Five MLB games that stand out in a lifetime of watching baseball
One of the joys of being a long-time baseball fan is the accumulation of memories. Any fan can relate fondly to the consideration of an answer to this question: What were the most memorable MLB games you ever attended?
I walk through my five most memorable not because they were especially famous – there have been lots of more historic games played – but rather to lay out a framework for a sort of communal exercise. Here’s my list: now you think about your own.
The rules are simple. You must have attended the game in person…watching on TV or listening on radio is too easy. You must be able to clearly assert why the game was personally memorable. By the way, in this internet age plenty of resources exist to enable you to fill in the blanks left by memory. Finally, and perhaps toughest, you are limited to identifying only the five most memorable.
If you have attended 10 World Series Game 7s, a half dozen no-hitters and the last games of 15 Hall of Famers, narrow the list.
My own five begin with the very first MLB game I recall attending as a child. It was played Aug. 7, 1955 at Chicago’s Wrigley Field between the team I have rooted fo rmy entire life, the Cubs, and the visiting Brooklyn Dodgers.
I was barely six years old, living with my family – all die-hard White Sox fans – on the South Side. But I was a Cubs holdout, and an excess of begging finally persuaded by dad to drive all the way across town to fulfill my dream of seeing my guys in person.
These many years later I retain the essential memorable vision and first impression that has always drawn me to baseball: emerging from the tunnel to an ocean of green, brown and blue such as I had never seen before: grass, ivy, the iconic scoreboard, the perfectly manicured infield dirt and the deep blue sky overlaying it all.
I didn’t know it at the time, but this was a day for Hall of Famers. The Dodger lineup featured stars of the magnitude of Pee Wee Reese, Duke Snider, Don Newcombe, Roy Campanella and Jackie Robinson. Yes, I saw Jackie Robinson play baseball. My Cubs, of course, were led by my idol, Ernie Banks.
The official record, which supplements my recollections, tells me that my Cubs took an early 4-0 lead against Dodger starter Billy Loes and held on to beat Brooklyn 4-3. Ernie doubled one run home and second baseman Gene Baker singled in two more. Cub starter Bob Rush shut down a 3-run Dodger seventh inning rally.
The Cubs were 55-58 and in fifth place; they would finish sixth. The Dodgers were running away with the National League pennant, leading by 14 and one-half games. They would win by 13 and one-half games and take their first World Series that fall.