100 Years Of The World Series 1903 - 2003

[GaryMrMets]

http://www.time.com/time/2003/worldseries/



http://www.time.com/time/2003/worldseries/story.html



The World Series: America's Greatest Championship Event
As the Fall Classic celebrates its 100th anniversary, it remains a sporting event like no other
By Paul Katcher

Posted Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2003
Is it possible that a championship event for a sport as maligned as baseball ranks as the greatest in sports? After all, the Super Bowl gets better ratings, the Final Four has a more in-demand ticket and the NHL carries around that beautiful, distinctive trophy. But it says here that no championship event combines elements that make sports great as much as the World Series.

For these reasons, we say it is still a true Fall Classic:

NO SPORT'S MOMENTS CARRY AS MUCH WEIGHT
World Series moments are not just part of baseball history; they are part of American history. Even if one only considers home runs, the events come to mind quicker than we can write them down: Maz's clincher, Fisk's game-ender, Reggie's shot into the black, Gibson's miracle. We know exactly where the balls landed, how the batter rounded the bases, sometimes the announcer's call. Those four came at home, igniting spontaneous mini-earthquakes. Ever seen a still shot of Ray Knight scoring the winning run in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series? It doesn't exist. The entire stadium shook. That's a scene the Super Bowl or Final Four could never duplicate, because crowd allegiance is split, while the NBA and NHL play to smaller live audiences.

In this World Series retrospective, we remember 10 great World Series moments in a special photo essay, and we could have come up with 10 or 20 more before you could find someone on the street who can identify which two players were involved in a play often mentioned as an all-time great Super Bowl moment, the touchdown-saving tackle that ended Super Bowl XXXIV. (Answer: Tennessee receiver Kevin Dyson and St. Louis linebacker Mike Jones). Other great game-ending Super Bowl moments: Scott Norwood's miss and Adam Vinatieri's make. Field-goal attempts, people. We're talking field-goal attempts.

BACK-TO-BACK-TO-BACK GAMES
No championship event matches the nonstop intensity of Games 3, 4 and 5 of the World Series, played on consecutive midweek nights. While the NHL and NBA Finals take nights off between games, Major League Baseball sends 'em back out there 20 hours after the previous night's game ends. In a span of around 52 hours, starting Oct. 30, 2001, the New York Yankees went from trailing Arizona two games to none in the World Series to leading 3-2. All that happened during that time was a 2-1 win by Roger Clemens in Game 3 and walkoff victories in Games 4 and 5 that were sent to extra innings by two-out home runs in the ninth. In recent years, teams down 0-2 have turned the tide on three straight nights in 1987, 1991 and 1996.

EVERYONE GETS TO BE A HERO
Astonishingly, the last 13 NBA Finals MVPs have been awarded to only four players. Four! Michael Jordan (6), Shaquille O'Neal (3), Hakeem Olajuwon (2) and Tim Duncan (2). Why bother suiting up the other players? NBA Finals 2004: Dirk Nowitzki vs. Jason Kidd! In the World Series, all the starters get a shot at glory. So the MVP could be future Hall of Famers like Frank Robinson (1966), Johnny Bench (1976) or Mike Schmidt (1980) or guys who struck lightning one great week in October, like Lew Burdette (1957), Darrell Porter (1982) or Scott Brosius (1998).

THE MOUND CELEBRATION
Only a few World Series have ended with the home team winning in walkoff fashion. The rest have ended with the victors in the field, and everyone knows what to do after the third out: charge the mound. Hell, in the old days even the fans charged the mound. (Now they would get a faceful of nightstick.) The first player to reach the pitcher gets to be in the poster shot. Soscia hoisting Hershier, Girardi lifting Wetteland, both riding high before the rush from the dugout collapsed them into a pile, with the outfielders adding the toppings. Best celebration of all: Jesse Orosco tossing his mitt to the moon after closing out the 1986 Series with a strikeout of Boston's Marty Barrett. Football and basketball players don't know where to run when the clock stikes zero. To midfield? To the last guy who touched the ball? To the bench? No one has a clue.

