Bill Mazeroski’s memorable home-run: 1960 World Series Game
There have been many arguments throughout the years about which moment in baseball history is considered to be the greatest. Since the National League initiated in 1876, there have been more than 350,000 games in the event thus far.
There are many opinions regarding this argument. Many people do not regard the 1960 World Series game as “great”. Some are partial to Bobby Thompson and the Shot Heard ‘Round the World', while others tend to favour the 1991 World Series Game 7.
Each game has its own fame, but there was one that still stands out in the minds of baseball enthusiasts across America.
On October 13, 1960, the Pittsburgh Pirates and the New York Yankees were in Game 7, the final game of the World Series. The stakes were sky high; whichever team was victorious was going to be crowned as the World Series Champions.
The game was a dramatic and exhilarating game. The lead changed four different times, and of course, it had arguably the greatest moment in baseball history.
The underdog Pirates were pitted against the famous New York Yankees. The Yankees had an all-star roster, with big names such as Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, and Whitney Ford. While the Pirates had, it seemed nothing.
But all of that was about to change.
For once, the game didn’t have a single strikeout, which is still a World Series record till today. Moreover, a combination of talent and sheer luck propelled Bill Mazeroski into the Hall of Fame due to his incredible home run in the last innings of the
tied game.
A balmy fall day in Pittsburgh, over 36,000 fans had packed into Forbes Field to watch the 1 PM game. Until 1971, the World Series games were played during the day.
Even though the Series went to a seventh game, it wasn’t really one of the greatest that spectators had seen. The Yankees had crushed their opponents in all three games with scores of 12-0, 10-0, and 16-3. The Pirates had won each game by only a slim margin.
Yankees players had said to press reporters earlier that even if the Pirates somehow managed to win the final game, the Yankees were still the better team. The Pirates did have one advantage though. Their star pitcher, Vernon Law, was starting, while the
Yankees were struggling to decide on a pitcher, since Ford had started in Game 6.
So the game began with Bob Turley pitching for the Yankees. By the end of the first inning, much to everyone’s surprise, the Pirates had scored 2 runs.
In the third innings, Pittsburgh had added another two runs, but the fourth innings yielded none.
At the end of the fifth innings, New York had come to bat, scoring one run in the inning.
The sixth innings was when the Pirates started to get nervous. The Yankees made 4 runs in the sixth, putting them ahead with a score of 5-4.
The seventh inning saw no runs, but the eighth put the Pirates back in the game. While the Yankees scored two runs in the eighth to make their score 7-4, the Pirates managed 5 runs in the innings to make the score 7-9.
However, the greatest moment of the game, and possibly of baseball history, took place in the ninth innings.
After the Yankees had scored two runs to tie the game, the score was at par with 9-9. The managers wanted to save the better hitters in case of an extra innings, so they sent in Mazeroski. On the first ball, Mazeroski hit a 430-foot home-run to win the World
Series for the Pirates.
Mazeroski hit his famous home run exactly 50 years ago, which made the Pittsburgh Pirates the World Series Champions. It was the first time they had done so in 35 years.
Resultantly, Mazeroski was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2001.
To this day, Mazeroski can still remember radio announcer Chuck Thomson saying, "Here's a high fly ball going deep to left. This may do it. Back to the wall goes Berra … it is … over the fence, home run, the Pirates win the World Series!"
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