Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame Mickey Owen for the Brooklyn Dodgers Losing the 1941 World Series

Casey said it was a curveball. Henrich also said he thought it was a curveball. But many observers, including the Yankees' rookie shortstop, Phil Rizzuto, said that they thought it was a spitball.

Henrich swung and missed. Strike 3. Ballgame over. Dodgers win, and the World Series is tied at 2 games apiece.

Except… Owen didn't catch the 3rd strike! The ball tailed away from him, as spitballs have been known to do, and he couldn't hold onto it. It rolled all the way to the screen. Henrich saw this, and ran to 1st, and Owen didn't even time to get off a throw.

It is the most famous passed ball in baseball history, but if it was a spitball, which was and remains an illegal pitch anyway, then it should be the most famous wild pitch, and Casey, rather than Owen, should be faulted.

No matter. Casey only needed to get 1 more out. Even if Henrich represented the tying run and the next batter represented the winning run. Just 1 more out.

The batter was Joe DiMaggio. Uh-oh, you don't give the Yankee Clipper a written invitation to keep a game alive. Especially not in 1941, when he had his 56-game hitting streak and had become the most celebrated athlete in America, ahead of Ted Williams and his .406 average, ahead of football stars Sammy Baugh, Sid Luckman and Don Hutson, ahead of even heavyweight champion Joe Louis.

DiMaggio singled to left. Now the tying run was on 2nd, the potential winning run on 1st. But there were still 2 outs. If Casey could get the next batter, the game would still end, however precariously, with a Dodger victory.

The batter was Charlie Keller. At this point in his career, before a back injury curtailed it, he looked like he was headed to the Hall of Fame. And he did nothing to dispel that in this at-bat: He rocketed a Casey delivery off the right-field wall, and Henrich and DiMaggio scored.

Keller would later say, "When I got to 2nd base, you could have heard a pin drop in Ebbets Field." The noisiest, most raucous ballpark of his time had been stunned into silence.

The Yankees scored 2 more runs in the inning, won 7-4, and won the World Series in the next day's Game 5.

Keller would also say that, having won their 1st Pennant in 21 years, and having gotten past the arch-rival New York Giants to do it -- the Giants' last Pennant had been 4 years earlier and their last World Series win 8 -- Dodger fans were talking about "taking over New York," that they were now more popular than the Giants (probably true), and that soon they would beat the Yankees and were already more popular.

Sound familiar? It was just as stupid then as it has been in recent years when coming from Met fans, the children and grandchildren of the Dodger and Giant fans of the Forties and Fifties.

But don't blame Owen for losing the '41 Series.

Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame Mickey Owen for the Brooklyn Dodgers Losing the 1941 World Series

5. Hugh Casey. He threw the pitch. Even if the pitch was a curve, a totally legal pitch, it was still in a bad spot. And Casey was never the most clutch of relief pitchers.

4. Leo Durocher. The Dodger manager messed up the pitching rotation that had won the Pennant. And he admitted it, a rare occasion when Leo the Lip didn't blame someone else, such as an umpire or a dirty player on the other team, and didn't try to claim credit solely for himself.

Durocher started Curt Davis in Game 1, on 9 days' rest. He could have had an additional start in there. Game 2: Whitlow Wyatt, his ace, on 7 days' rest. He could have had an additional start. Fred Fitzsimmons pitched on September 18, and Durocher didn't use him again until Game 3 of the Series -- 16 days later! He could have had 3 additional starts. The fact that Fat Freddie pitched pretty well in Game 3 helps Durocher, but not much. In Game 4, the game we're looking at here, he started Kirby Higbe, who was on 11 days' rest -- 2 additional starts. In Game 5, he started Wyatt on 3 days' rest.

The rotation should have been Wyatt, Fitzsimmons, Higbe, Wyatt again, and then, if it went further than that, Fitzsimmons in Game 5, Higbe in Game 6, and Wyatt again in Game 7.  Instead, Durocher really blew it.

3. Marius Russo -- Two-Way Threat. The day before, in Game 3, Russo had not only pitched brilliantly, but hit a line drive off the knee of his opposite number, Giant pitcher and Dodger nemesis turned Dodger hero Fred Fitzsimmons, literally knocking him out of the game and the Series.

2. Tommy Henrich. He was alert enough to realize that he could take 1st, and it was DiMaggio and Keller who followed it up with key hits.

1. The Yankees Were Better. Certainly, with many of the men on that '41 team having played on World Championship teams of '39, '38, some '37 and '36, a few even in '32, they were much more experienced. The Dodgers had finished 2nd in '40 and 3rd in '39, but before that, the team hadn't been in a Pennant race since '24 or a World Series since '20. Only Durocher, Joe Medwick (both '34 Cardinals), Fitzsimmons ('33 and '36 Giants), Billy Herman ('32, '35 and '38 Cubs), Johnny Allen ('32 Yankees) and a washed-up Paul Waner ('27 Pirates) had appeared in a World Series before.

VERDICT: Not Guilty. "Mickey Owen's Muff," as it came to be known, was bad, but it was hardly the biggest, and certainly not the chronological first, reason the Dodgers lost the 1941 World Series.

Despite America's entry into World War II, Owen never went into the service. I wonder if some Dodger fans said, "Mickey Owen is such a bum, even the Army don't want him!"

I wonder if a lot of the accolades that would later come the way of Roy Campanella were due to Mickey Owen's Muff. That Campy might have been cheered not just for what he was, a fantastic player and a good guy, but for what he wasn't: Owen.