THE UNIQUENESS OF STARTING PITCHING MATCHUPS
In other team sports' championship events, you're pretty much assured of seeing the same players start and the rest of the roster get relatively the same amount of playing time. Exceptions come into play, of course, when an NBA star gets into foul trouble — sometimes a guy will see major minutes in one game of the Finals, then disappear in the next. In the World Series, the most important rep from both teams changes each game. So you're beating up Drysdale in Game 2? Koufax awaits in Game 4. Who doesn't look ahead in any series Randy Johnson or Pedro Martinez pitches in? Game 5 isn't just the day after Game 4. It's an entirely different experience, with new starters and relievers whose availability and effectiveness are directly related to their work in previous games and managers' decisions to save them for later games.

BASEBALL FEVER: YOU CAN'T HELP BUT CATCH IT
Going into last season, you would never have thought of Anaheim Angels fans as the wild, stick-thundering crowd that they were in October of 2002. In fact, they were probably bemoaning how the same teams always make the playoffs. But baseball's so-called problems sure seem to vanish when your team's winning. By Game 7 of the Angels' classic series against the Giants, normally laid-back Californians were no less frenzied than the normally laid-back people in Arizona were the year before. And this year, next year and in the decades to come, the World Series will still hold more tense moments, more twists of fate, more tips of the cap to years past than any other crowning sporting event, attended by tens of thousands a game who, when asked what's wrong with baseball will say, "What? I can't hear you over all this noise."

***

And now, in a preemptive strike against hate mail in our feedback form — insult-free ones will be read, otherwise don't waste your time — I'll share my overall positions on other championship sporting events, all worth watching, but none as great as the World Series.

NHL Finals: Tops all in sportsmanship, from the end-of-series handshake to the lack of fighting (call me crazy, but if fighting is not smart play during the Finals, shouldn't it be equally disadvantageous to a team during the regular season?). In the end, though, it's still hockey, and it still plays to what is essentially a rabid but niche audience. Best overtime in sports? Maybe. The puck flies from one end to the other quickly, looking to bounce off someone's stick or skate or face. Is that any more exciting than extra innings in the World Series or an overtime period in the Super Bowl?

NBA Finals: Seems almost predetermined. If a series looks like the favorite will win in five games, that's what happens. Looking back at a list of NBA Finals history, we've had one seven-game series in 15 years. The rest went according to plan, aside from when Hakeem Olajuwon and the Rockets dusted Shaq and the Magic, 4-0. The NBA Finals can be great again, but you need two A-list teams in there, and it seems we've been anticipating the Western Conference finals more than the championship series for years.

World Cup: Not enough Americans care. I don't know why people try to bring this up when talking about great sporting events. So what if the rest of the world cares about it? They also think David Hasselhoff is a great singer. Love the color, love the goooaaaallll thing, but you could cut up a World Cup final into two-minute bits, mix 'em all up, glue 'em together out of order, and nobody would know the difference. The game doesn't develop; it just happens.

Final Four: The entire NCAA men's basketball tournament is great, but we're limiting this discussion to the championship event, the Final Four. To me, it's a little corporate. How great can an event be if to get the best wild-fan camera shot, you have to have a TV hookup in a campus bar 2,000 miles away? A relative few number of real students and alumni are actually there. The rest are people rich enough to book hotels and flights a year in advance without even knowing who's playing. Also, I'm not sure you always get the feeling that the best team won the title.

Super Bowl: Hard to knock it, since it's such an American institution. Major, major points for being a true party day. And I don't even buy the whole "it's always a blowout" thing. The NFC teams of the '80s and early '90s were just that good, so it's not a fault of the game itself. I do think, though, that the World Series trumps it in terms of the current game's relationship to the sport's past. The Super Bowl lives for the day, and the sport evolves so quickly that comparisons to even 5-10 years ago are apples to oranges. Baseball has a smoother lineage and every World Series fights for its place in history. The Roman numerals add some confusion, too. For example, 1927 means the New York Yankees, 1955 is the Brooklyn Dodgers, 1984 is the Detroit Tigers. But XIX? Does that immediately bring to mind the 18-1 (3-0 in postseason) 1984-85 San Francisco 49ers?

