World Series. Game 2 had been called due to darkness while tied – no lights at ballparks in those days – so this will decide it. The greatest pitcher the game had yet seen, Christy Mathewson, hero of the 1905 Series, squares off against Hugh Bedient in quest of his 1st win of this Series.
Matty takes a 1-0 lead into the 7th‚ but with 1 out‚ Boston manager Jake Stahl hits a pop-up to short left field. The ball drops among Art Fletcher‚ Josh Devore‚ and Fred Snodgrass. Heinie Wagner walks‚ and with 2 outs‚ pinch hitter Olaf Henriksen doubles home the tying run. Smoky Joe Wood relieves Bedient‚ and the 2 aces match zeroes until Red Murray doubles and Fred Merkle singles in the 10th to give New York a 2-1 lead. It looks like the Giants will win the Series.
But in the last of the 10th‚ pinch hitter Clyde Engle lifts a can of corn to center fielder Snodgrass‚ who, interviewed about it in 1965, said, "Well, I dropped the darn thing." Engle reaches 2nd base on the error.
In the next at-bat, Snodgrass makes a great catch of a long drive by Harry Hooper. If only Snodgrass had made an ordinary catch of Engle's popup, and let Hooper's drive drop for a hit, the final score would have been exactly the same, but the perception of how the teams got there would have been totally different, and Snodgrass wouldn't have gone down in history as the man who made "The $30,000 Muff," a figure equivalent to the difference between the totals of the winning and losing teams’ shares. (About $848,000 in today's money.)
To be fair, though, Snodgrass wasn't a bad ballplayer at all, and dealt with it far better than teammate Merkle did with his "boner" that helped to cost the Giants the 1908 Pennant. As it is, Merkle has, for the moment, the RBI that will win the World Series, and stands to have been completely redeemed.
But Mathewson, for a decade the very definition of a control pitcher, walks Steve Yerkes, bringing up Tris Speaker. The all-time leader in victories by a National League pitcher, with 373, faces the all-time leader in doubles, with 792, a true classic confrontation.
"Matty" gets "Spoke" to pop a high foul along the first-base line. Catcher John Meyers -- a member of the Cahuilla Indian tribe and thus nicknamed "Chief" -- chases it‚ but it drops a few feet from Merkle‚ who could have taken it easily. Much more so than the 1908 "boner," this is something for which to fairly criticize Merkle.
Reprieved‚ Speaker didn't need a written invitation to put his .345 lifetime batting average to work. He singles in the tying run and sends Yerkes to 3rd. After Duffy Lewis is walked intentionally‚ 3rd baseman Larry Gardner hits a long sacrifice fly to a retreating Devore that scores Yerkes with the winning run.
Just as in the playoff necessitated by the Merkle's Boner game in 1908, Mathewson, often hailed as the greatest pitcher of all time (especially back then), did not get the job done.
The Red Sox win the World Series in their 1st season in Fenway Park. By the time Fenway has hosted 7 seasons, the Sox will have won 4 World Championships there, plus the 1st-ever World Series from when they were playing at the Huntington Avenue Grounds. In their next 85 seasons at Fenway, the Sox will win a grand total of no World Series.
If either Merkle or Meyers had caught Speaker's popup, the Giants might have held on to win. In fact, you can make a better case for Merkle being a "bonehead" on October 16, 1912 than you can for him being such on September 23, 1908. Ordinarily, both he and the Chief were very smart players, but they both blew it big-time on this one.
Then there's Mathewson. Even 107 years later, it seems like sacrilege to blame "The Christian Gentleman" for this loss, but, just as in the Merkle playoff 4 years earlier, if he had pitched like Christy Mathewson, the Giants would have won both games.
Most of all, the Red Sox were better. True, the Giants won 103 games and were defending NL Champions, but the Sox won 105 -- a record for Boston baseball that has never been matched. And the Sox did win 3 of the first 4 decisions in the Series. While the Giants won the Pennant again in 1913 and again in 1917, the Sox would win the World Series again in 1915, 1916 and 1918 -- the Giants wouldn't win another until 1921.
Snodgrass was a standup guy about it all for the last 62 years of his life, becoming a banker in Oxnard, California, and later being elected the city's Mayor. He died on April 5, 1974, at the age of 86.
The last survivors of this Series were: For the Red Sox, Wood, who lived on until 1985, at the age of 95; and, for the Giants, Hall of Fame lefthander Richard "Rube" Marquard, who lived on until 1980, at the age of 93.
October 16, 1912 was a Wednesday. The baseball season ended. No football games were played. It was too early for the nascent pro hockey industry to start its season. And pro basketball may only have existed at the most minor of level. So there is no point in doing a "Scores On This Historic Day" post, because there were no other scores.
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October 16, 1921, 100 years ago: In defiance of a ban by Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis on World Series participants playing postseason exhibitions‚ Yankees Babe Ruth‚ Bob Meusel and pitcher Bill Piercy launch a barnstorming tour in Buffalo. Five days later‚ they cut it short in Scranton. In the meantime, Ruth openly challenges Landis to act.
The Judge does act‚ fining the players their World Series shares -- $3‚362.26, or $51,525 in today's money -- and suspending them until May 20 of the 1922 season.
Also on this day, after playing the 1st season of the NFL, 1920, as the Decatur Staleys in downstate Illinois, the team founded by George Halas plays its 1st home game as the Chicago Staleys. They defeat the Rochester Jeffersons 16-13 at Cubs Park, later to be renamed Wrigley Field, in front of only 8,000 people. This was a typical crowd for the early NFL. The next year, to match the Cubs, Halas would change the name of the team to the Chicago Bears.
October 16, 1926: Charles Francis Dolan is born in Cleveland. He is the founder and owner of HBO and Cablevision. Through HBO, he owns AMC and a half-share (with the BBC) of BBC America.
So, through AMC, he is he boss of the Walking Dead franchise, the Breaking Bad franchise,
Humans and Preacher. Through BBC America, he shows the Star Trek, Doctor Who and Orphan Black franchises.
Humans and Preacher. Through BBC America, he shows the Star Trek, Doctor Who and Orphan Black franchises.
Through Cablevision, he owns ITT, which owns Gulf + Western, which owns Viacom, which owns Paramount Pictures, which owns the Madison Square Garden Corporation, which owns The Garden itself, the NBA's New York Knicks, the NHL's New York Rangers, the WNBA's New York Liberty, the NBA G-League's Westchester Knicks, the American Hockey League's Hartford Wolf Pack (but no longer the XL Center, which used to be the Hartford Civic Center), the Garden's boxing operations, MSG Network, Radio City Music Hall, the Beacon Theatre, the Chicago Theatre, and has part-ownership of the Wang Theatre in Boston and the Forum in the Los Angeles suburbs.
He leaves actual operation of the Garden and its subsidiaries to his son, James L. Dolan. Which led me to the joke that the Knicks (or the Rangers) are just 1 man away from winning a world championship -- unfortunately, it's Jimmy Dolan. Since Jimmy was given final say over The Garden, 21 years ago, the Knicks and Rangers have won just 1 Finals game between them. In Finals, the Rangers are 1-4, while the Knicks are 0-0. Unlike Ed McCaskey of the Chicago Bears, son-in-law of club founder George Halas, Charles has never "taken the keys" from his son.
October 16, 1927: The Chicago Bears beat the NFL version of the New York Yankees, 12-0 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Hall of Fame center and (as we would say today) nose tackle George Trafton tackles his once-and-future Bears teammate, Red Grange, the biggest star in football at the time, and wrecks his knee.
That tackle may have changed the history of football: "After that," the Galloping Ghost said, "I was just another straight-ahead runner, and the world is full of straight-ahead runners." The greatest player in the game missed the rest of the 1927 season and all of 1928, before going back to the Bears in 1929, and, like many great athletes forced to go both ways, changed his focus and improved his defense, making a game-saving tackle at the end of the 1933 NFL Championship Game.
That tackle may have changed the history of football: "After that," the Galloping Ghost said, "I was just another straight-ahead runner, and the world is full of straight-ahead runners." The greatest player in the game missed the rest of the 1927 season and all of 1928, before going back to the Bears in 1929, and, like many great athletes forced to go both ways, changed his focus and improved his defense, making a game-saving tackle at the end of the 1933 NFL Championship Game.
But Grange was essentially done as a superstar at age 24, and played his last game at 31. And the reason was that tackle by Trafton. (Although Trafton was considered a mean player, no one has ever suggested that this was a dirty play.) If Grange had failed in his rookie season of 1925, the NFL might well have folded. But, going in the other direction, if Grange had been able to do in New York what he'd done in Chicago, the NFL might have gotten much bigger much sooner -- and maybe, today, we'd have a surviving football team in New York named after baseball's Yankees, not one named after baseball's Giants.
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October 16, 1931, 90 years ago: David Michael Sisler is born in St. Louis. The son of Baseball Hall-of-Famer George Sisler, the brother of All-Star Dick Sisler, and the brother of longtime minor-league executive George Sisler Jr., Dave Sisler pitched in the major leagues from 1956 to 1962. He was an original 1961 member of the "new" Washington Senators, the team that became the Texas Rangers in 1972.
He finished with a career record of 38-44. He later became a successful investment banker, and lived until 2011.
Also on this day, Charles W. Murphy dies in Chicago at age 63. Previously a sportswriter in Cincinnati, in 1905 he bought the Chicago Cubs, whom he led through their greatest period, winning 4 National League Pennants in 5 seasons from 1906 to 1910, including the 1907 and 1908 World Series -- until 2016, the only World Series the team had ever won. He sold the team in 1913.
One Charles W. out on this day, one in: Charles Wendell Colson is born in Boston. A lawyer and a Marine officer in the Korean War, he worked on Richard Nixon's 1968 Presidential campaign, served as White House Counsel early in the Nixon Administration, and then ran the White House's Office of Public Liaison into Nixon's 2nd term.
White House Chief of Staff H.R. "Bob" Haldeman, who called himself "Richard Nixon's son of a bitch," called Chuck Colson "Richard Nixon's hitman." Colson himself said, "I was willing to be ruthless in getting things done." He was the author of the original version of what came to be known as "Nixon's Enemies List."
He hired some of the men who were involved in planning the break-in at the Watergate complex on June 17, 1972. He, too, would be indicted for his role in the break-in's cover-up. He made a deal, and pleaded guilty to 1 count of obstruction of justice. He was sentenced to 1 to 3 years in prison, fined $5,000, and disbarred. He ended up serving 7 months.
The experience reminded him that his parents had tended to prisoners in his youth. No longer permitted to practice law, he began to assist on the other side, becoming an ordained minister and founding Prison Fellowship, which he continued to run until his death in 2012. Another Watergate defendant, Jeb Stuart Magruder, also went into the ministry after being released from prison.
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October 16, 1940: David Albert DeBusschere is born in Detroit. He pitched for the Chicago White Sox in the 1962 and '63 seasons, but he was also a basketball star in his home town, first for the University of Detroit, then for the Pistons, where he became the youngest head coach in NBA history, at 24, from 1964 to 1967.
He is 1 of only 12 athletes to have played in both Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association (or its predecessor, the Basketball Association of America). The others are, in reverse chronological order: Mark Hendrickson (NBA forward 1996-2000, MLB pitcher 2002-11), Danny Ainge, Ron Reed, Steve Hamilton, Gene Conley (the only man to win titles in both sports, with the 1957 Milwaukee Braves and the 1959, '60 and '61 Boston Celtics), Dick Groat, Cotton Nash, Frank Baumholtz, Dick Ricketts, Howie Schultz, and, better known as an actor, Chuck Connors.
For a long time, Madison Square Garden would host NBA doubleheaders, with the Knicks playing the nightcap but not the opener. When the new Garden opened on February 14, 1968, Dave DeBusschere, playing for the Pistons, scored the new building's 1st basket.