It's not fair to Owen. He was widely respected prior to the '41 Series, and most Dodger fans didn't go on to hate him. Certainly, he escaped the scorn that was heaped on Ralph Branca after 1951. And neither one of them got the kind of treatment that Bill Buckner got from Boston fans after 1986.
Which is a good thing. Nobody deserves that. Well, maybe not nobody… But certainly not Buckner, nor Branca, nor Owen.

Owen died on July 13, 2005, in his home town of Mount Vernon, Missouri. He was 89. Henrich died on December 1, 2009, as the last survivor of this game. He was also the last surviving person who had been a teammate of Lou Gehrig. Herman Franks, who later helped steal a Pennant from the Dodgers as a 1951 New York Giant, had died earlier in 2009 as the last surviving '41 Dodger.

Today, Sandlot Baseball Missouri, formerly the Mickey Owen Baseball School, is still open on State Highway 96 in Miller, Missouri, in the southwestern part of the State, in the Ozark Mountains, about halfway between Joplin and Springfield -- 238 miles southwest of St. Louis, 171 miles southeast of Kansas City, 64 miles northwest of Branson (the "Redneck Vegas"), and 80 miles northeast of Mickey Mantle's hometown of Commerce, Oklahoma.

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October 5, 1824: Henry Chadwick (no middle name) is born in Exeter, Devon, England, and moved with is family to Brooklyn at age 12. He wrote and taught music, and loved the English games of cricket and rounders, and when The New York Times was founded in 1851, he was hired as their 1st cricket reporter. But by the time he was a young man in the 1840s, those games were already being phased out in America, in favor of baseball -- and, upon covering his 1st game in 1856, he loved it.

In 1857, he was hired by the New York Clipper, and became the world's 1st true baseball beat writer. From 1860 to 1881, he edited The Beadle Dime Base-Ball Player, which was in its time what Spalding's Base Ball Guide, The Sporting News, The Baseball Encyclopedia and Total Baseball were in their times, and what Baseball-Reference.com is now: The closest thing there was to a definitive source on the sport, both currently and historically. He later wrote for Spalding's Base Ball Guide.

It was long told that Henry Chadwick invented the box score, adapting it from the scorecards kept for cricket matches. We now know this to not be true, as box scores have been found as far back as 1845, but he did popularize them, and he did help to standardize baseball statistics, and thus to popularize the game itself in the 1860s and '70s.

He became known as "The Father of Baseball." Today, we would call him "The First Sportswriter,""The First Stathead,""The First Seamhead," and "The First Sabermetrician." Grantland Rice, Fred Lieb, Shirley Povich, Dick Young, Jim Murray, Dan Shaughnessy? They can all be traced back to Henry Chadwick. So can Peter Gammons and Bill James. In a way, so can Billy Beane and Allen Barra.

He died on April 20, 1908, at the age of 83, not long after becoming one of the first famous people to be hit by a car. He had lived long enough to see baseball become the National Pastime, and to see both the National League and the American League, and their postseason World Series, established. In the preceding season of 1907, he went to Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, or the Polo Grounds or Hilltop Park in Upper Manhattan, and watched Cy Young, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson, Nap Lajoie, 20-year-old Ty Cobb, and a pair of 19-year-old rookies named Tris Speaker and Walter Johnson. However, he would have just missed, starting the next year, the first concrete-and-steel stadiums: Shibe Park in Philadelphia, Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, and the last edition of Sportsman's Park in St. Louis.

He was buried in Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery, along with many other personalities from the early days of baseball. In 1938, he and Alexander Cartwright, the rulesmith who has also been called The Father of Baseball, were elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

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October 5, 1857: The City of Anaheim is founded in Orange County, California. In 1966, it became the home of the baseball team then known as the Los Angeles Angels. They became the California Angels upon moving to Anaheim, the Anaheim Angels in 1997, and the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in 2004. (Not only is Anaheim not part of the City of Los Angeles, it's not even in the County of Los Angeles.)
October 5, 1949: Game 1 of the World Series. Allie Reynolds of the Yankees and Don Newcombe of the Dodgers pitch a scoreless game, taking it to the bottom of the 9th.


The only player from this game who is still alive, 66 years later, is Phillies reserve Ralph "Putsy" Caballero. Yogi Berra was the last surviving Yankee who played in it. Whitey Ford would start and win Game 4, and is still alive, but did not appear in Game 2.

October 5, 1951: Game 2 of the World Series. The Yanks and Eddie Lopat even up the Series against the Giants by winning 3-1 over Larry Jansen. But the big story comes in the top of the 5th.

The Giants' big rookie, Willie Mays, hits a fly ball to right-center. The Yankees' big rookie, Mickey Mantle, already a big story and not yet 20 years old for another 15 days (Mays had turned 20 in May), sees DiMaggio calling for it, and stops short. But Mantle steps in a water sprinkler that had been mistakenly left open, catching his spikes and tearing his right knee.

With today's sports medicine, Mickey would have been operated on the next day, and would have been ready for Opening Day the next April. But they didn't know how to treat a torn-up knee in the Truman years, and the surgery he got is hardly good enough, and it never really heals right. This is why people say, "We never got to see Mickey Mantle on 2 good legs."

October 5, 1952: Game 5 of the World Series. Johnny Mize hits a home run in a 5-run 5th inning for the Yankees, putting them on top after a Duke Snider homer put the Dodgers up 4-0.