[GaryMrMets]

http://www.time.com/time/2003/worlds...nts/index.html


1. Bill Mazeroski's HR
1960, Game 7
Ever since the first World Series was played in 1903, kids have dreamed of hitting a ninth-inning, title-winning home run. But Pittsburgh second baseman Bill Mazeroski was the first player make that dream come true. Despite having been outscored by the heavily favored Yankees 55-26 to that point in the Series, the Pirates found themselves tied 9-9 in the bottom of the ninth of the deciding game. Maz, who'd hit just 11 home runs in the regular season, launched a bomb over left fielder Yogi Berra's head that sent Forbes Field into delirium. The Series MVP? Yankees second baseman Bobby Richardson, of course.


2. Fisk's HR
1975, Game 6
It may have lacked the jaw-dropping athleticism of Mays' catch or the beauty of Larsen's perfect game, but Carlton Fisk's game-winning homer leading off the bottom of the 12th of a tied Game 6 of the 1975 Series may have been baseball's brightest-shining moment. It capped what many consider to be the greatest game in the greatest Series ever played. We look back and almost forget that, once again, the Red Sox were the losers in the Series after they dropped Game 7. But for one night, baseball's most haunted franchise was on top of the world.


3.Don Larsen's Perfect Game
1956, Game 5
In 100 years of World Series play, there has been only one day when a pitcher was perfect. And if they play the World Series for 100 more, Don Larsen may still be the only man to take on 27 batters from a league champion and send 'em all back to the bench. Larsen was a respectable 11-5 in the 1956 regular season, but no one could have predicted his Game 5 heroics. During the game, his Yankees teammates abided by the superstition that no one was to talk to the pitcher throwing a no-hitter, lest they would jinx the history unfolding before them. Larsen, who regarded such tradition as bunk, kept trying to strike up conversation and share his excitement. Alas, Larsen was the loneliest man in the stadium until the final out, when catcher Yogi Berra leaped into his arms in one of the most recognizable images in baseball history.


4.Bill Buckner's Error
1986, Game 6
In reality, it was merely a fielding error in a game already tied after Boston relievers couldn't hold a two-run, two-out lead in the 10th inning of what should have been the game that gave the Red Sox a World Series win. But considering the cursed history of the Red Sox — no World Series championship since 1918; Game 7 losses in 1946, '67 and '75 — there are many who remember the play as if the World Series trophy itself rolled through first baseman Bill Buckner's legs. A rainout gave Boston another day to recover for Game 7, and despite holding and eventually squandering a three-run lead in that game, it was Buckner's error that's held responsible for losing the Series. The Red Sox have not returned to the World Series since.


5.Reggie's 3 HRs
1977, Game 6
By 1977, Yankees fans had gotten a little tired of not winning a World Series. It had been 15 years and three Series losses since their last title. Enter Mr. October. Already a three-time champ and MVP of the 1973 Series, Jackson came to New York with a flair for the dramatic and an ego matched only by team owner George Steinbrenner and manager Billy Martin, with whom he clashed famously. With three swings against three different pitchers, Jackson clinched the World Series for the Yanks with one of the greatest one-man shows in baseball history, made even more spectacular by a theatrical curtain call and a couple of thunderous shoulder blocks he delivered to fans who'd run onto the field after the final out.


6.Kirk Gibson's HR
1988, Game 1
It's a wondrous moment that shines high above an otherwise unremarkable World Series won by a relatively unremarkable team. This time, you see, baseball didn't come to the movies. The movies came to baseball. For it was the game's best reliever, Oakland's Dennis Eckersley, protecting a one-run lead with a runner on against the Dodgers' ailing MVP, Kirk Gibson, who volunteered to pinch-hit despite a ravaged knee that was supposed to keep him out of the Series. Gibson looked anything like the NL's best player as he worked the count to 3-2, before serving an Eckersley slider into the right-field seats. Bedlam. To this day, no one has summed up the event quite like radio announcer Jack Buck, who said, "I don't believe what I just saw!" It was Gibson's only at-bat in the Series.


7.Willie Mays' Catch
1954, Game 1
"I had it the whole time," Giants center fielder Willie Mays quipped after making his famous catch of a shot off the bat of Cleveland's Vic Wertz. He probably did. Depending on whom you talk to, Wertz hit the ball between 450 feet and 450 miles in the cavernous Polo Grounds, with runners on first and second in the top of the eighth of a 2-2 game. Mays' improbable over-the-shoulder catch saved two runs, and the Indians now had runners on first and third with one out. New York reliever Don Liddle had been brought in to face Wertz but now was being taken out of the game. "Well," he said to incoming pitcher Marv Grissom, "I got my man." Grissom squeezed out of the jam, and the Giants went on to win the Series.