The Knicks traded Walt Bellamy to the Pistons to get DeBusschere, already with a reputation as one of the league’s best defensive players. He led the defense that helped the Knicks win the NBA Championship in 1970 and 1973. He later served as head coach and general manager of the Knicks, and his Number 22 has been retired. He was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame, and named to the NBA’s 50th Anniversary 50 Greatest Players.
My generation knows DeBusschere best as the Knick GM who won the 1st pick in the 1st-ever NBA Draft Lottery in 1985, selecting Patrick Ewing. Sadly, the great Double D suffered a heart attack and died in 2003, age 63.
October 16, 1941, 80 years ago: The destroyer USS Kearny is summoned from its dock in Reykjavik, Iceland to assist a convoy of British and Canadian ships that had been attacked by German U-boats (submarines). The Kearny dropped depth charges, but was hit by a Nazi torpedo. The ship managed to get away and would resume operations after repairs, but 11 men were killed.
The Knicks traded Walt Bellamy to the Pistons to get DeBusschere, already with a reputation as one of the league’s best defensive players. He led the defense that helped the Knicks win the NBA Championship in 1970 and 1973. He later served as head coach and general manager of the Knicks, and his Number 22 has been retired. He was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame, and named to the NBA’s 50th Anniversary 50 Greatest Players.
My generation knows DeBusschere best as the Knick GM who won the 1st pick in the 1st-ever NBA Draft Lottery in 1985, selecting Patrick Ewing. Sadly, the great Double D suffered a heart attack and died in 2003, age 63.
October 16, 1941, 80 years ago: The destroyer USS Kearny is summoned from its dock in Reykjavik, Iceland to assist a convoy of British and Canadian ships that had been attacked by German U-boats (submarines). The Kearny dropped depth charges, but was hit by a Nazi torpedo. The ship managed to get away and would resume operations after repairs, but 11 men were killed.
In spite of this, President Franklin D. Roosevelt still did not ask Congress for a Declaration of War. But when Germany declared war on America, this incident was one of the reasons cited.
Also on this day, James Timothy McCarver is born in Memphis -- but, like James Paul McCartney Jr., born 8 months later, this James is best known by his middle name. He played from 1959 to 1980, and is the only baseball player to be thrown out of major league games in 4 different decades.
But he was also the catcher on the 1964 and '67 World Champion St. Louis Cardinals, and Steve Carlton's "personal catcher" on the Philadelphia Phillies. He had also caught Carlton on the '67 Cards, and has joked that he and Steve will be buried 60 feet, 6 inches apart. (So far, it has not been necessary for either.) Although he did not play in the 1980 postseason, and in fact served as a Phils broadcaster during the NLCS, he received a World Series ring when the Phils won.
But he is best known as a broadcaster, for the Mets and several networks, and has been elected to the broadcasters' wing of the Hall of Fame. He's also written several books about baseball. He is 1 of 16 surviving members of the '64 Cards, 1 of 12 from the '67 titlists, and a member of the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame.
The weird thing about McCarver is that the ballpark in his hometown, which served as the home of a series of Memphis teams from 1968 to 1999, was renamed Tim McCarver Stadium in 1978, while he was not only still alive, but still active in baseball. It has since been replaced by a more modern facility, and was demolished in 2005. Like Helen Hayes with the 1st Broadway theater named for her, McCarver has outlived the "playhouse" named for him.
No wonder that, when James Timothy McCarver joined James Paul McCartney Jr. as a recording artist, and recorded Tim McCarver Sings Songs from the Great American Songbook in 2009, one of the songs he chose was the one that Joe Raposo wrote about Ebbets Field for Frank Sinatra: "There Used to Be a Ballpark."
Also on this day, Mel Grant Counts is born in Coos Bay, Oregon. A center, he starred at Oregon State, and was a member of the U.S. basketball team that won the Gold Medal at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo. He won the NBA Championship with the Boston Celtics in 1964 and 1965.
He later reached the NBA Finals with the Los Angeles Lakers in 1968, 1969, 1970 and 1973, but was not with them when they won the title in 1972. He was sent in to substitute for Wilt Chamberlain when Wilt needed a breather in Game 7 of the 1969 NBA Finals, but when Wilt told head coach Butch van Breda Kolff he was ready to go back in, VBK kept Wilt on the bench, and let Counts stay in to guard Bill Russell, to whom he was once a backup. This is the greatest coaching miscalculation in NBA history, and it was the last one VBK made as head coach of the Lakers.
Mel Counts was an original member of the New Orleans Jazz in 1974. Oregon State retired his Number 21, and he has been elected to the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame. He became a real estate agents, and had 3 sons who became college basketball players, although none reached the NBA. He is still alive.
October 16, 1946, 75 years ago: Gordie Howe makes his NHL debut. Wearing Number 15 instead of the familiar 9 that he will start wearing the next season, the 18-year-old right wing scores against Turk Broda, and the Detroit Red Wings play the Toronto Maple Leafs to a 3-3 tie at the Olympia Stadium in Detroit.
The goal will be the 1st of 786 that the man who becomes known as Mr. Hockey will score for the Wings, going on to win 4 Stanley Cups and becoming the greatest player the game has ever known, and I don't want to hear about no Number 99: Gordie was better. We lost him in 2016, at the age of 88.
Also on this day, Geoffrey Colin Barnett is born in Northwich, Chester, England. The goalkeeper was a career backup, not making enough appearances to qualify for the League title with Liverpool-based Everton in 1963 or North London's Arsenal in 1971, nor the FA Cup with Everton in 1966 or Arsenal in 1971.
But in 1972, when Bob Wilson was injured in Arsenal's FA Cup Semifinal win over Stoke City, Barnett had to step in. They lost the Final 1-0 to Leeds United, but don't blame Barnett: Wilson wouldn't have stopped Allan Clarke's diving header, either.
In 1976, he came to America, and played for the Minnesota Kicks of the North American Soccer League, eventually alongside his former teammate, Arsenal legend Charlie George. He managed the team in its final season, 1981, but, through no fault of his, it folded. He returned to England and ran a pub in Cheshire until 2010, then came back to Minnesota, where he served as an official at a golf course until his death on January 15, 2021.
Also on this day, Suzanne Marie Mahoney is born in San Bruno, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. We know her as Suzanne Somers. She starred in 2 ABC sitcoms, playing Chrissie Snow on Three's Company in the 1970s and Carol Lambert on Step By Step in the 1990s.
Despite being 75 years old and having survived breast cancer, she remains in the phenomenal shape that has allowed her to write several fitness books, make her own exercise videos, and serve as the spokeswoman for the Thighmaster. Which, I suppose, gives her a tangential relationship to sports.
Also on this day, 10 Nazi war criminals, convicted of crimes against humanity, are executed by hanging at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Germany. They include Joachim von Ribbentrop, Adolf Hitler's Foreign Minister; Julius Streicher, Nazi Germany's top propaganda publisher; General Alfred Jodl, Chief of the Armed Forces, who had signed the surrender papers on V-E Day; and Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel.
You may have seen the "Hitler Rants Parodies," based on a scene from the 2004 film Downfall, starring Bruno Ganz as Hitler. Christian Redl played Jodl in that scene, and Dieter Mann played Keitel.
In 1976, he came to America, and played for the Minnesota Kicks of the North American Soccer League, eventually alongside his former teammate, Arsenal legend Charlie George. He managed the team in its final season, 1981, but, through no fault of his, it folded. He returned to England and ran a pub in Cheshire until 2010, then came back to Minnesota, where he served as an official at a golf course until his death on January 15, 2021.
Also on this day, Suzanne Marie Mahoney is born in San Bruno, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. We know her as Suzanne Somers. She starred in 2 ABC sitcoms, playing Chrissie Snow on Three's Company in the 1970s and Carol Lambert on Step By Step in the 1990s.
Despite being 75 years old and having survived breast cancer, she remains in the phenomenal shape that has allowed her to write several fitness books, make her own exercise videos, and serve as the spokeswoman for the Thighmaster. Which, I suppose, gives her a tangential relationship to sports.
Also on this day, 10 Nazi war criminals, convicted of crimes against humanity, are executed by hanging at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Germany. They include Joachim von Ribbentrop, Adolf Hitler's Foreign Minister; Julius Streicher, Nazi Germany's top propaganda publisher; General Alfred Jodl, Chief of the Armed Forces, who had signed the surrender papers on V-E Day; and Field Marshal Wilhelm Keitel.
You may have seen the "Hitler Rants Parodies," based on a scene from the 2004 film Downfall, starring Bruno Ganz as Hitler. Christian Redl played Jodl in that scene, and Dieter Mann played Keitel.
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October 16, 1950: Branch Rickey's contract as president, and de facto general manager, of the Brooklyn Dodgers expires. He is still owner of 1/4 of the franchise. With the death of quarter-owner John L. Smith, another quarter-owner, Walter O'Malley, buys Smith's share from his heirs, making him the largest owner: O'Malley 50 percent, Rickey 25 percent, and James Mulvey and his wife, Elizabeth "Dearie" Mulvey each having 12.5 percent.
Dearie was the daughter of Steve McKeever, who with his brother Ed ran the construction company that helped former sole owner Charlie Ebbets build Ebbets Field in 1912-13.
O'Malley knew he could dominate the Mulveys, and did so until he finally bought their children out in 1975. But he and Rickey were both very strong personalities, with little in common except cheapness, the Republican Party, the love of a good cigar, and the belief that they always had to be right.
O'Malley hated everything about Rickey, including his favorite player, Jackie Robinson, and his favorite broadcaster, Red Barber; and would force Rickey, Robinson and Barber out of the organization -- all before moving the team, meaning he would have been a dirty bastard even if the team were still in Brooklyn to this day.
O'Malley offered to buy Rickey's quarter-share of the club. Seeing no reason to hold onto it -- he was not going to be offered a new contract as president, and would no longer have control over transactions and salaries -- Rickey decided to comply.
However, in a final act of spite, Rickey instead offered his percentage of the club to a friend for a million dollars. His chances at complete franchise control at risk, O'Malley was forced to offer more money, and Rickey finally sold his portion for $1,050,000 -- about $11.9 million in today's money. (In the era of free agency and big TV packages, basketball legend Magic Johnson bought the Dodger franchise for $1.4 billion in 2012.)
Nevertheless, O'Malley got what he wanted: Control. From this day onward, the Brooklyn Dodgers were doomed.
Rickey's son, Branch Rickey Jr. -- known as "Twig," but never to his face, or to his father's -- was already the Dodgers' farm director. After leaving the Dodgers, Branch Sr. was offered the position of general manager for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He took it, and took Branch Jr. with him to direct their farm system. Health problems forced Branch Sr. to retire in 1955, but his contributions, and those of Branch Jr., would help lead to a World Championship for Pittsburgh in 1960.
Oddly, Branch Jr., who had diabetes, died first, in 1961; Branch Sr. died in 1965. Branch Jr.'s son, Branch Barrett Rickey (never "Branch Rickey III," but that's what people call him), soon to turn 75, is the president of the Pacific Coast League, having also worked in the Pirates' organization, and also in that of the Cincinnati Reds (which makes sense, since Branch Sr. was from Ohio).
Rickey's son, Branch Rickey Jr. -- known as "Twig," but never to his face, or to his father's -- was already the Dodgers' farm director. After leaving the Dodgers, Branch Sr. was offered the position of general manager for the Pittsburgh Pirates. He took it, and took Branch Jr. with him to direct their farm system. Health problems forced Branch Sr. to retire in 1955, but his contributions, and those of Branch Jr., would help lead to a World Championship for Pittsburgh in 1960.
Oddly, Branch Jr., who had diabetes, died first, in 1961; Branch Sr. died in 1965. Branch Jr.'s son, Branch Barrett Rickey (never "Branch Rickey III," but that's what people call him), soon to turn 75, is the president of the Pacific Coast League, having also worked in the Pirates' organization, and also in that of the Cincinnati Reds (which makes sense, since Branch Sr. was from Ohio).