In the top of the 11th, Billy Cox gets a hit off Johnny Sain, is moved to 2nd on a Pee Wee Reese single, and then the Duke doubles him home. Carl Erskine pitches all 11 innings for the Brooks, closing it out by retiring future Hall-of-Famers Mickey Mantle, Mize and Yogi Berra. The Dodgers win, 6-5, and lead the Series 3 games to 2.

They only have to win 1 of the last 2 games at home at Ebbets Field. But they will not win another game that counts until April 1953.

Also on this day, Imran Khan Niazi is born in Lahore, Pakistan, and grew up there and in England. I don't know what makes a cricket player great, but, playing, from 1971 to 1992, Imran Khan (he doesn't use his last name) he is regarded as one of the best ever, closing his career by captaining Pakistan to its only win thus far in the Cricket World Cup.

He became a social reformer, specializing in education, and was named Chancellor of the University of Bradford in Yorkshire, serving 9 years, and founded Namal College in Pakistan, which he partnered with the University of Bradford. In 1996, he founded Pakistan Tereek-e-Inshaf, a centrist political party, and since 2013 has served in his country's federal parliament. He may be the most popular living person from Pakistan.

October 5, 1953: Game 6 of the World Series. Billy Martin singles up the middle in the bottom of the 9th, his record-tying 12th hit of the Series, driving in Hank Bauer with the winning run.
It is the Yankees' 16th World Championship, and their 5th in a row.

Since then, 3 in a row has been done, but not 4, and certainly not 5. The Montréal Canadiens would soon start a streak of 5 straight Stanley Cups, but they were unable to make it 6. The Boston Celtics would later win 8 straight NBA Titles, but basketball didn't exactly get the best athletes then.

This was the last World Series, and the last Pennant in either League, won by an all-white team. The next season, the Yanks lost the Pennant to the well-integrated Indians, and the argument of, "Why integrate? We're winning with what we've got" was no longer valid. Elston Howard became the 1st black man to play for the Yankees the following April, and the team went on to win 9 Pennants and 4 World Series in the next 10 years.

Still alive from this game, 63 years later: Only Ford from the Yankees, and Dodgers Carl Erskine and Bobby Morgan. (Newcombe was in the Army for the Korean War in 1952 and '53, as Ford was in '51 and '52.) There are 5 members of the '53 Yanks still alive: Ford, Bob Kuzava, Charlie Silvera, Irv Noren and Art Schallock.

October 5, 1956, 60 years ago: Game 2 of the World Series. Both starting pitchers got shelled in the 2nd inning. Don Newcombe of the Dodgers allowed 5 runs, but was already a legend. Don Larsen of the Yankees was not yet a legend, and allowed 6. But getting knocked out of the box in the 2nd inning allowed manager Casey Stengel to start him on 3 days' rest in Game 5.

Yogi and Duke homered, and Don Bessent held the Yankees to 2 runs over the last 7 innings, and the Dodgers won 13-8. The defending World Champions were now up 2 games to 0, and it looked like they finally had the Yankees number after beating them the season before. This would turn out to not be the case.

October 5, 1957: The 1st World Series game in the State of Wisconsin is played. The Yankees beat the Milwaukee Braves 12-3 at Milwaukee County Stadium in Game 3.

Also on this day, Bernard Jeffrey McCullough is born in Chicago. A standup comic, best known for his Fox sitcom The Bernie Mac Show, he starred in Mr. 3000, about a former player for the Milwaukee Brewers who retires with exactly 3,000 career hits, only to have it discovered when he's 47 years old that one of his games was mistakenly counted twice, and he really only has 2,997, and so he makes a comeback to get back to 3,000.

He suffered from sarcoidosis, and died in 2008, not quite 51 years old.

October 5, 1958: Game 4 of the World Series. Warren Spahn, 37 years old and on just 3 days' rest, not only beats Whitey Ford, but pitches a 3-hit shutout. The Milwaukee Braves beat the Yankees 3-0, and go up 3 games to 1.

The Braves were now just 1 win away from beating the Yankees, and clinching at Yankee Stadium, in back-to-back World Series. Failing that in Game 5, they could win either Game 6 or Game 7 at home at Milwaukee County Stadium.

After the game, Mickey Mantle looked around at his teammates, and said, "This is it, fellas." Everybody laughed, and was reassured by the Mick's good-natured self-deprecating humor. The Braves needed just 1 win in the next 3 games, but wouldn't win again in a game that counted until April 10, 1959.

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October 5, 1960: Game 1 of the World Series at Forbes Field. Roger Maris becomes the 7th player to hit a home run in his 1st World Series at-bat, but the Yankees fall to the Pittsburgh Pirates, 6-4. So begins perhaps the strangest World Series ever.

Also on this day, Antônio de Oliveira Filho is born in Araraquara, São Paulo state, Brazil. Known as Careca -- the name means "bald," and he got it because he admired a TV clown who went by that name; his own hair appears intact at age 56 -- the striker led São Paulo FC to the title in Brazil's national league, Campeonato Brasileiro Série A (or simply "Brasileirão") in 1978 (just 17 years old) and 1986. He moved on to Naples-based club Napoli, and, as a teammate of Argentine superstar Diego Maradona, won the 1989 UEFA Cup and the 1990 title in Italy's national league, also named Serie A.

He also played for Brazil in the 1986 and 1990 World Cups, but not on the 1994 team that won it. He has been out of the game since retiring as a player in 1999.

Also on this day, David Edward Kirk is born in Wellington, New Zealand. I don't know what makes a rugby player great, but in 1987, he captained New Zealand to victory in the 1st Rugby World Cup. Then, at age 26, he retired from the sport to accept a Rhodes scholarship. He now runs an investment group and is a commentator on rugby telecasts.