8. Joe Carter's HR
1993, Game 6
Toronto outfielder Joe Carter was the highest-paid player in baseball in 1993 ($5.5 million), and despite hitting just .254 for the season and .250 in the 1993 World Series before his final at-bat, he proved to be worth every penny when he tagged what remains only the second walk-off homer in a Series-clinching game. Carter's three-run blast victimized Phillies reliever Mitch Williams, who was protecting a one-run lead that would have extended the Series to a deciding Game 7. Instead, the Blue Jays became the first repeat champs in 15 years and Williams — who finished the Series with a 20.25 ERA — would add just six more saves to his then-career-total of 186.


9.The Mad Dash
1946, Game 7
In the bottom of the eighth of a 3-3 game, Cardinals outfielder Enos Slaughter took off from first with the pitch, which was shot into left-center by Harry Walker. Red Sox center fielder Leon Culberson bobbled the ball briefly, and there was no stopping Slaughter who recklessly ran through a stop sign at third and charged home. Second baseman Johnny Pesky's relay throw was late and one of baseball's most contended stories was born. Was it a double? Walker was credited with one, but he would surely have stopped at first if Slaughter hadn't drawn a throw home. Thus, we say, Slaughter scored the Series' game-winning run from first on a single (and fielder's choice). The ultimate moment of hustle.


10. Bush Throws a Strike
2001, Game 3
Just a few miles away from a still-smoldering site of the World Trade Center, less than two months removed from a terrorist attack that had the country still shaken, President George W. Bush walked confidently to the mound at Yankee Stadium before Game 3 of the 2001 World Series and toed the rubber. Most ceremonial first pitches are tossed from much closer than the regulation 60 feet 6 inches. This one was for real. Covered neck to toe in bullet-proof body armor and without a Secret Service detail in view, Bush threw a perfect strike to Yankees catcher Todd Greene. If ever there was a doubt about baseball's importance as an American institution, Bush erased it that night.

[GaryMrMets]

http://www.time.com/time/2003/worldseries/winners.html


A pitcher's worst nightmare: the 1927 Yankees. In the back row, Lou Gehrig is left-most and Babe Ruth is two places to the right

Top 10 W.S. Winners
The most formidable teams that got the job done in October
By Paul Katcher

Posted Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2003
1. 1927 New York Yankees
They were called Murderers' Row, in deference to a lineup dominated by two incomparable sluggers. Babe Ruth (.356 BA, 60 HRs, 164 RBIs, 158 runs, 137 BBs) and Lou Gehrig (.373 BA, 47 HRs, 175 RBIs, 149 runs, 109 BBs) posted numbers that would earn them nine-figure deals in today's market. The Yankees topped the AL in home runs with 156, exactly 100 more than any other team. Ruth outhomered all seven other AL clubs himself. Bolstered by the league's best pitching staff, the Yankees set an American League record with 110 wins, outpacing second-place Philadelphia by 19 games. They were in first place every day of the season, then polished off the Pirates, 4-0, in the World Series. No team has ever so dominated an entire season.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYY/1927.shtml

2. 1961 New York Yankees
This Yankees club was ahead of its time when it came to the long ball. Six players clouted more than 20 home runs, including the M&M Boys, Mickey Mantle (54) and MVP Roger Maris (61), who chased Babe Ruth's single-season record of 60. Maris, of course, did set the mark, and it stood for 37 years, longer than Ruth's. The club's 240 home runs were a major league record (the 1997 Mariners hit 264), and nine players were named All-Stars — including Cy Young Award winner Whitey Ford (25-4) — en route to a 109-win regular season and a 4-1 victory over the Reds in the World Series.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYY/1961.shtml