Also on this day, C.S. Lewis publishes The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, beginning his Chronicles of Narnia series.
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October 16, 1961, 60 years ago: Christopher John Doleman is born in Indianapolis, and grows up in York, Pennsylvania. The defensive end was an 8-time All-Pro, and was named to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the NFL's 1990s All-Decade Team, and the Minnesota Vikings Ring of Honor. He died this past
October 16, 1961, 60 years ago: Christopher John Doleman is born in Indianapolis, and grows up in York, Pennsylvania. The defensive end was an 8-time All-Pro, and was named to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the NFL's 1990s All-Decade Team, and the Minnesota Vikings Ring of Honor. He died this past
January 28, in the Atlanta suburb of Duluth, Georgia, of cancer at the age of 58.
Also on this day, Paul Leon Vaessen is born in Gillingham, Kent, England. A forward, and the son of Gillingham and South London club Millwall forward Leon Vaessen, he debuted for North London's Arsenal in the UEFA Cup in the Autumn of 1978.
In 1980, only 18 years old, he traveled with Arsenal to Turin, where Italian giants Juventus had not lost a match in any European tournament in 5 years, and, as a late substitute, in the 88th minute, scored the goal that won a European Cup Winners' Cup Semifinal. It was the 1st time any British team had won away to Juventus. (Arsenal would lose the Final to Spanish club Valencia.)
Paul Vaessen was a teenager, living the dream. It turned into a nightmare. He wrecked his knee the next season, and played his last game before he was 21. He turned to drugs to kill the pain. In 1985, in a drug deal gone wrong near Millwall's ground, he was stabbed nearly to death. In 1998, he was charged with assaulting a policeman who'd arrested him for shoplifting in Farnborough, Hampshire.
On August 8, 2001, he died of an overdose in Bristol, Gloucestershire. The most spectacular tragedy in Arsenal's history, he wasn't quite 40 years old.
Also on this day, Kim Nichole Wayans is born in Manhattan. She is 1 of 2 sisters in the 6-sibling Wayans family, and is best known for working with her brothers on In Living Color.
October 16, 1962: Game 7 of the World Series at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Oddly, the Yankees' 1956 World Series hero, Don Larsen, is available to pitch against them, for the San Francisco Giants.
Also on this day, Paul Leon Vaessen is born in Gillingham, Kent, England. A forward, and the son of Gillingham and South London club Millwall forward Leon Vaessen, he debuted for North London's Arsenal in the UEFA Cup in the Autumn of 1978.
In 1980, only 18 years old, he traveled with Arsenal to Turin, where Italian giants Juventus had not lost a match in any European tournament in 5 years, and, as a late substitute, in the 88th minute, scored the goal that won a European Cup Winners' Cup Semifinal. It was the 1st time any British team had won away to Juventus. (Arsenal would lose the Final to Spanish club Valencia.)
Paul Vaessen was a teenager, living the dream. It turned into a nightmare. He wrecked his knee the next season, and played his last game before he was 21. He turned to drugs to kill the pain. In 1985, in a drug deal gone wrong near Millwall's ground, he was stabbed nearly to death. In 1998, he was charged with assaulting a policeman who'd arrested him for shoplifting in Farnborough, Hampshire.
On August 8, 2001, he died of an overdose in Bristol, Gloucestershire. The most spectacular tragedy in Arsenal's history, he wasn't quite 40 years old.
Also on this day, Kim Nichole Wayans is born in Manhattan. She is 1 of 2 sisters in the 6-sibling Wayans family, and is best known for working with her brothers on In Living Color.
October 16, 1962: Game 7 of the World Series at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Oddly, the Yankees' 1956 World Series hero, Don Larsen, is available to pitch against them, for the San Francisco Giants.
Tony Kubek, who missed much of the season due to military service, grounds into a double play in the 5th inning, but a run scores on the play. The score remains Yankees 1, Giants 0 in the bottom of the 9th. With 2 outs and Matty Alou on 1st‚ Willie Mays rips a double to right off Ralph Terry‚ but great fielding by Roger Maris keeps Alou from scoring.
The Yankees now have a choice to make: Have the righthanded Terry, who gave up Bill Mazeroski's Series-winning homer in Game 7 in 1960, pitch to the next batter, the dangerous lefthander Willie McCovey; or walk him to load the bases, and set up the Series-clinching out at any base, and pitch to the equally dangerous but righthanded Orlando Cepeda. (Keep in mind, Mazeroski was righthanded.)
Between them, they would hit 900 home runs in the major leagues: McCovey 521, Cepeda 379. Nobody knows that yet, but everybody knows that both were already All-Stars, and that both had been Rookie of the Year: Cepeda in 1958, McCovey in '59. It's like choosing between the guillotine and the hangman's noose.
Oddly, despite all the talk about whether to pitch to McCovey or Cepeda, removing Terry for a relief pitcher, possibly a lefthander to pitch to the lefthanded McCovey, seems never to have been discussed.
They decide to pitch to McCovey. "Stretch" hits a screaming liner toward right field‚ but 2nd baseman Bobby Richardson takes one step to his left and snares it. Ballgame over, Yankees win, theeeeeeee Yankees win. Barely. It is the 1st World Series Game 7 that ends 1-0. There has since been only one more, in 1991, and that one went 10 innings.
It is the Yankees' 20th World Championship, their 2nd in a row. Terry, who had also won 23 regular season games, Game 5 of the Series, and soon the Cy Young Award, is awarded the Series MVP award. He is fully redeemed for having given up the Mazeroski homer.
The Yankees now have a choice to make: Have the righthanded Terry, who gave up Bill Mazeroski's Series-winning homer in Game 7 in 1960, pitch to the next batter, the dangerous lefthander Willie McCovey; or walk him to load the bases, and set up the Series-clinching out at any base, and pitch to the equally dangerous but righthanded Orlando Cepeda. (Keep in mind, Mazeroski was righthanded.)
Between them, they would hit 900 home runs in the major leagues: McCovey 521, Cepeda 379. Nobody knows that yet, but everybody knows that both were already All-Stars, and that both had been Rookie of the Year: Cepeda in 1958, McCovey in '59. It's like choosing between the guillotine and the hangman's noose.
Oddly, despite all the talk about whether to pitch to McCovey or Cepeda, removing Terry for a relief pitcher, possibly a lefthander to pitch to the lefthanded McCovey, seems never to have been discussed.
They decide to pitch to McCovey. "Stretch" hits a screaming liner toward right field‚ but 2nd baseman Bobby Richardson takes one step to his left and snares it. Ballgame over, Yankees win, theeeeeeee Yankees win. Barely. It is the 1st World Series Game 7 that ends 1-0. There has since been only one more, in 1991, and that one went 10 innings.
It is the Yankees' 20th World Championship, their 2nd in a row. Terry, who had also won 23 regular season games, Game 5 of the Series, and soon the Cy Young Award, is awarded the Series MVP award. He is fully redeemed for having given up the Mazeroski homer.
However, the Yankees will not win another World Series for 15 years. The Giants? They would have to wait another 27 years just to get into another Series, and won't win one until 2010.
Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz, a Giants fan living in nearby Santa Rosa, soon draws a cartoon having Charlie Brown yell to the heavens, "Why couldn't McCovey's drive have been just three feet higher?" McCovey did his job, and the Giants took the Series to the last out of the last game. They just got beat by a team that was a little bit better.
Still alive from the 1962 World Champion Yankees, 59 years ago, are 9 players: Terry, Richardson, Kubek, Bud Daley, and Hector Lopez; plus Joe Pepitone, Rollie Sheldon, Jack Reed and Jake Gibbs, who never got into any of the Series games. Surviving from the Giants are 6 players: Cepeda, Willie Mays, Juan Marichal, Felipe Alou, Gaylord Perry and Bobby Bolin.
Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz, a Giants fan living in nearby Santa Rosa, soon draws a cartoon having Charlie Brown yell to the heavens, "Why couldn't McCovey's drive have been just three feet higher?" McCovey did his job, and the Giants took the Series to the last out of the last game. They just got beat by a team that was a little bit better.
Still alive from the 1962 World Champion Yankees, 59 years ago, are 9 players: Terry, Richardson, Kubek, Bud Daley, and Hector Lopez; plus Joe Pepitone, Rollie Sheldon, Jack Reed and Jake Gibbs, who never got into any of the Series games. Surviving from the Giants are 6 players: Cepeda, Willie Mays, Juan Marichal, Felipe Alou, Gaylord Perry and Bobby Bolin.
October 16, 1963: Two newly-moved NBA teams play their 1st games in their new cities. The Syracuse Nationals, having ended the era of small-town NBA teams that also included Rochester and Fort Wayne as recently as 1957, take the place of the Philadelphia Warriors, who moved to San Francisco (and adopted their current name, the Golden State Warriors, in 1971), and became the Philadelphia 76ers. With 26 points from Hal Greer, the Sixers beat the Detroit Pistons, 117-115 at Cobo Hall in Detroit.
The Baltimore Bullets, who took up the name of the 1946-54 Charm City franchise after 2 seasons as the Chicago Packers and Chicago Zephyrs expansion franchise, aren't so lucky: Walt Bellamy scores 32 points and Terry Dischinger 26, but the Boston Celtics beat them 109-95 at the Baltimore Civic Center (which still stands, now named the Royal Farms Arena).
October 16, 1967: The Dallas Chaparrals of the American Basketball Association play their 1st game. They beat the Anaheim Amigos 129-125. The Chaps would move in 1973, and become the San Antonio Spurs.
October 16, 1968: American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, teammates at San Jose State University, win the Gold and Bronze Medals, respectively, in the 200 meters, at the Olympic Games in Mexico City, Mexico. Smith sets a world record, winning the race in 19.83 seconds, the 1st time 20 seconds had been beaten in the race. Peter Norman of Australia wins the Silver Medal.
But when they take the podium to receive their medals, all 3 -- including Norman, a critic of the infamous White Australia Policy (barring non-Europeans from immigrating), accepting Smith and Carlos' request -- are wearing pins of the Olympic Project for Human Rights. Smith and Carlos remove their shoes, revealing not bare feet as is usually remembered, but black socks.
Smith, born in Clarksville, North Texas on June 6, 1944 (D-Day), and raised in Lemoore, Central California, wears a black scarf around his neck to represent black pride. Carlos, a black Cuban from Harlem who was a year minus 1 day younger (born on June 5, 1945), had his tracksuit top unzipped, to show solidarity with all blue-collar workers in the U.S., and wore a necklace of beads, which he described as being "for those individuals who were lynched, or killed, and that no one said a prayer for, that were hung and tarred. It was for those thrown off the side of the boats in the Middle Passage." This term referred to the sea voyage taking slaves from Africa to the Americas, North, Central and South.
They had intended to wear black gloves on each hand, but Carlos forgot his pair. Norman suggested that Smith give Carlos his left glove, and that's why Smith raised his right fist in what was then interpreted as "the Black Power Salute" (Smith has always insisted it was "a human rights salute") as "The Star-Spangled Banner" started playing, while Carlos raised his left, which was not the usual Black Power salute. Both men bowed their heads.
Tommie Smith and John Carlos were the biggest sports-related story -- of the day, and the year. It would have been the biggest sports-related story of the decade, if not for Muhammad Ali refusing to be drafted the year before, and being stripped of the Heavyweight Title because of it.
The U.S. Olympic Committee kicked Smith and Carlos off the Olympic team immediately. Both received condemnation from the white U.S. media and death threats from anonymous sources.
This protest was just 9 days after Jose Feliciano's performance of the National Anthem during the World Series -- which, unlike "The Silent Gesture," was a totally unintentional controversy. It was 7 weeks after the riot at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, 4 months after the assassination of Robert Kennedy, 6 months after that of Martin Luther King, 15 months after the race riots in Newark and Detroit, 16 months after the one in Boston's Roxbury.