October 5, 1961: Game 2 of the World Series: Despite a home run by Yogi Berra, the Cincinnati Reds beat the Yankees 6-2. Gordy Coleman homers for them, and Joey Jay, who'd won a ring with the Braves in 1957, is the winning pitcher.

This turns out to be the only World Series game the Reds win in a 30-year stretch, from 1940 to 1970.

October 5, 1962: Game 2 of the World Series. Willie McCovey hits a long home run, Jack Sanford pitches a 3-hit shutout, and the Giants have their 1st World Series game win since moving to San Francisco, 2-0 over the Yankees.

The 2 biggest British phenomena of the post-World War II era are linked by this day -- and I don't mean the England soccer team. The Beatles release their 1st single, "Love Me Do," backed with "P.S. I Love You"; and the 1st James Bond film, Dr. No, is released. Of course, America would find out about each of them considerably later (although Ian Fleming's Bond novels had already been published here).

James Bond has never been depicted as a professional athlete, even as a spy's "cover." But, in his various incarnations, he has certainly been athletic. George Lazenby skied and drove a snowmobile in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, while Roger Moore skied in both The Spy Who Loved Me and For Your Eyes Only. Moore, Sean Connery, Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan have all, technically, raced cars and boats. Brosnan, sort of, raced a tank.

Also on this day, Michael Mario Andretti is born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Son of Mario, brother of Jeff, cousin of John and Adam, father of Marco and uncle of Aldo, his greatest achievement in auto racing is winning the CART IndyCar World Series in 1991. But, that year, he also fell short in his closest call at the Indianapolis 500, a race won in his family only once, by his father in 1969. (Mario is now 76, and while he still runs the family's racing empire, he is long retired from competing.)

October 5, 1963: Game 3 of the World Series at Dodger Stadium. Jim Bouton makes his 1st World Series start, and allows just 1 run on 4 hits. The run scored in the bottom of the 1st, as he walks Jim Gilliam, wild-pitches "Junior" to 2nd, and gives up an RBI single to Tommy Davis.

That's all Don Drysdale needs, as he pitches a 3-hit shutout. Dodgers 1, Yankees 0, and lead the Series 3 games to none. Bouton had won 21 games in the regular season, but was unlucky here -- especially since Joe Pepitone nearly bailed him out in the 9th, with a drive that would have been a home run in Yankee Stadium with its 296-foot right field pole, but was caught by Ron Fairly for the final out.

Also on this day, Laura Jane Davies (pronounced "DAY-viss," not "DAY-veez," as is usually the case with "Davis" in Britain) is born in Coventry, West Midlands, England. In 1994, she became the 1st non-American to be the LPGA's top money-winner in a year. She won the U.S. Women's Open in 1987, the Women's PGA Championship in 1994 and 1996, and the du Maurier Classic, also considered a major, in 1996. Oddly, she has never come close to winning the Women's British Open. She is in the World Golf Hall of Fame.

October 5, 1965: This was a great day in the history of hockey, although we wouldn't know it for over 20 years, when 2 legends born on this day, both in Québec, began to make their mark on the NHL.

An All-America defensive end at the University of Florida, he was elected to their Athletic Hall of Fame. He was drafted by the Chicago Bears, made All-Pro with the Miami Dolphins, and reached Super Bowl XXXVII with the Oakland Raiders.

He now works as an agent, including for Green Bay Packers coach Mike McCarthy and Ohio State coach Urban Meyer, whom he knew from his Gators days. Ironically, his son Jared is not only a quarterback, but for arch-rival Florida State.

October 5, 1966, 50 years ago: In the 1st World Series game in Baltimore Orioles history, Polish-born reliever Moe Drabowsky has to bail out Dave McNally, and sets a Series record for relief pitchers that still stands, with 11 strikeouts. Frank Robinson and Brooks Robinson both hit 1st-inning home runs, and the Orioles beat the Dodgers, 5-2. They would go on to sweep, with McNally redeeming himself by winning the clinching game.

Still alive from this game, 50 years later: Orioles Brooks Robinson, Frank Robinson, John "Boog" Powell, Luis Aparicio (though better-known as a Chicago White Sock), Russ Snyder, Andy Etchebarren, and future Met manager Davey Johnson; and Dodgers Maury Wills, Tommy Davis, Lou Johnson (black, and no relation to the white Davey), Jim Lefebvre, Wes Parker, Ron Fairly, Joe Moeller, Jim Barbieri, and Fair Lawn, New Jersey native Ron Perranoski.

Future Hall-of-Fame pitchers Sandy Koufax and Jim Palmer, both still alive, did not appear in Game 1, but would oppose each other in Game 2.

Also on this day, Dennis DeWayne Byrd is born in Oklahoma City. A graduate of the University of Tulsa, he was drafted by the New York Jets in the 2nd round of the 1989 NFL Draft, and on November 29, 1992, he was enjoying a modest, not particularly noteworthy career as a defensive end when he took the field against the Kansas City Chiefs at Giants Stadium.

Byrd and teammate Scott Mersereau attempted to sack Chiefs quarterback Dave Krieg, but Krieg got away, resulting in a collision between the Jet defenders. Byrd's helmet hit Mersereau straight in the chest, compressing Byrd's neck and breaking it. This was 1 year after Detroit Lions guard Mike Utley had broken his neck in a game, and just 3 days after an emotional Thanksgiving game in which Utley guided his wheelchair out to midfield and served as Lions' honorary captain.

