My wish list for the World Series begins and ends with one word.
Drama.
That’s all I want, all I need.
If the Phillies pull off an upset, great. If the Yankees take care of business, fine. Their destination doesn’t really matter to me, as long as the journey rocks and rolls.
The World Series hasn’t been taken to a do-or-cry seventh game since the Angels beat the Giants in 2002. How long ago is that? This long: Scott Spiezio hit the three-run homer that helped Anaheim bounce back from a 5-0 deficit in Game 6. San Francisco skipper Dusty Baker, approaching the end of his contract, was a hot managerial commodity. Giants fans were not a bit curious why Barry Bonds’ head had expanded to the size of a medicine ball.
Only one other World Series of this decade – the 2001 classic between the Diamondbacks and Yankees – went the distance. When I began following baseball, in the 1960s, six Series that decade were decided in the seventh game. Five Series in the 1970s went seven games, and four went seven in the 1980s.
But there were only two seven-gamers in the 1990s, and there have been none since 2002. Put it this way: more seven-game World Series were played between 1960-1968 than have been played since 1987.
The short attention span of a generation of kids weaned on video games is considered a primary reason for the World Series’ sagging TV ratings in recent years, but what’s there been to watch?
The Red Sox’s 2004 sweep of the Cardinals was historic, but it was anticlimactic on the heels of Boston’s comeback against the Yankees in the American League Championship Series.
The White Sox’s 2005 sweep of the Astros also was historic – it broke an 88-year drought in Chicago – but it was over in five days.
The Cardinals’ five-game decision over the Tigers, in 2006, is memorable for the mysterious substance pitcher Kenny Rogers put on the ball during Detroit’s only victory.
Another Boston sweep followed in 2007, and this time, their dominance of the Rockies had nothing to do with fighting off ghosts or solving jinxes. And if it weren’t for the rain that forced Game 5 into a two-part finale won by the Phillies, the 2008 World Series would have had no compelling plot line.
Maybe things will be different this year. Despite some nostalgic pining for a Dodgers-Yankees World Series, the most intriguing matchup is the one at hand: baseball’s defending champions facing the team with baseball’s best overall record.
A convergence of such superpowers is rare. The last time the defending champs took on the team with the best overall record was in 1974, when the Athletics met the Dodgers. The three-peating A’s prevailed in five games – four of which ended with the score 3-2.
Sorry, but five games won’t cut it this year. I’ll settle for the moderate suspense of a six-game Series, but I’m holding out hope for seven. The Yankees’ home-field advantage likely would assert itself – home-field advantage in the World Series is irrelevant until Game 6 – but at least they’d be required to respond to high-pressure stakes.
During their reign as a dynasty under Joe Torre, who between 1996 and 2003 guided New York to four world championships and six league pennants, the Yankees’ lone appearance in a seventh game found consistently stoic closer Mariano Rivera committing a ninth-inning throwing error in 2001.
Rivera’s misplay of a sacrifice bunt put the winning run on second base for the Diamondbacks, and when Luis Gonzalez’s bloop hit landed in left-center field, the Yankees were deprived of a fourth consecutive World Series title.
Rivera, whose Hall of Fame plaque no doubt will tout his superior postseason performances, was nails before that night in Arizona, and he’s been nails ever since. But a seventh game of a World Series – specifically, the ninth inning of a seventh game – can unravel anybody. It even unraveled Babe Ruth, who made the last out of the 1926 Series by getting thrown out on an attempt to steal second base against the Cardinals. With the score 3-2 and the dangerous Bob Meusel, a .315 hitter, at the plate.
As for the 2009 Yankees, they’ve got the better starting pitching after tonight’s deliciously anticipated showdown between CC Sabathia and the Phillies’ Cliff Lee. Their bats are least equal to Philadelphia’s versatile, potent offense, and though inconsistent Phillies closer Brad Lidge seems to have recovered from a rocky summer, Rivera is lights out when the lights are brightest.
Still, I crave the tension he’ll face if called upon in a seventh game. For that matter, I crave the tension the Yankees will face in a seventh game. America’s version of blue-blooded royalty hasn’t won a seventh game of a World Series since it faced the Giants in 1962 when second baseman Bobby Richardson caught Willie McCovey’s ninth-inning line drive with two outs and two on to preserve a 1-0 victory.
Can you imagine the Phillies and Yankees in a similar scenario? A seventh game, with two on and two out in the bottom of the ninth?
I don’t care who wins – I’ve got no dog in this hunt – but as a baseball fan, I’m tired of hearing how the World Series has lost its traction as must-see sporting event.
A one-run game in the ninth inning of a seventh game, with two on and two out – we’ll all make it a point to see that. Even the kids, who’ll realize there’s nothing, anywhere on earth, comparable to the urgency of a mighty swing offered on the last at-bat of a World Series taken to the distance.
john.mcgrath@thenewstribune.com