At the time, no white person was willing to stand up and publicly say that Smith and Carlos had a point. Today, nearly everyone, except for the truly delusional, is willing to admit that they had one. In 2005, San Jose State dedicated a statue of the medal podium, with an empty space where Norman would have stood, so that anyone who wants to can stand with Smith and Carlos in a personal re-enactment.
Smith went on to teach at Oberlin College, outside Jesse Owens' hometown of Cleveland. It had been the 1st integrated college in America, starting in 1835. He accepted a peace offering from the USOC, a coaching position the U.S. track team at the 1995 Indoor World Championships. Carlos was accepted as part of the organizing committee for the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, and became a high school track coach.
Smith and Carlos receiving the Arthur Ashe Award for Courage
at the 2013 ESPY Awards
Smith is now 76. Carlos is 75. Both have become paid public speakers regarding their stories. Norman died in 2006, and Smith and Carlos traveled all the way to Melbourne for his funeral, and served as the front pallbearers.
On September 28, 2016, the 1st black President, Barack Obama, invited Smith and Carlos to the White House, as part of his reception for the 2016 American Olympic athletes. He said, "We're proud of them. Their powerful silent protest in the 1968 Games was controversial, but it woke folks up, and created greater opportunity for those that followed."
Just 4 months later, Donald Trump was sworn into the office of President. Prior to 1865, we had Presidents who were slaveholders. Afterward, we had Presidents who openly made bigoted statements. But no President has ever pandered more to the elements of bigotry in this country.
And we have Colin Kaepernick, the now-blacklisted former quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers, kneeling instead of standing during the playing of the National Anthem, and bigots ripping him for it, in print, on the air, and online. Obama suggested that Kaepernick reconsider his action, saying that it bothers war veterans. But Smith and Carlos publicly backed Kaepernick. "Don't hate the kid because he stood up for something to change," Smith said. "He stood up for the right to exercise Amendment 1."
Carlos added, "Protest is a good thing, because you're trying to expose certain things through protest... In any protest, I think you make a statement to try and reach the far ends of the Earth. What better way to do it than if you're in a sport." Sounds like something that Ali, Gold Medalist in heavyweight boxing in the 1960 Olympics under his birth name of Cassius Clay, would have said.
But Donald Trump called Colin Kaepernick "that son of a bitch." And Trump's supporters say that "taking a knee" during the National Anthem is "disrespecting the flag." And Brent Musberger piped up. On October 8, 2017, the yutz, by then 78 years old, tweeted, "Yo #49ers Since you instigated protest, 2 wins and 19 losses. How about taking your next knee in the other team's end zone ?" (In the 2019 season, the 49ers won the NFC Championship.)
Trump doesn't get it. All the people calling Kaepernick and the other protestors "disrespectful to the flag" are either too stupid to get it, or too evil to tell the truth. It is not about the flag, you dumb schmucks. It is about the inalienable right to be treated as a human being, equal to all others.
The 1st Amendment gave Smith and Carlos, their allies then, and Kaepernick and his compatriots, and their allies now, and me, and you -- whether you are their ally or not -- the right to publicly show their discontent with what is being done to your people, or your people-within-a-people. It does not give you the right to lie about them and defame them, as Trump and his allies do. If you cannot respect the First Amendment, then THE FLAG MEANS NOTHING.
There is no place in a modern society for the bigotry that made Trayvon Martin (black, murdered in 2012), Matthew Shepard (gay, murdered in 1998) and Brandon Teena (transgender, murdered in 1993) dead and famous. Or treats Alicia Machado and the parents of Captain Humayun Khan as if they are less than full human beings, less than full Americans. Or puts children in cages -- in concentration camps -- because their parents entered America illegally.
Tommie Smith and John Carlos stood for something. Not because they could, but because someone had to, and their Gold Medal presentation was a golden opportunity.
We don't need a world without Tommie Smith, John Carlos, Muhammad Ali, LeBron James and Colin Kaepernick. We need a world which makes additions to their actions unnecessary.
On the same day as the Smith & Carlos protest, the Milwaukee Bucks make their NBA debut. They play the team that will become their arch-rivals, the Chicago Bulls, and lose 89-84 at the Milwaukee Exposition and Convention Center Arena, a.k.a. The MECCA (now the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena).
Also on this day, former Boston Red Sox pitcher Ellis Kinder dies during open-heart surgery, probably complicated by heavy drinking all through his adult life. Kinder was one of the heroes of Boston’s 1948 and 1949 Pennant runs, though both fell short.
Yet despite not becoming a big-league regular until he was 31, he won 102 games and saved 102 others in his career. Had he come along 40 years later, in the era of bullpen specialists and rehab, he might have been one of the best relief pitchers ever. He was only 54. But that's not the biggest sports story of the day.
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The Orioles do their best to win the game and send the Series back to Baltimore. They take a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the 6th, thanks to the pitching and home run of Dave McNally, and it looks like the Series is going back to Baltimore for at least a Game 6.
Cleon Jones‚ the only Met to have hit .300 that season – in fact, his .340 remained a Met single-season record until John Olerud's .359 in 1998 – is hit on the foot with a pitch, much like the unrelated Nippy Jones of the Milwaukee Braves in the 1957 World Series. And, like Nippy, Cleon is awarded 1st base after his manager proves he was hit, by showing the umpire a shoe-polish stain on the ball.
On the official World Series highlight film, Pearl Bailey, who had sung the National Anthem, can be seen asking if the pitch had hit Jones, and being delighted that it had, she used the slogan: "Did it hit him? Oh, it hit him! It's amazing! It's amazing!"
He is awarded 1st base, and then Clendenon hits a home run to close the Mets to within 3-2. Light-hitting 2nd baseman Al Weis ties it up with a homer in the 7th, and in the 8th, Swoboda doubles, and the Orioles uncharacteristically make 2 errors, leading to Mets 5, Orioles 3.
Koosman goes the distance. Just as the 2000 film Frequency used the '69 World Series as a major plot point, connecting the past with that film's present, so, too, does the final out link the Mets' 2 and, so far, only World Championships. The last Oriole batter is 2nd baseman Dave Johnson. Or, as he was sometimes known, Davey Johnson. And, 17 years before he manages the Mets to the 2nd title, he flies to left, where Cleon Jones is under it. At 3:17 PM -- the game took just 2 hours and 14 minutes -- that's the Mets' 1st title.
As Curt Gowdy says on NBC, "The 2-1 pitch: There's a fly ball to left, waiting is Jones, the Mets are the World Champions! Jerry Koosman is being mobbed! Look at this scene!"
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Thousands upon thousands of fans ran onto the field, and took whatever souvenirs they could find, a repeat of the September 24 Division clincher and the October 6 Pennant clincher, and then some. In the locker room, both Mayor Lindsay and Pearl Bailey are doused with champagne.
Naming the Most Valuable Player of the World Series was a tough call. Koosman had won 2 games. Agee had won Game 3 with a home run and 2 sensational catches. Weis was a surprising star. In the end, though, the sportswriters decided they couldn't ignore 3 home runs, including the one that got the Mets back into the ballgame in Game 5, and awarded it to Clendenon. Formerly given out by the now-defunct SPORT magazine, in 2017, this award was renamed the Willie Mays Award.
The New York branch of the Baseball Writers' Association of America (the guys who vote for the Hall of Fame) awarded a separate Babe Ruth Award, and had just expanded its scope to cover the entire postseason (and would again in 1995). They gave it to Weis.
It had been 5 years since New York had a World Series appearance. It had been 12 years since Met fans, most of them previously fans of the New York Giants or Brooklyn Dodgers, lost their old teams. It had been 13 years since the Dodgers last won a New York Pennant, 15 years for the Giants. And it had been 14 years since the '55 Dodger title, 15 years since the '54 Giant title.
And New York was in a hell of a mess in '69, with rising crime, bad weather (the February blizzard), poverty, racial discontent, the sense that the whole world was spiraling out of control, and the feeling that Mayor Lindsay didn't know what the hell to do, with anything. But by tying himself to the Mets' World Series win, he managed to get re-elected.
If the Mets had finished 2nd to the Cubs in the new 6-team NL East, after 7 seasons of either 9th or 10th in the single-division 10-team NL, most Met fans would have gladly taken it. If they had won the Division but lost the Pennant to the NL West Champion Braves, it would have been a disappointment, but they would have gotten over it.
And if they had won the Pennant but lost the Series to the overwhelming favorite Orioles, it would have been fairly easy to take, as just being in the World Series is quite an honor – that is, so long as you don't lose it on a bonehead move or play, as the Red Sox did against the Mets in '86 (and I mean John McNamara's managerial decisions and Bob Stanley's wild pitch, not Bill Buckner's error), or as the Mets did against the Yankees in 2000 (the baserunning blunders and Armando Benitez's walk of Paul O'Neill).
The '69 Mets acted as if there was no pressure, as if the pressure was all on the other guys. It really wasn't on the Mets. They had fun. And their fans had fun. It was fun they did not expect to have. And sometimes, that's the best kind of fun of all. And that's why the win was not just glorious, but, to use the cliché, Amazin'.
It was also the last Major League Baseball game played before I was born, exactly 9 weeks later. So I was born with both the Mets and the Jets as defending World Champions.
But I still hate the Mets. But that's not why. I hate them because I'm a Yankee Fan.
Today, 52 years later, 19 of the '69 Mets are still alive: J.C. Martin is 84 years old; Al Weis and Ron Taylor are 83; Art Shamsky is 80; Cleon Jones and Jerry Grote are 79; Jerry Koosman and Jack DiLauro are 78; Bud Harrelson, Ron Swoboda, Bobby Pfeil and Jim McAndrew are 77; Ed Kranepool and Duffy Dyer are 76; Ken Boswell, Rod Gaspar and Gary Gentry are 75; Nolan Ryan is 74; and Wayne Garrett is 73. Coach Joe Pignatano is also still alive, at 92.
However, there is a cloud over that. In addition to Tom Seaver's battle with dementia that ended with his death in 2020, Harrelson has been dealing with it for some time. Kranepool nearly died of kidney failure before he got a transplant 2 years ago.
General manager Johnny Murphy died of a heart attack just 3 months after the 1969 World Series. Manager Gil Hodges died of a heart attack on the eve of the 1972 season, owner Joan Payson of natural causes in 1975, and Danny Frisella in a dune buggy accident while still an active player on New Year's Day 1977.
Coach Rube Walker died of lung cancer in 1992, Cal Koonce of lymphoma in 1993, Tommie Agee of a heart attack in 2001, Tug McGraw of brain cancer in 2004, Donn Clendenon of leukemia in 2005, Don Cardwell of Pick's disease in 2008, coach Eddie Yost of heart disease in 2012 (43 years to the day, today is the anniversary), coach Yogi Berra of old age in 2015, and Ed Charles of heart trouble in 2018.
For all that the Yankees have achieved, for all that the New York Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers achieved before moving to California, for all the joy brought to the New York Tri-State Area by the Super Bowl wins of the Giants and the Jets, the Knicks' 1970 NBA Championship, and the Stanley Cups won by the Rangers, the Islanders, and the New Jersey Devils, the 1969 New York Mets remain the most beloved single-season sports team in New York history.
October 16, 1970: The Portland Trail Blazers, the 1st major league sports team in Oregon, make their regular-season debut. They beat one of the other NBA expansion teams, the Cleveland Cavaliers, 115-112 at the Portland Memorial Coliseum.
Elsewhere in Queens on this day, 17-year-old Jerry Seinfeld -- at least, as shown in a flashback on the TV show Seinfeld -- borrows Henry Miller's smutty 1934 novel Tropic of Cancer from the New York Public Library. He later claimed that he returned the book on time. Stay tuned for the 1991 entry.