Like Utley, Byrd was paralyzed from the waist down as a result of his injury. Utley took years before he could even take a few steps unaided, and, essentially, remains in a wheelchair, although he hasn't let that stop him from getting around and raising money for spinal cord research. Byrd was considerably luckier: With intense physical therapy, he was able to walk to midfield for the Jets' 1993 season opener, and serve as honorary captain.

The Jets announced that his Number 90 would never be reissued, and in 2012 it was formally retired. Byrd has been elected to the Jets Ring of Honor. He has made a living as a motivational speaker, and had he been paid for it, he certainly would have earned it on January 16, 2011. He had sent Jet coach Rex Ryan a letter and the jersey that was cut off from him as a result of his accident, to motivate the players before their Playoff against the arch-rival New England Patriots. Ryan saw Byrd's bet and raised it by asking him to come and give the team's pregame pep talk. He did. The Jets won, beating the Patriots 28-21 in Foxboro. It remains the team's greatest moment since Super Bowl III.

October 5, 1967: Game 2 of the World Series. Pitching on 3 days' rest in Fenway Park, Cy Young Award winner Jim Lonborg pitches a 1-hitter, Triple Crown winner Carl Yastrzemski hits 2 home runs off Dick Hughes, and the Red Sox beat the Cardinals 5-0.

Also on this day, Rex Everett Chapman is born in Bowling Green, Kentucky. A star guard at the University of Kentucky, he declared early for the NBA Draft because, he said years later, people at that Southern school were angry that he was a white man dating a black woman. He also said that UK had refused to look at then-high school stars Allan Houston and Derek Anderson because they were black. It was 22 years after then-all-white Kentucky was beaten by the all-black starting five from the school now known as Texas-El Paso in the 1966 National Championship game. Clearly, they hadn't learned.

He was an original Charlotte Hornet in 1988, and also played for the Washington Bullets, Miami Heat and Phoenix Suns. He worked in the front offices of the Suns, the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Denver Nuggets. He has since become a broadcaster.

Also on this day, Dorian Edward West is born in Wrexham, Wales, but grows up in England, and played rugby for the England national team. He played for the England team that won the 2003 Rugby World Cup. He is now a coach in the sport.

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October 5, 1971: Game 3 of the AL Championship Series. Reggie Jackson of the Oakland Athletics makes his 1st big postseason impact, but hardly his last. He hits 2 home runs, but it's not enough, as the Orioles beat the A's 5-3, and complete a sweep. It is Baltimore's 3rd straight Pennant, and their 4th in the last 6 seasons.

Also on this day, Mauricio Andrés Pellegrino Luna is born in Leones, Argentina. A centreback, he played for Buenos Aires soccer team Vélez Sarsfield, winning 4 league titles. He moved on to Spanish club Valencia, reaching the 2001 Champions League Final, but he missed a key penalty to give Bayern Munich the victory.

He closed his playing career in 2006 with Deportivo Alavés, in the Basque country of northern Spain, and now manages them. Apparently, all was forgiven by fans of Valencia, because he has previously managed them as well. Despite a long career, he never played for Argentina in a World Cup.

October 5, 1972: Grant Henry Hill is born in Dallas, the son of Cowboys running back Calvin Hill and his wife Janet, both of whom attended Yale University. Janet was Hillary Rodham's roommate at Yale Law School, and when Grant was drafted into the NBA, he got a congratulatory phone call from Hillary's husband, then-President Bill Clinton.

Grant played basketball instead of football, and helped Duke win its 1st 2 National Championships in 1991 and '92. He was NBA Rookie of the Year with the Detroit Pistons in 1995, but despite being a 7-time All-Star, and so respected that Alvan Adams granted his request to allow him to wear Adams' retired Number 33 with the Phoenix Suns, he never even reached an NBA Finals.

He last played in 2013, with the Los Angeles Clippers. He worked as a TNT basketball analyst, and last year, a group of which he is a member bought the Atlanta Hawks, making him a minority owner under majority owner Tony Ressler. His wife is R&B singer Tamia. They were introduced by another singer, her friend Anita Baker.

Also on this day, Aaron Colin Guiel is born in Vancouver. He played 4 seasons with the Kansas City Royals, before being traded to the Yankees and playing briefly with them in 2006. He played the next 5 seasons in Japan.

October 5, 1975: Game 2 of each League's Championship Series. Tony Perez hits a home run, and Fred Norman shuts the Pirates down, as the Reds win 6-1 at Riverfront Stadium, to go up 2 games to none.

Reggie Jackson hits a home run for the A's, but Carl Yastrzemski and Rico Petrocelli, veterans of Boston's 1967 "Impossible Dream," go yard, and the Red Sox win 6-3 at Fenway. They also go up 2 games to none.

Also on this day, Dianbobo Baldé (no middle name) is born in Marseille, France. The son of immigrant's from France's former African colony of Guinea, "Bobo" Baldé played for that country in 4 African Cups of Nations. The centreback also won 5 Premier League titles and 3 Scottish Cups, including "Doubles" in 2004 and 2007, with Celtic FC of Glasgow.

October 5, 1976, 40 years ago: The NHL version of the Colorado Rockies, who had been the Kansas City Scouts in the 1974-75 and 1975-76 season, make their home debut. They beat the Toronto Maple Leafs 4-2 at McNichols Sports Arena.

But they would only make the Playoffs once, in 1978, and move in 1982, to become the New Jersey Devils. (See 1982, below.) Ironically, in 2001, their replacements, the Colorado Avalanche, would beat the Devils in the 2001 Stanley Cup Finals. In 1993, Denver's Major League Baseball team began play, also named the Colorado Rockies. They have been a bit more successful, on the field and especially at the box office.


