Happy Game 7 Day
A World Series reached its seventh game tonight. This is not an annual thing. It's the 39th time in history we've had one of these, and here's a fun fact: the St. Louis Cardinals have won eight of them. That's more than any other team. Even the vaunted Yankees, with their 27 total championships, have only won five Game 7's, and the last one of those took place against the San Francisco Giants in 1962.There is no sports team for whom Game 7 is more sacred. For the Cardinals, Game 7 means flickering memories of a hungover Grover Cleveland Alexander playing hero and Babe Ruth ending the action by getting himself thrown out attempting to steal second. It means Pepper Martin running with abandon and Burleigh Grimes throwing his "grandfathered" spitball to victory. It means the Gashouse Gang in a 13-0 blowout, Ducky Medwick being removed from a game in Detroit for the consideration of his own safety, and Dizzy Dean delivering what he promised. It means Enos Slaughter's "Mad Dash" from first base on a long single against the Red Sox. It means a complete game, nine-inning victory on the hill for the great Bob Gibson, and then a repeat of that same feat three years later. It means an Ozzie back flip, the self-styled "one tough Dominican" Joaquin Andujar, and the shutdown splitter of Bruce Sutter in the conclusion of the colorful "Suds Series," and then it means Chris Carpenter and David Freese each supplying the juice one more time and wrapping up the greatest combination-regular season/postseason comeback in American sports history.
It's the Dodgers and Astros tonight. The Dodgers clinched in a Game 7 in both 1955 and 1965, but for only one of those were they the Los Angeles Dodgers and they've never done it at Dodger Stadium. The Astros of Houston, Texas, of course, had never won a World Series game at all until last week.
Good luck to both teams. The winning one will be remembered forever.
posted by CM @ 9:29 PM
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