October 16, 1973: The Oakland Athletics win Game 3 of the World Series, 3-2 in 11 innings over the New York Mets. Bert Campaneris gets the winning RBI.
In the bottom of the 10th, Willie Mays pinch-hits for Mets pitcher Tug McGraw against Paul Lindblad, and grounds to short, where Bert Campaneris turns a force play. It is Mays' last major league appearance.
In a private clubhouse meeting‚ Dick Williams tells A's players he will resign after the Series, win or lose. He has had it with the meddling of team owner Charlie Finley. Alvin Dark will succeed Williams.
In his 1987 autobiography Trump: The Art of the Deal -- which was actually written by Tony Schwartz, then writing for GQ, and who now correctly calls Trump a "sociopath" -- Trump said, "The idea of settling drove me crazy... I'd rather fight than fold, because as soon as you fold once, you get the reputation of being a folder."
Nevertheless, on June 10, 1975, Fred (who had previously been arrested for attending a Ku Klux Klan demonstration in Queens in 1927) and Donald signed an agreement prohibiting them from "discriminating against any person in the terms, conditions, or privileges of sale or rental of a dwelling." The decree made it clear that the Trumps did not view the agreement as a surrender, saying the settlement was "in no way an admission" of a violation.
Nevertheless, Trump officially became famous by being exposed as a bigot. And when you're officially too bigoted for Richard Nixon, you've got a problem.
October 16, 1977: The Dodgers stay alive in the World Series with a 10-4 victory in Game 5. Steve Yeager and Reggie Smith homer as Don Sutton pitches a complete game. Reggie Jackson, who homered in Game 4, does so again in Game 5.
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October 16, 1980: Suzanne Brigit Bird is born in Syosset, Long Island, New York. Sue Bird is one of the premier female basketball players of all time. She led the University of Connecticut to the 2000 and 2002 National Championships, going 114-4 there. She has led the Seattle Storm to the 2004, 2010, 2018 and 2020 WNBA Championships, and was a member of the 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016 U.S. teams that won Olympic Gold Medals.
Her father is an Italian-born Russian Jew -- the family name had been Boorda -- and she played professionally in Russia before returning to the Storm. She is an 11-time WNBA All-Star. and, was named to the WNBA's 20th Anniversary All-Time Team -- meaning that Larry might no longer be the greatest basketball layer named Bird.
Also on this day, Alan Gordon (no middle name) is born in the Los Angeles suburb of Long Beach, California. A forward, he helped the Los Angeles Galaxy win "The Double," taking the MLS Cup and the U.S. Open Cup (America's "FA Cup"), in 2005; Toronto FC the Canadian Championship (Canada's "FA Cup") in 2011, the San Jose Earthquakes the Supporters' Shield (the MLS regular-season title) in 2012, and the Galaxy the MLS Cup again in 2014.
He also helped the U.S. national team win the 2013 CONCACAF Gold Cup, the continental championship. He retired after the 2018 season.
Also on this day, DeAndrew White (no middle name) is born in Houston. A receiver, he was with the New England Patriots when they won Super Bowl LI. He now plays for the Baltimore Ravens.
Also on this day, Moshe Dayan dies of colon cancer in Tel Aviv, Israel. He was 66 years old. One of the founding fathers of the State of Israel, he was Minister of Defense during both the Six-Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973, and Foreign Minister during the Camp David Accords of 1978.
Just 3 months after that, he was playing in his 1st of now 6 All-Star Games. Just 3 months after that he had helped the Nats win their 1st National League Eastern Division title, and reach their 1st postseason (unless you count 1981 as the Montreal Expos). Just a month after that, he was named NL Rookie of the Year. He would help get the Nats to the Division title again in 2014, 2016 and 2017. In 2015, he led the NL in home runs, and was named Most Valuable Player.
But he couldn't get the Nats into the NLCS, and his contract ran out after 2018. He signed with the Phillies for $330 million over 13 years. The Phils-Nats rivalry became hotter than ever, but the Nats have finally reached the NLCS, and even won a World Series, without him. In 2 seasons with him, the Phils haven't made the Playoffs.
But did he make a mistake by not re-signing with the Nats? As the man himself would say, "That's a clown question, bro."
Why go for 2 there? At that point, there was little difference between trailing by 10 and by 9: You still needed a touchdown and a field goal to make the difference. But failing at the 2-pointer meant trailing by 11, so you needed 2 touchdowns. Obviously, the right thing to do was to kick the extra point, and make it 24-14.
Kotite told the media, "The rain made the ink run and blurred the chart, so I couldn't see what was written on it to know what to do." He shouldn't have needed a chart to tell him what to do! But it was worse than that: He knew it was going to rain, and didn't have a plastic sheet to protect his ink and paper. I guess Yankee Fans are lucky that the dugout protected Joe Girardi's infamous binder from the rain.
The loss dropped the Eagles to 4-2. They would get to 7-2, leading the NFC Eastern Division. Then they lost their last 7 games, including to the Giants and the Cincinnati Bengals by 3 points each, the Arizona Cardinals by 6, and the Atlanta Falcons by 7.
Kotite was fired, then got hired by the Jets, and went 3-13 and 1-15 in his 2 seasons with them. In other words, from November 7, 1994 onward, he went 4-35 as a head coach. That's a .103 ercentage, worse than the worst single seasons in the histories of MLB (the 1899 Cleveland Spiders went 20-134, or .134), the NBA (the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers went 9-73, or .110) and the NHL (the 1974-75 Washington Capitals went 8-67-5, or .131).
After the 1996 Jets, he's never worked for another professional football team, in any league. Even the XFL -- both the laughingstock 2001 version and the new edition getting ready to begin play next year -- haven't touched him. That's how radioactive Rich Kotite has been.
October 16, 1995: The Yankees sign former Met superstar pitcher Dwight Gooden‚ who has been on suspension for violation of his substance abuse program. George Steinbrenner likes comeback stories, redemption stories. This one works out for the Yankees, and for Doctor K, at least for 1996.
October 16, 1996, 25 years ago: A crowd of 47,000 people attempts to squeeze into the 36,000-seat Estadio Nacional Doroteo Guamuch Flores in Guatemala City, for a 1998 World Cup qualifying match between Guatemala and Costa Rica. As many as 84 people are killed (the number varies, depending on the source, but 84 is the highest figure quoted), and 180 injured. Álvaro Arzú, President of Guatemala, orders that the match be postponed.
Built in 1950, and named for a runner, who won the 1952 Boston Marathon and the 1955 Pan American Games Marathon, Estadio Flores still stands, and remains home to the national team and local club Municipal. Its capacity is now listed at 26,000, and is rigidly enforced. Arzú, who had previously been Mayor of Guatemala City, became its Mayor again, but died in 2018.
Also on this day, the 2nd and final debate of the year's Presidential election is held, at the University of San Diego. Conservatives were begging former Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas to hit President Bill Clinton hard, on issues ranging from taxes to foreign policy to the "scandals" of his Administration – the June 1996 "Filegate" story having resurfaced that week.
But Dole, remembering that he came across as mean-spirited in his 1976 Vice Presidential debate with Walter Mondale, was determined to be seen as a calm, mature man in comparison to the "immature" Clinton. Dole did ask, in connection with Filegate, "Who hired Craig Livingstone?"
Livingstone was the director of the White House's Office of Personnel Security, who improperly requested background reports from the FBI, concerning several hundred people, without asking permission from the White House Chief of Staff, at the time Thomas "Mack" McLarty. And yet, the FBI granted him the request and the files.
In the end, who hired him didn't matter, because he hadn't broken any laws. The scandal was so dumb (How dumb was it?), even Special Counsel Kenneth Starr, who despised both Bill and Hillary Clinton, refused to charge anyone in connection with it.
At the debate, President Clinton ignored the question as if it didn't matter, showing that he was considerably more mature than the Republicans would have had us believe. The audience, in the auditorium and on TV, quickly forgot about it.
It is the Mets' 4th Pennant, following 1969, 1973 and 1986. They got their 5th in 2015. But they're still waiting for their 3rd World Championship.
If only the Yankees had won this Game 2, it might have stopped the Rangers from winning the 2010 and 2011 Pennants. Oh well.
October 16, 2014: Game 5 of the NLCS at AT&T Park. Joe Panik and Michael Morse hit home runs for the San Francisco Giants, but the St. Louis Cardinals get homers from Matt Adams and Tony Cruz, and the game goes to the bottom of the 9th tied.
The Giants get 2 men on against Michael Wacha, MVP of the previous year's NLCS, and then Travis Ishikawa -- with considerably less pressure, as the Giants lead the Cards 3 games to 1 -- does what Bobby Thomson did, 63 years earlier and 2,910 miles to the east: He hits a home run that means, "The Giants win the Pennant! The Giants win the Pennant! And they're going crazy! They're going crazy!"
We don't need a world without Tommie Smith, John Carlos, Muhammad Ali, LeBron James and Colin Kaepernick. We need a world which makes additions to their actions unnecessary.
On the same day as the Smith & Carlos protest, the Milwaukee Bucks make their NBA debut. They play the team that will become their arch-rivals, the Chicago Bulls, and lose 89-84 at the Milwaukee Exposition and Convention Center Arena, a.k.a. The MECCA (now the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena).
Also on this day, former Boston Red Sox pitcher Ellis Kinder dies during open-heart surgery, probably complicated by heavy drinking all through his adult life. Kinder was one of the heroes of Boston’s 1948 and 1949 Pennant runs, though both fell short.
Yet despite not becoming a big-league regular until he was 31, he won 102 games and saved 102 others in his career. Had he come along 40 years later, in the era of bullpen specialists and rehab, he might have been one of the best relief pitchers ever. He was only 54. But that's not the biggest sports story of the day.
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October 16, 1969: Yes, the Miracle on 126th Street really happened. Was it actually a "miracle"? Not really: The Mets unquestionably outplayed the Baltimore Orioles in the World Series. And while varying amounts of luck are necessary for any sports victory, the Mets pretty much made their own luck in this Series.
A crowd later listed as 57,397 -- including Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, her children Caroline and John, and her 2nd husband, Aristotle Onassis -- files into "The William A. Shea Municipal Stadium" for Game 5. The skies on this Thursday afternoon are a mix of Sun and clouds, and the temperature is in the mid-60s throughout the game.
Caroline, John-John, Jackie, Ari
The Orioles do their best to win the game and send the Series back to Baltimore. They take a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the 6th, thanks to the pitching and home run of Dave McNally, and it looks like the Series is going back to Baltimore for at least a Game 6.
Cleon Jones‚ the only Met to have hit .300 that season – in fact, his .340 remained a Met single-season record until John Olerud's .359 in 1998 – is hit on the foot with a pitch, much like the unrelated Nippy Jones of the Milwaukee Braves in the 1957 World Series. And, like Nippy, Cleon is awarded 1st base after his manager proves he was hit, by showing the umpire a shoe-polish stain on the ball.
On the official World Series highlight film, Pearl Bailey, who had sung the National Anthem, can be seen asking if the pitch had hit Jones, and being delighted that it had, she used the slogan: "Did it hit him? Oh, it hit him! It's amazing! It's amazing!"
He is awarded 1st base, and then Clendenon hits a home run to close the Mets to within 3-2. Light-hitting 2nd baseman Al Weis ties it up with a homer in the 7th, and in the 8th, Swoboda doubles, and the Orioles uncharacteristically make 2 errors, leading to Mets 5, Orioles 3.
Koosman goes the distance. Just as the 2000 film Frequency used the '69 World Series as a major plot point, connecting the past with that film's present, so, too, does the final out link the Mets' 2 and, so far, only World Championships. The last Oriole batter is 2nd baseman Dave Johnson. Or, as he was sometimes known, Davey Johnson. And, 17 years before he manages the Mets to the 2nd title, he flies to left, where Cleon Jones is under it. At 3:17 PM -- the game took just 2 hours and 14 minutes -- that's the Mets' 1st title.
