World Series Heroes The Big Boppers

hey everybody,

the world Series resets tonight in tiger town, and i'm ready !  if the tigers are gonna come back, they are sure gonna need a home run or two.  in that spirit, let's take a look at some hitters who certainly brought their bats to the Fall Classic...

"home run" baker

we begin with a guy who earned his nickname specifically by hitting home runs in the 1911 Fall Classic. he banged out 2 dingers, one each, in Games 2 and 3.  his Game 3 homer tied the game in the 9th, and he hit it off Christie Mathewson.  yeh, if you hit one off mathewson in the Classic, everybody SHOULD call you "home run".

 in the last postseason game ever played north of the border, joe carter came up BIG and smashed a home run off mitch 'wild thing' williams.  carter jumped like a little boy as he trucked around the bases.  it was only the second time in history that a WS was ended by a home run.  who else was on base when he hit it?  HOFers ricky henderson and paul molitor. not a bad cast.

 what a world series it was in 1991.  it went all 7, 4 games ended in the last at bats, and 3 went extra innings.  in game 6 kirby puckett came up in the 11th, and sent the twins faithful home with a game winning blast that sent the series to game 7, and an eventual minnesota championship.

fisk hit one of the most famous WS smashes, and i think we've all seen the video of him using autumn magic to wave that dang ball fair.  this homer epitomizes what it was like to suffer under the curse of the bambino, for as joyous as that moment was, as much hope it brought to fenway, it turned out fisk's mojo wasn't enough.  the reds won it all and boston fell into winter.

why wouldn't the Home Run King blast one in the Classic?

any Dodger WS home run that i have a card for makes it into the countdown. :)

“Partner, sure as I’m standing here breathing, you’re going to throw me that 3-2 backdoor slider, aren’t you?”

THIS is THE Dodgers WS home run for the ages.  the biggest WS home run EVER hit at Dodger stadium.  sure, cheater canseco hit a grand slam that dented a camera in center field earlier in the game, that most of America oohed and ahhed about - but Gibby's 9th inning blast erased all significance of that - forever.

let's check it, one more time, just for fun....

 Gibby's HR is certainly iconic, but that '88 series had another home run hero who is sometimes forgotten.  He was the guy who replaced Gibby...

mickey only hit one home run all season, but with the Fall Classic spotlight upon him, he came up big with a first inning 2-run shot in Game 1, and another first inning dinger to help close out the A's in the final, Game 6. 

 next up, the ONLY guy to EVER live that baseball dream that lots of us grew up dreaming about... Game 7,  bottom of the 9th, , against the yankees...BLAMMO !!!

HOME RUN and baseball immortality ! the only time it ever happened, and probably ever will.

THANKS for reading!