The very first time the Mets faced the wrenching possibility of postseason elimination – Game 5 of the 1973 NLCS against the defending pennant-winners, the Reds – the club received an imposing harmony of contribution. The NL’s ’73 Cy Young Award winner, Tom Seaver, gave the club an ace-like line, […]
The grandeur of postseason baseball is that with the condensed number of games and expanded importance of each contest, the moments turn to MOMENTS and more easily cast us back to “remember when.” A swing in the bottom of the ninth in Cleveland can instantly be a teleporter to Wrigley […]
Imagine a postseason résumé that contains the following numbers for a single year: 10 games played, 15 hits with seven going for extra-bases, 12 RBI, a .341/.370/.750/1.120 slash line. Looks and feels like a middle of the order guy, right? Maybe Jay Buhner in 1995 or Bernie Williams in 1996 […]
If the 2010 postseason wasn’t quite a pitching version of “anything you can do, I can do better,” that’s mainly because Roy Halladay set the bar too high to begin things. In Game 1 of the Phillies’ NLDS tussle with the Reds, the right-hander was nearly perfect, allowing just one […]
By the time Sandy Alomar established a new Indians postseason record with his 10 RBI in the 1997 World Series, the 31-year-old catcher was a long established member of the team. He had pre-dated Manny and Lofton and Vizquel and Thome and had represented Cleveland in five All-Star Games; he […]
League Division Series play has produced 39 winner-take-all contests – those ultimate, tension-filled testing grounds that have a way of squeezing out all of the possible drama. The very first year of this round – 1981 – was especially generous in its largesse, serving up three Game 5’s on the […]
Seven years ago, Francisco Lindor walked to the plate in the bottom of the sixth inning, the glare and tension of postseason baseball emanating all around – a reality throttled up by a line score showing the home team losing and running out of outs to make up the difference. […]
On October 10, 1981, pinch-hitter George Vukovich stepped into the box to face Montreal’s Jeff Reardon. It was the start of the bottom of the 10th, the Expos and Phillies were knotted at five, and Philadelphia was trying to force a decisive Game 5. A pitch, a swing … and […]