October 5, 1978: Jesse James Palmer is born in Toronto, and grows up in the Ottawa suburb of Nepean, Ontario. The son of Bill Palmer, a quarterback for the CFL's Ottawa Rough Riders, he impressed Steve Spurrier enough to be taken on at the University of Florida, winning a Southeastern Conference Championship in 2000.

He was a backup on the Giants from 2001 to 2004. If you can't beat out Kerry Collins for a starting quarterback job, you need to look for a new line of work. He became the 1st contestant born outside the U.S. on ABC's The Bachelor, but it quickly failed to work out between him and his choice. He's since become an actor and a sportscaster.

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October 5, 1980: The Dodgers beat the Houston Astros for the 3rd day in a row, to force a 1-game playoff for the NL West title -- also at Dodger Stadium. Ron Cey hits a 2-run homer in the 8th to win the game 4-3. Los Angeles trailed Houston by 3 games with 3 games left in the season‚ and won all 3 by a single run.

October 5, 1981: Joel Lindpere is born in Tallinn, Estonia. He may be the greatest soccer player his country has ever produced. He led hometown club Flora Tallinn to the Estonian league title in 2002 and '03, CSKA Sofia to Bulgaria's league title in 2005, and the New York Red Bulls to win the MLS Eastern Conference in 2010. A 2-time MLS All-Star, he returned to Estonia, playing for Nõmme Kalju, and winning the Estonian Cup last year, before retiring.

October 5, 1982: The New Jersey Devils play their 1st game, a 3-3 tie against the Pittsburgh Penguins at the Brendan Byrne Arena in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The 1st goal is scored by team Captain Don Lever. Three days later, the Devils will get their 1st win, against, appropriately enough, the New York Rangers.

Also on this day, Mikhel Roos is born in Taebla, Estonia, and grows up in Vancouver, Washington, a suburb of Portland, Oregon. Unlike his fellow Estonian Lindpere, when I say he played football, I mean he played football. He played offensive tackle for the Tennessee Titans from 2005 to 2014, and was an All-Pro in 2008.

Because he and his wife, Katherine Fossett, are graduates of Eastern Washington University in Cheney, Washington, outside Spokane, they donated to the school to upgrade its football facilities. The stadium, built in 1967 as Woodward Field, was renamed Roos Field in 2009. It seats 8,600, and has red artificial turf, much as another Northwest college football facility, Albertsons Stadium at Boise State University in Idaho, has blue artificial turf, known as The Smurf Turf.

October 3, 1983: Jesse Adam Eisenberg is born in Queens, New York City, and grows up there and in East Brunswick, New Jersey -- my hometown. He and his sister Hallie Eisenberg -- you might remember her as the little girl from the Pepsi commercials with the voices of Joe Pesci and Aretha Franklin -- both attended East Brunswick High School, my alma mater, before transferring to the performing-arts school in New York made famous by the film Fame.

Hallie, now 24, has mostly done Broadway the last few years, so that she can simultaneously attend college in New York. Jesse has become a much bigger star, nominated for an Oscar for playing Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network.

He played Lex Luthor in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, and will play the villain again in Justice League, despite atrocious reviews (although that was due more to how the character was written than how Jesse played him). He has made 2 movies with Woody Allen: To Rome With Love and Café Society.

October 4, 1984: Kenwyne Joel Jones is born in Point Fortin, Trinidad and Tobago. A striker, he has starred in Britain for Southampton, Sunderland, Stoke City and ardiff City, and is the Captain of his national team, having played for it at the 2006 World Cup. Next year, he will be an original member of MLS expansion team Atlanta United.

October 5, 1985: The Yankees went into a season-ending at Exhibition Stadium against the Toronto Blue Jays, needing to sweep all 3 games to win the AL East. A win by the Jays in any of the 3, and the Jays would win it. But after Butch Wynegar's home run in the 9th inning tied the Friday night game and the Yankees went on to win it, it looked like the Yankees might be a team of destiny.

But it was not to be. Billy Martin, who had done one of his best managing jobs, started Joe Cowley in the Saturday afternoon game, and he didn't make it out of the 3rd inning, giving up home runs to Ernie Whitt, Willie Upshaw and Lloyd Moseby. Getting out of the 3rd required Cowley, Bob Shirley and Rich Bordi, while getting out of the 4th required Bordi and Dennis Rasmussen. Neil Allen pitched 4 1/3 shutout innings after that, but it was too late.

Doyle Alexander, whom the Yankees had let go twice, pitched a complete game, allowing a double to Ken Griffey Sr., and singles to Dave Winfield (RBI), Don Mattingly, Willie Randolph and Don Baylor. That was it: The Yankees got 1 run on 5 hits and no walks, in their biggest regular-season game since the season-closer against the Red Sox in 1949. (Officially, MLB counts the '78 Playoff game with the Sox as regular-season, but I don't.) Alexander was 35. Winfield's RBI was his 100th of the season, making him the 1st Yankee to both score and drive in 100 runs in the same season since Joe DiMaggio in 1942. But it was the only Yankee run of the game.

The Jays won, 5-1, and clinched their 1st-ever 1st place finish. From 1985 to 1993, a 9-year stretch, they will win the Division 5 times, and nearly make it 8 out of 9: Only in 1986 will they finish more than 2 games out of first place, and even then they were only 5½ back. But since Joe Carter "touched 'em all" to clinch back-to-back World Championships in 1992-93, it took them until 2015 to make the Playoffs again.