As Curt Gowdy says on NBC, "The 2-1 pitch: There's a fly ball to left, waiting is Jones, the Mets are the World Champions! Jerry Koosman is being mobbed! Look at this scene!"
Naming the Most Valuable Player of the World Series was a tough call. Koosman had won 2 games. Agee had won Game 3 with a home run and 2 sensational catches. Weis was a surprising star. In the end, though, the sportswriters decided they couldn't ignore 3 home runs, including the one that got the Mets back into the ballgame in Game 5, and awarded it to Clendenon. Formerly given out by the now-defunct SPORT magazine, in 2017, this award was renamed the Willie Mays Award.
The New York branch of the Baseball Writers' Association of America (the guys who vote for the Hall of Fame) awarded a separate Babe Ruth Award, and had just expanded its scope to cover the entire postseason (and would again in 1995). They gave it to Weis.
It had been 5 years since New York had a World Series appearance. It had been 12 years since Met fans, most of them previously fans of the New York Giants or Brooklyn Dodgers, lost their old teams. It had been 13 years since the Dodgers last won a New York Pennant, 15 years for the Giants. And it had been 14 years since the '55 Dodger title, 15 years since the '54 Giant title.
And New York was in a hell of a mess in '69, with rising crime, bad weather (the February blizzard), poverty, racial discontent, the sense that the whole world was spiraling out of control, and the feeling that Mayor Lindsay didn't know what the hell to do, with anything. But by tying himself to the Mets' World Series win, he managed to get re-elected.
If the Mets had finished 2nd to the Cubs in the new 6-team NL East, after 7 seasons of either 9th or 10th in the single-division 10-team NL, most Met fans would have gladly taken it. If they had won the Division but lost the Pennant to the NL West Champion Braves, it would have been a disappointment, but they would have gotten over it.
And if they had won the Pennant but lost the Series to the overwhelming favorite Orioles, it would have been fairly easy to take, as just being in the World Series is quite an honor – that is, so long as you don't lose it on a bonehead move or play, as the Red Sox did against the Mets in '86 (and I mean John McNamara's managerial decisions and Bob Stanley's wild pitch, not Bill Buckner's error), or as the Mets did against the Yankees in 2000 (the baserunning blunders and Armando Benitez's walk of Paul O'Neill).
The '69 Mets acted as if there was no pressure, as if the pressure was all on the other guys. It really wasn't on the Mets. They had fun. And their fans had fun. It was fun they did not expect to have. And sometimes, that's the best kind of fun of all. And that's why the win was not just glorious, but, to use the cliché, Amazin'.
It was also the last Major League Baseball game played before I was born, exactly 9 weeks later. So I was born with both the Mets and the Jets as defending World Champions.
But I still hate the Mets. But that's not why. I hate them because I'm a Yankee Fan.
Today, 52 years later, 19 of the '69 Mets are still alive: J.C. Martin is 84 years old; Al Weis and Ron Taylor are 83; Art Shamsky is 80; Cleon Jones and Jerry Grote are 79; Jerry Koosman and Jack DiLauro are 78; Bud Harrelson, Ron Swoboda, Bobby Pfeil and Jim McAndrew are 77; Ed Kranepool and Duffy Dyer are 76; Ken Boswell, Rod Gaspar and Gary Gentry are 75; Nolan Ryan is 74; and Wayne Garrett is 73. Coach Joe Pignatano is also still alive, at 92.
However, there is a cloud over that. In addition to Tom Seaver's battle with dementia that ended with his death in 2020, Harrelson has been dealing with it for some time. Kranepool nearly died of kidney failure before he got a transplant 2 years ago.
General manager Johnny Murphy died of a heart attack just 3 months after the 1969 World Series. Manager Gil Hodges died of a heart attack on the eve of the 1972 season, owner Joan Payson of natural causes in 1975, and Danny Frisella in a dune buggy accident while still an active player on New Year's Day 1977.
Coach Rube Walker died of lung cancer in 1992, Cal Koonce of lymphoma in 1993, Tommie Agee of a heart attack in 2001, Tug McGraw of brain cancer in 2004, Donn Clendenon of leukemia in 2005, Don Cardwell of Pick's disease in 2008, coach Eddie Yost of heart disease in 2012 (43 years to the day, today is the anniversary), coach Yogi Berra of old age in 2015, and Ed Charles of heart trouble in 2018.
For all that the Yankees have achieved, for all that the New York Giants and the Brooklyn Dodgers achieved before moving to California, for all the joy brought to the New York Tri-State Area by the Super Bowl wins of the Giants and the Jets, the Knicks' 1970 NBA Championship, and the Stanley Cups won by the Rangers, the Islanders, and the New Jersey Devils, the 1969 New York Mets remain the most beloved single-season sports team in New York history.
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October 16, 1970: The Portland Trail Blazers, the 1st major league sports team in Oregon, make their regular-season debut. They beat one of the other NBA expansion teams, the Cleveland Cavaliers, 115-112 at the Portland Memorial Coliseum.
October 16, 1971, 50 years ago: All In the Family airs the episode "Flashback: Mike Meets Archie." At least Mike Stivic (Rob Reiner) shaved his beard, if not his mustache, for his 1969 wedding to Gloria Bunker (Sally Struthers). Before, he looked like as much of a caricature of a hippie as Gloria's father Archie (Carroll O'Connor) looked like a caricature of a lower-middle-class WASP bigot.
Elsewhere in Queens on this day, 17-year-old Jerry Seinfeld -- at least, as shown in a flashback on the TV show Seinfeld -- borrows Henry Miller's smutty 1934 novel Tropic of Cancer from the New York Public Library. He later claimed that he returned the book on time. Stay tuned for the 1991 entry.
October 16, 1973: The Oakland Athletics win Game 3 of the World Series, 3-2 in 11 innings over the New York Mets. Bert Campaneris gets the winning RBI.
In the bottom of the 10th, Willie Mays pinch-hits for Mets pitcher Tug McGraw against Paul Lindblad, and grounds to short, where Bert Campaneris turns a force play. It is Mays' last major league appearance.
In a private clubhouse meeting‚ Dick Williams tells A's players he will resign after the Series, win or lose. He has had it with the meddling of team owner Charlie Finley. Alvin Dark will succeed Williams.
Also on this day, Donald Trump is mentioned in The New York Times for the 1st time. The story is of a lawsuit filed against the 27-year-old Trump, his father Fred, and their real estate company, by the U.S. Department of Justice, then (at least, for another 4 days) reporting to Attorney General Elliot Richardson, who reported to President Richard Nixon, for housing discrimination in their Queens apartment complexes.
In his 1987 autobiography Trump: The Art of the Deal -- which was actually written by Tony Schwartz, then writing for GQ, and who now correctly calls Trump a "sociopath" -- Trump said, "The idea of settling drove me crazy... I'd rather fight than fold, because as soon as you fold once, you get the reputation of being a folder."
Nevertheless, on June 10, 1975, Fred (who had previously been arrested for attending a Ku Klux Klan demonstration in Queens in 1927) and Donald signed an agreement prohibiting them from "discriminating against any person in the terms, conditions, or privileges of sale or rental of a dwelling." The decree made it clear that the Trumps did not view the agreement as a surrender, saying the settlement was "in no way an admission" of a violation.
Nevertheless, Trump officially became famous by being exposed as a bigot. And when you're officially too bigoted for Richard Nixon, you've got a problem.
October 16, 1977: The Dodgers stay alive in the World Series with a 10-4 victory in Game 5. Steve Yeager and Reggie Smith homer as Don Sutton pitches a complete game. Reggie Jackson, who homered in Game 4, does so again in Game 5.
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October 16, 1980: Suzanne Brigit Bird is born in Syosset, Long Island, New York. Sue Bird is one of the premier female basketball players of all time. She led the University of Connecticut to the 2000 and 2002 National Championships, going 114-4 there. She has led the Seattle Storm to the 2004, 2010, 2018 and 2020 WNBA Championships, and was a member of the 2004, 2008, 2012 and 2016 U.S. teams that won Olympic Gold Medals.
Her father is an Italian-born Russian Jew -- the family name had been Boorda -- and she played professionally in Russia before returning to the Storm. She is an 11-time WNBA All-Star. and, was named to the WNBA's 20th Anniversary All-Time Team -- meaning that Larry might no longer be the greatest basketball layer named Bird.
She came out in 2017, stating that she was dating soccer star Megan Rapinoe. It is a toss-up as to which of them has been the better athlete.
October 16, 1981, 40 years ago: Anthony Loza Reyes is born in the Los Angeles suburb of Whittier, California. A major league pitcher from 2005 to 2009, his career record was 13-26, but he won a World Series with the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals. He retired due to injury in 2011, and is now a firefighter outside Los Angeles.
Also on this day, Alan Gordon (no middle name) is born in the Los Angeles suburb of Long Beach, California. A forward, he helped the Los Angeles Galaxy win "The Double," taking the MLS Cup and the U.S. Open Cup (America's "FA Cup"), in 2005; Toronto FC the Canadian Championship (Canada's "FA Cup") in 2011, the San Jose Earthquakes the Supporters' Shield (the MLS regular-season title) in 2012, and the Galaxy the MLS Cup again in 2014.
He also helped the U.S. national team win the 2013 CONCACAF Gold Cup, the continental championship. He retired after the 2018 season.
Also on this day, DeAndrew White (no middle name) is born in Houston. A receiver, he was with the New England Patriots when they won Super Bowl LI. He now plays for the Baltimore Ravens.
Also on this day, Moshe Dayan dies of colon cancer in Tel Aviv, Israel. He was 66 years old. One of the founding fathers of the State of Israel, he was Minister of Defense during both the Six-Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur War of 1973, and Foreign Minister during the Camp David Accords of 1978.
On June 8, 1941, while serving with the British Army in World War II, he was looking at an enemy position, when his binoculars were shattered by a sniper's bullet. He survived, but the damage to his left eye was such that he lost it, and the muscular damage to his face was such that a glass eye could not be held in place. So he wore an eye patch for the rest of his life, and it made him one of the most identifiable statesmen in the world.
October 16, 1983: Eddie Murray slams a pair of home runs and Scott McGregor pitches a 5-hitter, as the Baltimore Orioles beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-0 at Veterans Stadium, and win the World Series 4-1. Baltimore catcher Rick Dempsey‚ who hit .385 with 4 doubles and a home run‚ is the Series MVP.
The Orioles win their 3rd World Series, marking a unique double: Edward Bennett Williams, famed trial lawyer, majority owner of the Orioles, and minority owner and former majority owner of the Washington Redskins, becomes the only man ever to be an owner of the current World Series and Super Bowl champions at the same time.
NFL rules prohibit a majority owner from being a majority owner in another sport, so before buying the Orioles, Williams sold some of his stake in the Redskins to Jack Kent Cooke, former owner of the Los Angeles Lakers and Kings, builder of the Forum arena outside L.A., and the last owner of the minor-league baseball team that gave its name to an NHL powerhouse, the Toronto Maple Leafs.
This caps a period where they have finished 1st 8 times in 18 years, and have at least been competitive almost continuously since 1960. But, due to their core players getting old and later mismanagement by owner Peter Angelos, they have not played a World Series game since.
The last out is a line shot to shortstop Cal Ripken Jr., son and namesake of the Orioles' longtime 3rd base coach. He will play another 18 seasons, but never appear in another World Series.
October 16, 1985: Baseball gets its 1st intrastate World Series since 1974‚ as the Kansas City Royals and St. Louis Cardinals win their respective Pennants. Kansas City beats the Toronto Blue Jays 6-2 in Game 7, to cap a comeback from a 3-games-to-1 deficit.