3. 1936 New York Yankees
This team featured six Hall of Famers and eight All-Stars, including league MVP Lou Gehrig (.354 BA, 49 HRs, 152 RBIs) and rookie Joe DiMaggio (.323 BA, 29 HRs, 125 RBIs). Five players drove in more than 100 runs for an offensive that led the league in home runs with 182 (61 more than second-place Cleveland), and runs scored. The pitching staff posted the lowest ERA in the league at 4.17. It was a team that won the first of four straight World Series for the Pinstripes, and it was also the first of a record 12 straight Yankees teams that would lead the league in home runs.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYY/1936.shtml

4. 1970 Baltimore Orioles
The middle team of three straight O's teams to have advanced to the World Series, this is the only one of the trio to have won the Fall Classic. Led by three 20-game winners (Mike Cuellar, 24 wins; Dave McNally, 24; and Jim Palmer, 20), Baltimore's stamp was its starting pitching and defense, which led the league in lowest ERA and fewest errors committed. MVP Boog Powell (.297 BA, 35 HRs, 114 RBIs) wasn't too shabby at the plate, and neither were his Hall of Fame teammates, Brooks and Frank Robinson. Earl Weaver's team won 108 games in the regular season, and easily danced trough the postseason, sweeping the Twins in three games and besting the Reds, 4-1, in the World Series.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/BAL/1970.shtml

5. 1976 Cincinnati Reds
It's pretty much the same team that won a seven-game World Series against the Red Sox the previous season, but we'll call this one better if only because of the way it romped through the postseason. Seven games up, seven games down. A three-game sweep of the Phillies in the NLCS and a four-game dismantling of the Yankees. Three of the top four leading vote-getters for MVP were Reds batters, including award-winner Joe Morgan (.320 BA, 27 HRs, 111 RBIs, 60 SBs). The Big Red Machine led the NL in virtually every offensive category: runs, home runs, batting average, stolen bases. The pitching staff didn't rival that of the 1970 Orioles, but it did place fourth in ERA. On defense, four players won Gold Goves, including catcher Johnny Bench.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/CIN/1976.shtml

6. 1998 New York Yankees
Aided by extra playoff series added in 1969 and 1995, this team of Bronx Bombers holds the record for most total wins in a season with 125 — a then-AL-record 114 in the regular season and 11 more in three playoff series in which they lost only two games. The roster may have featured only two future Hall of Famers in Derek Jeter and Mariano Rivera (both were in only their third full seasons), but it was a consistent stream of solid, smart, talented players that wore down opponents. Bernie Williams, Paul O'Neill, Tino Martinez, Jorge Posada and David Cone were just some of the players that led the Yankees not only to this World Series title, but the following two as well.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYY/1998.shtml

7. 1986 New York Mets
They may have squeaked by in two classic playoff series against the Astros and Red Sox, but this team was the best of the 1980s. Hall of Fame catcher Gary Carter is the only team member inducted into Cooperstown, but Dwight Gooden and Darryl Strawberry sure looked like they were headed there. The Mets' pitching staff, the youngest in the league, led the NL with a scant 3.11 ERA. Offensively, the Mets topped and league in batting average and runs scored. As a whole, New York outdistanced the second-place Phillies by 21.5 games and made no apologies for their wealth of talent.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYM/1986.shtml

8. 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers
Having six Hall of Famers on your team is usually a good thing. And so is having Don Zimmer on your bench, no? Zim hit 15 homers as a reserve infielder for the talented squad that finally got passed the Yankees, 4-2, in the World Series. MVP Roy Campanella, Duke Snider, Gil Hodges and Carl Furillo powered an offense that was the oldest in the league but talented enough to lead the NL in runs, home runs, batting average and stolen bases. The pitching staff was the league's stingiest. Despite the success, the Dodgers drew just over a million fans, second-best in the league but roughly half of what Milwaukee's third-year team drew.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/BRO/1955.shtml

9. 1984 Detroit Tigers
History will likely record no Hall of Famers on this team, but a couple of numbers really jump at you: a 35-5 record to start the season and six All-Stars. They won nine in a row to start the season, went 18-2 in April, 19-7 in May and never looked back, winning the division by 15 games over Toronto. The offense, led by Kirk Gibson and Lance Parrish, led the league in home runs and runs scored, while the AL's best pitching staff was bolstered by Jack Morris and Willie Hernandez, who won both the Cy Young Award and MVP.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/DET/1984.shtml