The Yankees would win the meaningless finale the next day, for their 97th win of the season, but, with the format then in place, missed miss the Playoffs. Aside from 1954, when 103 wasn't enough to overcome Cleveland's then-AL record of 111, it was their most wins in any season without making the Playoffs. The Yankees wouldn't reach the postseason again for another 10 years.

I was 15 going on 16, and I thought this was the year. It wasn't. This one hurt. This near-miss still bothers me. One more good starting pitcher, alongside Ron Guidry and 46-year-old knuckleball wizard Phil Niekro, and the history of baseball in New York could have been very different.

My consolation was that this was also a rough day for Met fans. The St. Louis Cardinals clinched the NL East by beating the Chicago Cubs, 7-1 at Busch Memorial Stadium. Not that it made a difference, but the Mets lost to the Montréal Expos, 8-3 at Shea. The Cards were now up by 3 with 1 game to play.

The best Met season in 12 years comes to an end tomorrow. They have failed. And yet, before the 1985 postseason has even gotten underway, their fans are already convinced they will win the 1986 World Series. (They did, of course, but it turned out to be a lot harder than they’d imagined.)
October 5, 1990: Game 2 of the NLCS. Right fielder Paul O'Neill drives in both Cincinnati runs and throws out a runner at 3rd base, to spark the Reds to a 2-1 win over the Pirates‚ tying the series at one game apiece. It's Paulie's 1st big postseason moment. It will not be his last.

October 5, 1991, 25 years ago: The Atlanta Braves beat the Houston Astros, 5-2 at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, and clinch the National League Western Division title for the 1st time in 9 years. It is the 1st "worst-to-first" season in NL history. Ron Gant hits a home run, and John Smoltz is the winning pitcher.

October 5, 1993: Bob Watson replaces Bill Wood as the general manager of the Astros, making the former Houston 1st baseman the 1st black GM in baseball history. Bill Lucas had performed many similar duties for the Braves in the late 1970s, but he never officially held the title.

Also on this day, the Dallas Stars play their 1st game, after 26 seasons as the Minnesota North Stars. To this day, I don't get why the move to Texas didn't convince them to rename themselves the Lone Stars. Neal Broten scores 2 goals, and the Stars beat the Detroit Red Wings 6-4 at Reunion Arena.

October 5, 1996, 20 years ago: Game 4 of the AL Division Series. After dropping Game 1 to the Texas Rangers, the Yankees have taken the last 3 straight. Bernie Williams of the Yankees and Juan Gonzalez of the Rangers each hit 5 home runs in the series, tying a postseason record. "Burn Baby Bern" hit 2 today, and "Juan Gone" 1, but the Yankees won, 6-4.

Also on this day, the Phoenix Coyotes make their debut, after 24 seasons as the original Winnipeg Jets. Oddly, they play their 1st game against another former NHL team, one that will play just one more season in their current location before moving: The Hartford Whalers. The Whalers win 1-0 at the Hartford Civic Center (now named the XL Center), as Alexander Godynyuk scores the only goal.


For a lot of Yankee Fans, this one hurt. It didn't both me much, though it might have if we hadn't won in 1996. But this was the spark that led to the historic 1998 season.

October 5, 1999: Game 1 of the ALDS. Just another day at the office for Joe Torre's Yankees. Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez pitches a 2-hit shutout. Bernie Williams hits a single, a double and a homer for 6 RBIs. The Yankees beat the Rangers 8-0 at The Stadium.

*

October 5, 2000: Game 2 of the NLDS: The Mets even their series with the Giants at 1 game apiece by winning a 10-inning thriller‚ 5-4. Jay Payton's single drives home the winning run in the top of the 10th, after J.T. Snow's pinch-hit 3-run HR ties the game in the bottom of the 9th. Edgardo Alfonzo hit a 2-run homer in the top half of the frame. Al Leiter pitches into the 9th, and is relieved by Armando Benitez, who gives up the tying homer‚ but gets the win in relief.

Also on this day, Cătălin Hîldan of Romanian soccer giants Dinamo București suffers a heart attack and dies during a match with FC Oltenița. The midfielder had captained Dinamo to win Romania's league the year before, and seemed to have a fine career ahead of him. He was only 24 years old. The North Stand of Dinamo's stadium is now named for him.

October 5, 2001: At what was then known as Pacific Bell Park (now AT&T Park), Barry Bonds hits his 71st and 72nd home runs of the season, to set a new major league single-season record… which we now know is bogus. The 1st-inning homer, his 71st, is off Dodger pitcher Chan Ho Park.

But the Dodgers win the game, 11-10, and, to make matters worse, the Dodgers' win both clinches the NL West and eliminates the Giants, still their arch-rivals, from Playoff eligibility.

Bonds will raise his total to 73*. With teammate Rich Aurilia's 37 (as far as I know, his are legit), they set a (tainted) NL record for homers by teammates, 110. The major league record remains 115, by Mickey Mantle (54) and Roger Maris (still the legit record of 61) in 1961.

Also on this day, the Seattle Mariners beat the Texas Rangers 6-2, for their 115th win of the season, setting a new AL record. At age 38, Jamie Moyer becomes the oldest 1st-time 20-game winner in history. (Mike Mussina will break that record in 2008.) As it turned out, at an age at which many players are done, Moyer was far from done.

Also on this day, the Montréal Expos defeat the Mets‚ 8-6‚ but the Mets' Lenny Harris ties Manny Mota's major league record with his 150th career pinch hit.