In Los Angeles‚ Jack Clark drills a 3-run home run deep into the left field pavilion, off Tom Niedenfuer with 2 outs in the top of the 9th and first base open to give the Cardinals a 7-5 victory over the Dodgers, and a 4-2 series win.
October 16, 1991, 30 years ago: The Delta Center opens in Salt Lake City, Utah. The 1st event is a minor-league hockey game, in which the host Salt Lake Golden Eagles lose 4-2 to the Peoria Rivermen. The Eagles will lose money there, and move to a smaller suburban arena in 1994.
October 16, 1983: Eddie Murray slams a pair of home runs and Scott McGregor pitches a 5-hitter, as the Baltimore Orioles beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-0 at Veterans Stadium, and win the World Series 4-1. Baltimore catcher Rick Dempsey‚ who hit .385 with 4 doubles and a home run‚ is the Series MVP.
The Orioles win their 3rd World Series, marking a unique double: Edward Bennett Williams, famed trial lawyer, majority owner of the Orioles, and minority owner and former majority owner of the Washington Redskins, becomes the only man ever to be an owner of the current World Series and Super Bowl champions at the same time.
NFL rules prohibit a majority owner from being a majority owner in another sport, so before buying the Orioles, Williams sold some of his stake in the Redskins to Jack Kent Cooke, former owner of the Los Angeles Lakers and Kings, builder of the Forum arena outside L.A., and the last owner of the minor-league baseball team that gave its name to an NHL powerhouse, the Toronto Maple Leafs.
This caps a period where they have finished 1st 8 times in 18 years, and have at least been competitive almost continuously since 1960. But, due to their core players getting old and later mismanagement by owner Peter Angelos, they have not played a World Series game since.
The last out is a line shot to shortstop Cal Ripken Jr., son and namesake of the Orioles' longtime 3rd base coach. He will play another 18 seasons, but never appear in another World Series.
October 16, 1985: Baseball gets its 1st intrastate World Series since 1974‚ as the Kansas City Royals and St. Louis Cardinals win their respective Pennants. Kansas City beats the Toronto Blue Jays 6-2 in Game 7, to cap a comeback from a 3-games-to-1 deficit.
In Los Angeles‚ Jack Clark drills a 3-run home run deep into the left field pavilion, off Tom Niedenfuer with 2 outs in the top of the 9th and first base open to give the Cardinals a 7-5 victory over the Dodgers, and a 4-2 series win.
October 16, 1991, 30 years ago: The Delta Center opens in Salt Lake City, Utah. The 1st event is a minor-league hockey game, in which the host Salt Lake Golden Eagles lose 4-2 to the Peoria Rivermen. The Eagles will lose money there, and move to a smaller suburban arena in 1994.
But the building, now named the Vivint rena, will be better to the NBA's Utah Jazz, reaching the Playoffs in 17 of the building's 1st 21 seasons -- but none of the last 4. This includes 7 trips to the Western Conference Finals and 2 to the NBA Finals.
Also on this day, the NHL's expansion San Jose Sharks play their 1st regular-season game, against their California arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Kings. The Kings win, 8-5, at the Great Western Forum in the Los Angeles suburb of Inglewood.
Also on this day, Seinfeld airs the episode "The Library." The character known to the show's fans as "TV Jerry," played by the real Jerry Seinfeld, is accused by the New York Public Library of borrowing Henry Miller's smutty 1934 novel Tropic of Cancer in 1971, 20 years earlier, and never returning it. In spite of the Library's records showing they never got it back, he insists that he returned it.
He tries to prove it, by looking up an old girlfriend, but her memory of the events is completely different, to the point where she says the book Jerry was reading to her, in order to "get her in the mood," was Miller's companion piece, the 1939 prequel Tropic of Capricorn. Jerry remembers that this was the book he returned, and that he had loaned the other to George Costanza (Jason Alexander). But George can't remember what he did with the book.
Jerry reluctantly pays the fine -- a big one, and he could afford it on his comedian's pay, but that wasn't the point, as he thought he shouldn't have to pay because he thought he'd returned it -- and the solution to the mystery of what happened to the book, never revealed to the main cast, is too stupid to explain here.
Also on this day, the NHL's expansion San Jose Sharks play their 1st regular-season game, against their California arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Kings. The Kings win, 8-5, at the Great Western Forum in the Los Angeles suburb of Inglewood.
Also on this day, Seinfeld airs the episode "The Library." The character known to the show's fans as "TV Jerry," played by the real Jerry Seinfeld, is accused by the New York Public Library of borrowing Henry Miller's smutty 1934 novel Tropic of Cancer in 1971, 20 years earlier, and never returning it. In spite of the Library's records showing they never got it back, he insists that he returned it.
He tries to prove it, by looking up an old girlfriend, but her memory of the events is completely different, to the point where she says the book Jerry was reading to her, in order to "get her in the mood," was Miller's companion piece, the 1939 prequel Tropic of Capricorn. Jerry remembers that this was the book he returned, and that he had loaned the other to George Costanza (Jason Alexander). But George can't remember what he did with the book.
Jerry reluctantly pays the fine -- a big one, and he could afford it on his comedian's pay, but that wasn't the point, as he thought he shouldn't have to pay because he thought he'd returned it -- and the solution to the mystery of what happened to the book, never revealed to the main cast, is too stupid to explain here.
*
October 16, 1992: Bryce Aron Max Harper is born in Las Vegas. The right fielder was the 1st pick in the 2010 Major League Baseball Draft. Within 21 months, he had debuted with the Washington Nationals.
October 16, 1992: Bryce Aron Max Harper is born in Las Vegas. The right fielder was the 1st pick in the 2010 Major League Baseball Draft. Within 21 months, he had debuted with the Washington Nationals.
Just 3 months after that, he was playing in his 1st of now 6 All-Star Games. Just 3 months after that he had helped the Nats win their 1st National League Eastern Division title, and reach their 1st postseason (unless you count 1981 as the Montreal Expos). Just a month after that, he was named NL Rookie of the Year. He would help get the Nats to the Division title again in 2014, 2016 and 2017. In 2015, he led the NL in home runs, and was named Most Valuable Player.
But he couldn't get the Nats into the NLCS, and his contract ran out after 2018. He signed with the Phillies for $330 million over 13 years. The Phils-Nats rivalry became hotter than ever, but the Nats have finally reached the NLCS, and even won a World Series, without him. In 2 seasons with him, the Phils haven't made the Playoffs.
Lots of people don't like him, because he's rude and arrogant. Well, if you had a .279 career batting average, a 142 OPS+, 1,273 hits, 267 home runs and 752 RBIs before your 29th birthday, you might be arrogant, too. Along with Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, he is generally regarded as 1 of the top 2 players in baseball today.
But did he make a mistake by not re-signing with the Nats? As the man himself would say, "That's a clown question, bro."
October 16, 1994: The Dallas Cowboys lead the Philadelphia Eagles 24-7 at Texas Stadium in Irving. The Eagles score a touchdown in the 4th quarter to make it 24-13, and head coach Rich Kotite tells his team to attempt a 2-point conversion. It fails, and the 24-13 score holds until the end of the game.
Why go for 2 there? At that point, there was little difference between trailing by 10 and by 9: You still needed a touchdown and a field goal to make the difference. But failing at the 2-pointer meant trailing by 11, so you needed 2 touchdowns. Obviously, the right thing to do was to kick the extra point, and make it 24-14.
Kotite told the media, "The rain made the ink run and blurred the chart, so I couldn't see what was written on it to know what to do." He shouldn't have needed a chart to tell him what to do! But it was worse than that: He knew it was going to rain, and didn't have a plastic sheet to protect his ink and paper. I guess Yankee Fans are lucky that the dugout protected Joe Girardi's infamous binder from the rain.
The loss dropped the Eagles to 4-2. They would get to 7-2, leading the NFC Eastern Division. Then they lost their last 7 games, including to the Giants and the Cincinnati Bengals by 3 points each, the Arizona Cardinals by 6, and the Atlanta Falcons by 7.
Kotite was fired, then got hired by the Jets, and went 3-13 and 1-15 in his 2 seasons with them. In other words, from November 7, 1994 onward, he went 4-35 as a head coach. That's a .103 ercentage, worse than the worst single seasons in the histories of MLB (the 1899 Cleveland Spiders went 20-134, or .134), the NBA (the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers went 9-73, or .110) and the NHL (the 1974-75 Washington Capitals went 8-67-5, or .131).
After the 1996 Jets, he's never worked for another professional football team, in any league. Even the XFL -- both the laughingstock 2001 version and the new edition getting ready to begin play next year -- haven't touched him. That's how radioactive Rich Kotite has been.
October 16, 1995: The Yankees sign former Met superstar pitcher Dwight Gooden‚ who has been on suspension for violation of his substance abuse program. George Steinbrenner likes comeback stories, redemption stories. This one works out for the Yankees, and for Doctor K, at least for 1996.
October 16, 1996, 25 years ago: A crowd of 47,000 people attempts to squeeze into the 36,000-seat Estadio Nacional Doroteo Guamuch Flores in Guatemala City, for a 1998 World Cup qualifying match between Guatemala and Costa Rica. As many as 84 people are killed (the number varies, depending on the source, but 84 is the highest figure quoted), and 180 injured. Álvaro Arzú, President of Guatemala, orders that the match be postponed.
Built in 1950, and named for a runner, who won the 1952 Boston Marathon and the 1955 Pan American Games Marathon, Estadio Flores still stands, and remains home to the national team and local club Municipal. Its capacity is now listed at 26,000, and is rigidly enforced. Arzú, who had previously been Mayor of Guatemala City, became its Mayor again, but died in 2018.
Also on this day, the 2nd and final debate of the year's Presidential election is held, at the University of San Diego. Conservatives were begging former Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas to hit President Bill Clinton hard, on issues ranging from taxes to foreign policy to the "scandals" of his Administration – the June 1996 "Filegate" story having resurfaced that week.
But Dole, remembering that he came across as mean-spirited in his 1976 Vice Presidential debate with Walter Mondale, was determined to be seen as a calm, mature man in comparison to the "immature" Clinton. Dole did ask, in connection with Filegate, "Who hired Craig Livingstone?"
Livingstone was the director of the White House's Office of Personnel Security, who improperly requested background reports from the FBI, concerning several hundred people, without asking permission from the White House Chief of Staff, at the time Thomas "Mack" McLarty. And yet, the FBI granted him the request and the files.
In the end, who hired him didn't matter, because he hadn't broken any laws. The scandal was so dumb (How dumb was it?), even Special Counsel Kenneth Starr, who despised both Bill and Hillary Clinton, refused to charge anyone in connection with it.
At the debate, President Clinton ignored the question as if it didn't matter, showing that he was considerably more mature than the Republicans would have had us believe. The audience, in the auditorium and on TV, quickly forgot about it.
While he didn’t hurt himself in either 1996 debate, Dole never really laid a glove on Clinton, perhaps the most skilled debater in Presidential history. (He was 5-0. Kennedy didn't go 4-0 against Nixon, Reagan lost both of his debates against Mondale, the George Bushes were 2-9 between them, and even Obama lost his 1st debate against Romney.)
October 16, 1999: Jean Shepherd dies at age 78. The author and former late-night talk-show host on New York radio station WOR, best known today as the writer and narrator of the film A Christmas Story, was born in Chicago and grew up in nearby Hammond, Indiana.
He was a tremendous Chicago White Sox fan, and hosted the team's 1987 video history. In it, he spoke poetically of his love for the city, the team, its then-home of Comiskey Park, and of his favorite player of all time, 1950s ChiSox sparkplug Nellie Fox.
"If I was a colonel in some awful war," he said in that video, "and there was an enemy pillbox that had to be taken, and it looked like a suicide mission, I'd look out at my men and say, 'Are there any White Sox fans here? Follow me!' And those White Sox fans would follow me, and we'd take that pillbox!