10. 1948 Cleveland Indians
Loaded with five All-Stars and five Hall of Famers, Cleveland's last world Series winner was a powerhouse. Shortstop Lou Boudreau, who hit .355, was named league MVP, and his infield mates Ken Keltner and Joe Gordon each smack more than 30 homers and drove in more than 100 runs. Bob Lemon and Gene Beardon posted 20 wins, and Bob Feller added 19, for a pitching staff was the league's best, allowing an ERA nearly a half-run better than any other team. Cleveland also drew the most fans in the AL, averaging 33,172 per game.
Team roster and stats http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/CLE/1948.shtml

[GaryMrMets]

http://www.time.com/time/2003/worlds...eam/index.html


Catcher: Yogi Berra
Yankees: 1947, '49-'53, '55-'58, '60-'63
His lifetime World Series batting average may be a pedestrian .274, but we're giving the Lord of the Rings some credit for being on 10 championship-winning clubs. (The one-for-the-toe effort fell short in a 1963 loss to the Dodgers.) A three-time regular-season MVP, Berra was never a World Series MVP (unlike his stiffest competition here, Johnny Bench) but he is baseball's all-time leader in World Series games (75), at-bats (259) and hits (71), and is second in runs (41) and RBIs (39).


First Base: Lou Gehrig
Yankees: 1926-28, '32, '36-'38
It's been said that the Iron Horse is the only Yankees legend who truly lived up to his heroic reputation. And so it's fitting that he lead this position despite tremendous competition from, among others, Hall of Fame sluggers Jimmie Foxx, Willie Stargell and Hank Greenberg. Gehrig was an absolute all-timer in October, hitting a lifetime .361 in 34 games, with 10 HRs and 35 RBIs en route to winning six World Series while losing just one. In 1928, he was simply unstoppable, batting .545 and slugging 1.727 with 4 HRs, 9 RBIs and 6 BBs in a four-game sweep of St. Louis.


Second Base: Eddie Collins
A's: 1910-11, '13-'14; White Sox: 1917, '19
He may not have hit a home run in any of his six World Series, but Collins played in an era when his four home runs in the 1915 regular season was good enough for ninth in the American League. The Hall of Famer did, however, hit over .400 in three different World Series (all victories), and that's pretty good in any era. He also swiped 14 bases, tied with Lou Brock for most ever in World Series play. Special mention to the Yankees second baseman Bobby Richardson, who, in 1960, became the only second baseman and the only member of a losing team to be named World Series MVP. He drove in a record 12 runs in that seven-game series.


Third Base: Frank Baker
A's: 1910-11, '13-'14; Yankees: 1921-22
The gut reaction is to pencil in 1970 World Series MVP Brooks Robinson here, but the man who was other-worldy against the Reds was rather ordinary in three other World Series, finishing with a career batting average of .263 in 21 games. Baker, meanwhile, hit 100 points higher and clouted three home runs in 25 games. No great shakes in this era, but Baker is the man who led the AL in home runs from 1911-14 with 11, 10, 12 and 9 HRs, respectively. It was in the 1911 Series, when he hit two home runs and hit .375, that the Hall of Famer first earned the nickname "Home Run" Baker.


SS: Alan Trammell
Tigers: 1984
One of only three shortstops to have been named World Series MVP (a couple of Yankees, Bucky Dent and Derek Jeter, did it in 1978 and 2000, respectively), Trammel made good on his only appearance in the Fall Classic. The lifetime Tiger, who only twice hit more than 15 homers in a season, belted a pair and hit .450 (9-for-20) in Detroit's five-game Series victory over the Padres. The Yankees' Phil Rizzuto and the Dodgers' Pee Wee Reese were mainstays at the position in October, but didn't put up as impressive numbers as Trammell or his main competition here, the Brewers' Robin Yount, who hit .414 and collected 12 hits in a seven-game defeat to the Cardinals in 1982.


Outfield:
Reggie Jackson
A's: 1972-74; Yanks: 1977-78, '81
Reginald Martinez Jackson hasn't always been referred to with such deference, but he goes by only one name at World Series time: Mr. October. A lifetime .262 hitter in the regular season, Jackson made like Ty Cobb in the Fall Classic. In only one of his five Series (four of which were victories), did he hit less than .310, and he finished with a lifetime average of .357 in 27 games. What everyone remembers, of course, are the home runs, 10 in all, most famously three in one game that ranks as our No. 5 all-time World Series moment. Jackson is the only non-pitcher to have been named a World Series MVP twice (1973, '77).