October 5, 2002: Game 4 of the AL Division Series. The Angels shock the Yankees with 8 runs in the 5th inning, knocking David Wells out of the box, and go on to a 9-5 victory. Shawn Wooten homers for the Halos, while Jorge Posada adds a round-tripper in vain for the Bronx Bombers. Jarrod Washburn gets the victory for the Angels.

The win gives the Anaheim club the 1st postseason series victory of their 42-season history‚ 3 games to 1. They had previously lost the ALCS in 1979, 1982 and 1986, and a Playoff for the AL West in 1995.

Also on this day, Chuck Rayner dies of a heart attack in the Vancouver suburb of Langley, British Columbia. He was 82. The goaltender was a 3-time NHL All-Star. In 1950, he pulled off a rare feat for a goalie, winning the Hart Trophy as NHL Most Valuable Player. He also helped the Rangers reach overtime of Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals, but an exhausted "Bonnie Prince Charlie" couldn't stop the overtime winner of Pete Babando of the Detroit Red Wings.

A 2009 book by Adam Raider and Russ Cohen ranked him Number 16 among 100 Ranger Greats, and he preceded Eddie Giacomin and Mike Richter into the Hockey Hall of Fame. (Henrik Lundqvist? We'll see.)

October 5, 2003: Atlanta Thrashers center Dan Snyder dies, 6 days after a car crash in Atlanta. He was only 25. The car was driven by his teammate, Dany Heatley, who was sentenced to probation.

Despite having played only 49 NHL games, the Thrashers wore patches with his Number 37 on their jerseys, and never reissued it, although they didn't retire it. Since the Thrashers became the Winnipeg Jets in 2011, they didn't reissue it until this year, when the Snyder family gave goaltender Connor Hellebuyck permission to wear it.

October 5, 2004: Rodney Dangerfield dies, shortly before his 83rd birthday. The great comedian had gone into UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles 6 months earlier, and was asked how long he expected to be there. Funny to the end, he said, "If all goes well, about a week. If not, about an hour and a half." He needed brain surgery to improve blood flow for heart surgery. The brain surgery went well. The heart surgery didn't: He went into a coma and never regained consciousness.

As far as I know, Rodney, whose birth name was Jacob Cohen, had no connection to sports. But he did have one great sports joke: "Boy, I wanna tell ya, I grew up in a tough neighborhood." How tough was it? "You shoulda seen some o' the football games. The nicknames. Killer. Spike. Toothless. And that was just the cheerleaders!" Actually, he grew up in Richmond Hill, Queens, graduating from Richmond Hill High School in 1939, 2 years ahead of a quarterback who also played baseball, whose nickname would soon be "Scooter." That's right: He went to the same high school, at the same time, as Phil Rizzuto! "Holy cow!"

His tagline was, "I don't get no respect. No respect at all!" I imagined him doing his routine in the afterlife: "Boy, I tell ya, I don't get no respect, not even in Heaven! All my life, I was Jewish, and my Christian friends told me, 'Jesus loves you!' I get up here, and I find out he only likes me as a friend! And everybody else, when they get up here, gets a golden harp. Me? They gave me a tin tuba!"

He is buried at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. His epitaph is, "There goes the neighborhood."

October 5, 2005: The NHL returns from its year-long lockout. This allows the long-awaited NHL debut of Sidney Crosby. As fate would have it, his Pittsburgh Penguins play their opener away to my New Jersey Devils, at the Meadowlands Arena, then named the Continental Airlines Arena.

The Devils choose to not believe the hype, and, 23 years to the day after their debut, in the same building, against the same team, they win, 5-1.


October 5, 2006, 10 years ago: Game 2 of the NLCS, at Petco Park in San Diego. Trevor Hoffman of the San Diego Padres, who had recently broken Lee Smith's career record of 478 saves, catches the ceremonial 1st pitch from Smith, who returns to the city (though not the stadium) where he threw his most-remembered pitch, the home run that Steve Garvey hit to win Game 4 of the 1984 NLCS.

Jeff Bleeping Weaver and 4 relievers (this was a Tony LaRussa game) combine for a shutout, and the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Padres, 2-0.

October 5, 2007: Game 2 of the ALDS at Fenway Park. The Angels blow a 3-2 lead in the 5th inning, and Manny Ramirez takes a Justin Speier pitch over the Green Monster in the 10th inning, giving the Red Sox a 6-3 win.

October 5, 2011: Game 4 of the NLDS. During the 5th inning at Busch Stadium, a squirrel runs across home plate just as Phillies pitcher Roy Oswalt begins to deliver a pitch to Skip Schumaker. Umpire Ángel Hernández calls the pitch a ball, much to the chagrin of the righthander, and of Philadelphia manager Charlie Manuel, who believe that "no pitch" should be called due to the distraction caused by the grey rodent, immortalized by the Redbirds fans as the "rally squirrel."

Despite the rodential "interference" and the Phils' objections, no runs were scored in the inning. The Cardinals win anyway, 5-3.

October 5, 2012: The 1st-ever regularly scheduled Wild Card play-in games are played. The National League game is played 1st, at Turner Field in Atlanta. Kris Medlen starts for the Braves, and in 12 starts that season, he was 9-0 with a 0.97 ERA. But the Cardinals beat him 6-3, thanks to pitching from Kyle Lohse and a home run by Matt Holliday.

In the American League, Joe Saunders' pitching and an Adam Jones sacrifice fly make the difference, as the Baltimore Orioles beat the Texas Rangers, 5-1 at Globe Life Park in Arlington, Texas.