October 16, 1999: Jean Shepherd dies at age 78. The author and former late-night talk-show host on New York radio station WOR, best known today as the writer and narrator of the film A Christmas Story, was born in Chicago and grew up in nearby Hammond, Indiana.
He was a tremendous Chicago White Sox fan, and hosted the team's 1987 video history. In it, he spoke poetically of his love for the city, the team, its then-home of Comiskey Park, and of his favorite player of all time, 1950s ChiSox sparkplug Nellie Fox.
"If I was a colonel in some awful war," he said in that video, "and there was an enemy pillbox that had to be taken, and it looked like a suicide mission, I'd look out at my men and say, 'Are there any White Sox fans here? Follow me!' And those White Sox fans would follow me, and we'd take that pillbox!
Because White Sox fans are special."
Well, Met fans are special. In fact, as my sister would say, they're "especially special." But tonight, in Game 4 of the NLCS, they have reason to be happy. Trailing 3 games to none, the Mets beat the Atlanta Braves‚ 3-2 at Shea Stadium‚ to stay alive. John Olerud drives home all 3 New York runs with a solo homer in the 6th inning‚ and a 2-run single off John Rocker in the 8th. Rick Reed shuts jtlanta out over the 1st 7 innings on a single hit.
Shortly before this series, Rocker, sticking his nose in the Mets-Braves "rivalry," said, "I hate the Mets. I hate their fans. How many times do you have to beat a team to make their fans shut up?" The lunkheaded redneck had a point, but we still don't know the answer.
After this game, hearing the reception Met fans gave him as he headed back to the dugout after being pulled off the mound by manager Bobby Cox, rocker is interviewed in the locker room, and flaps his gums again: "I would say the majority of Met fans aren't even humans. They’re more like... " He paused for an appropriate description, and came up with, "Neanderthals." I've said as much, but to John "Off His" Rocker, we can only say that it takes one to know one.
Yankees Fans have considerably less reason to be happy tonight, after what happened in the afternoon. The Red Sox roll over the Yankees‚ 13-1 at Fenway Park‚ behind the pitching of Pedro Martinez. Nomar Garciaparra gets 4 hits for Boston‚ while John Valentin drives home 5 runs. Garciaparra‚ Valentin‚ and Brian Daubach all homer for the Sox. New York now leads the ALCS‚ 2 games to 1.
Pedro outpitches Roger Clemens, and Sox fans, still thinking of him as a traitor, give him the worst ripping any player has ever received at Fenway Park. One fan holds up a sign: "Roger, thanks for the memories, especially this one." After he leaves the game, a chant goes up: "Where is Roger?" After a few rounds of this, a counter-chant goes up: "In the shower!"
But, as Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy would write afterwards, the Sox fans who showed up seemed to think that the point of coming was to stick it to Clemens, and it wasn't: The point was to beat the Yankees. The Sox did beat the Yanks on this day, but that's the only game they win in the series. It turns out to be the only game the Yankees lose in the entire postseason, the last game that they would lose in the 20th Century. Not until April 5, 2000 would they lose another game that counts.
(Wanting to stick it to Clemens first and beat the Yankees second? Met fans would make that same mistake after the 2000 World Series, all the way up to a 2002 Interleague matchup, although, unlike the Sox, they did win the series.)
Well, Met fans are special. In fact, as my sister would say, they're "especially special." But tonight, in Game 4 of the NLCS, they have reason to be happy. Trailing 3 games to none, the Mets beat the Atlanta Braves‚ 3-2 at Shea Stadium‚ to stay alive. John Olerud drives home all 3 New York runs with a solo homer in the 6th inning‚ and a 2-run single off John Rocker in the 8th. Rick Reed shuts jtlanta out over the 1st 7 innings on a single hit.
Shortly before this series, Rocker, sticking his nose in the Mets-Braves "rivalry," said, "I hate the Mets. I hate their fans. How many times do you have to beat a team to make their fans shut up?" The lunkheaded redneck had a point, but we still don't know the answer.
After this game, hearing the reception Met fans gave him as he headed back to the dugout after being pulled off the mound by manager Bobby Cox, rocker is interviewed in the locker room, and flaps his gums again: "I would say the majority of Met fans aren't even humans. They’re more like... " He paused for an appropriate description, and came up with, "Neanderthals." I've said as much, but to John "Off His" Rocker, we can only say that it takes one to know one.
Yankees Fans have considerably less reason to be happy tonight, after what happened in the afternoon. The Red Sox roll over the Yankees‚ 13-1 at Fenway Park‚ behind the pitching of Pedro Martinez. Nomar Garciaparra gets 4 hits for Boston‚ while John Valentin drives home 5 runs. Garciaparra‚ Valentin‚ and Brian Daubach all homer for the Sox. New York now leads the ALCS‚ 2 games to 1.
Pedro outpitches Roger Clemens, and Sox fans, still thinking of him as a traitor, give him the worst ripping any player has ever received at Fenway Park. One fan holds up a sign: "Roger, thanks for the memories, especially this one." After he leaves the game, a chant goes up: "Where is Roger?" After a few rounds of this, a counter-chant goes up: "In the shower!"
But, as Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy would write afterwards, the Sox fans who showed up seemed to think that the point of coming was to stick it to Clemens, and it wasn't: The point was to beat the Yankees. The Sox did beat the Yanks on this day, but that's the only game they win in the series. It turns out to be the only game the Yankees lose in the entire postseason, the last game that they would lose in the 20th Century. Not until April 5, 2000 would they lose another game that counts.
(Wanting to stick it to Clemens first and beat the Yankees second? Met fans would make that same mistake after the 2000 World Series, all the way up to a 2002 Interleague matchup, although, unlike the Sox, they did win the series.)
October 16, 2000: New York wanted a Subway Series -- which can only happen in a World Series. In a regular-season game, it's not. Nobody ever called New York Giants vs. Brooklyn Dodgers a "Subway Series."
The Mets keep up their half of the bargain: They defeat the Cardinals‚ 7-0 at Shea Stadium behind Mike Hampton‚ to win their 1st Pennant since 1986. Hampton takes NLCS MVP honors with his 16 scoreless innings and 2 victories. Todd Zeile drives home 3 runs with a bases loaded double.
It is the Mets' 4th Pennant, following 1969, 1973 and 1986. They got their 5th in 2015. But they're still waiting for their 3rd World Championship.
The Yankees are in a travel day for the ALCS, and can clinch tomorrow, at home.
The Yankees could have wrapped it up the next day with a 4th win in an ALCS. It took them another 5 years to get it, on October 25, 2009.
Also on this day, Arsenal defeat Birmingham team Aston Villa 3-1 at Highbury. Robert Pires scores 2 goals, and Thierry Henry the other. Arsenal have now played 9 Premier League games this season, winning 8 and drawing the other. Their League unbeaten streak, which began on May 7, 2003, has now reached 49 games: Won 36, drawn 13, lost exactly none. But Manchester United will cheat them out of a 50th straight.
October 16, 2005: The White Sox clinch their 1st Pennant in 46 years – the 1st Pennant for either Chicago team since the ChiSox clinched on September 22, 1959 – as they defeat the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim‚ 6-3‚ behind Jose Contreras. Joe Crede homers and drives in 3 runs for Chicago, and Paul Konerko is named MVP of the ALCS.
October 16, 2009: Game 1 of the ALCS. It's been 5 years since the Yankees got this far, and with a new vibe brought by manager Joe Girardi, a revived Alex Rodriguez and Robinson Cano, and new acquisitions Mark Teixeira, Nick Swisher, CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett, the Yankees are more ready to rumble than at any time since the Aaron Boone Game, 6 years to the day earlier.
CC nearly goes the distance, holding the Angels to 4 hits. Singles in the 1st inning by Derek Jeter and Johnny Damon, an Angel error, a sacrifice fly by A-Rod and a single by Matsui give the Yankees a 2-0 lead, and that's all they need, as they go on to a 4-1 victory. Even sweeter: It's against John Lackey, who'd driven them crazy in the 2002 and '05 ALDS. He would do it to them again for the Red Sox years later, though.
October 16, 2010: The Texas Rangers record the 1st Playoff win at home in the 50-year history of the franchise, when they take Game 2 of the ALDS, defeating the Yankees, 7-2. The victory Rangers Ballpark (recently renamed Choctaw Stadium) victory ends a 10-game postseason losing streak against New York, that includes yesterday's heartbreaking loss in which Texas had an early 5-0 lead over the Bronx Bombers.
October 16, 2004: The Yankees maul the Red Sox‚ 19-8 at Fenway Park‚ to take a commanding 3-games-to-none lead in the ALCS. The 19 runs remain an LCS record. Hideki Matsui leads the way for New York with 5 hits‚ including 2 home runs, 5 RBI‚ and 5 runs scored. Alex Rodriguez also scores 5 for the Yankees. Gary Sheffield and Bernie Williams each have 4 hits. Alex Rodriguez and Gary Sheffield also homer for the Yanks, Jason Varitek and Trot Nixon for the Sox.
The Yankees could have wrapped it up the next day with a 4th win in an ALCS. It took them another 5 years to get it, on October 25, 2009.
Also on this day, Arsenal defeat Birmingham team Aston Villa 3-1 at Highbury. Robert Pires scores 2 goals, and Thierry Henry the other. Arsenal have now played 9 Premier League games this season, winning 8 and drawing the other. Their League unbeaten streak, which began on May 7, 2003, has now reached 49 games: Won 36, drawn 13, lost exactly none. But Manchester United will cheat them out of a 50th straight.
October 16, 2005: The White Sox clinch their 1st Pennant in 46 years – the 1st Pennant for either Chicago team since the ChiSox clinched on September 22, 1959 – as they defeat the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim‚ 6-3‚ behind Jose Contreras. Joe Crede homers and drives in 3 runs for Chicago, and Paul Konerko is named MVP of the ALCS.
October 16, 2009: Game 1 of the ALCS. It's been 5 years since the Yankees got this far, and with a new vibe brought by manager Joe Girardi, a revived Alex Rodriguez and Robinson Cano, and new acquisitions Mark Teixeira, Nick Swisher, CC Sabathia and A.J. Burnett, the Yankees are more ready to rumble than at any time since the Aaron Boone Game, 6 years to the day earlier.
CC nearly goes the distance, holding the Angels to 4 hits. Singles in the 1st inning by Derek Jeter and Johnny Damon, an Angel error, a sacrifice fly by A-Rod and a single by Matsui give the Yankees a 2-0 lead, and that's all they need, as they go on to a 4-1 victory. Even sweeter: It's against John Lackey, who'd driven them crazy in the 2002 and '05 ALDS. He would do it to them again for the Red Sox years later, though.
October 16, 2010: The Texas Rangers record the 1st Playoff win at home in the 50-year history of the franchise, when they take Game 2 of the ALDS, defeating the Yankees, 7-2. The victory Rangers Ballpark (recently renamed Choctaw Stadium) victory ends a 10-game postseason losing streak against New York, that includes yesterday's heartbreaking loss in which Texas had an early 5-0 lead over the Bronx Bombers.
If only the Yankees had won this Game 2, it might have stopped the Rangers from winning the 2010 and 2011 Pennants. Oh well.
October 16, 2014: Game 5 of the NLCS at AT&T Park. Joe Panik and Michael Morse hit home runs for the San Francisco Giants, but the St. Louis Cardinals get homers from Matt Adams and Tony Cruz, and the game goes to the bottom of the 9th tied.
The Giants get 2 men on against Michael Wacha, MVP of the previous year's NLCS, and then Travis Ishikawa -- with considerably less pressure, as the Giants lead the Cards 3 games to 1 -- does what Bobby Thomson did, 63 years earlier and 2,910 miles to the east: He hits a home run that means, "The Giants win the Pennant! The Giants win the Pennant! And they're going crazy! They're going crazy!"