OF: Babe Ruth
Red Sox: 1915-16, '18; Yanks: 1921-23, '26-'28, '32
All you need to know about Babe Ruth and the World Series is that even the Red Sox won three of 'em with him. Not only did he bat .326, slug .744 and club a second-most 15 home runs in his World Series career, but he was also 3-0 with a 0.87 ERA as a starting pitcher, including a run of 29 2/3 straight scoreless innings. Which is the rough equivalent of Joe Montana being the Super Bowl's all-time leader in defensive sacks. Twice he hit three home runs in a World Series game and, of course, there was the one he called at Wrigley Field.


Outfield: Lou Brock
Cardinals: 1964, '67-'68
Since MLB began handing out World Series MVP awards in 1955, Brock owns the best Fall Classic career without having won one. He hit .300 and dove in five runs in a seven-game victory over the Yankees in 1964, but it was in 1967 and '68 where he really shined. Though he averaged only nine home runs per 162 games in his career, he hit three homers in those 14 games, racked up 25 hits, scored 14 runs and stole an incredible 14 bases. He was overshadowed for MVP in those years by pitchers Bob Gibson and Mickey Lolich. Brock finished his career with a .391 batting average and a .655 slugging percentage in World Series play.


Designated Hitter: Paul Molitor
Brewers: 1982; Blue Jays: 1993
Molitor hit a stellar .355 as a third baseman for the Brewers in the 1982 World Series, but it was in the offense-happy 1993 Fall Classic where he because a hitter of legend. Posting a ridiculous .500 average (12-for-24) in the six-game series, Molitor cranked out two homers, scored 10 runs, drove in eight and slugged 1.000 en route to being the first and only DH to be named MVP of a World Series. Molitor's lifetime average of .418 ranks second all-time behind Bobby Brown, who hit .439 in 41 at-bats for the Yanks.

[GaryMrMets]

Starting Pitcher: Bob Gibson
Cardinals: 1964, '67-'68
If you had one game to win, baseball fans are often asked, who would you want on the mound? It says here that Bob Gibson was the greatest big-game pitcher there ever was. He started nine games in three World Series, completed eight and won seven, took home Series MVP honors in 1964 and '67 (when he went 3-0, allowing three runs in 27 innings against the Red Sox) and finished his career with a 1.89 ERA in 81 career innings of work in the Fall Classic.


SP: Sandy Koufax
Dodgers: 1959, '63, '65-'66
In the two World Series in which he wasn't named MVP, Koufax allowed two earned runs in 15 innings of work. And then there were the 1963 and 1965 Fall Classics, in which he dominated Yankees and Twins sluggers to the point at which it almost wasn't fair. Koufax went 4-1 in those years, allowing just four earned runs in 42 innings. He finished his career with a 4-3 record and a 0.95 ERA in World Series play and is one of only three players (Bob Gibson, Reggie Jackson) to have been named MVP of two World Series.


RP: Rollie Fingers
A's: 1972-74
The original modern-day fireman, Fingers was a Hall of Fame reliever who was even better in the World Series. He's second all-time with six saves in the Fall Classic, earning two each in Oakland's three-year run as champs from 1972-74. Fingers also picked up a couple of wins and finished his World Series career with a miniscule 1.35 ERA in 33 1/3 innings. Not simply a situational specialist, Fingers averaged over two innings per appearance in his 16 World Series games.


RP: Mariano Rivera
Yankees: 1996, '98-2001
The freshest World Series image of Rivera is his blown save and loss in 2001's Game 7 (aided by his own throwing error), but until that point he'd been unstoppable, racking up two wins and a W.S.-record eight saves on four Yankees championship teams. He was named MVP of 1999 World Series, when he notched two saves and gave up nary a run in 4 2/3 innings of work. His career ERA in the World Series is a scant 1.67.

[Baseball Guru]

I'm just moving it over to the History Forum....

Thanks,
Guru

[metsfan001]

Cool. I named all of them.