Baseball's Most Exciting Games, No. 2: One Strike Away

Game 6, 2011 World Series: Texas Rangers at St. Louis Cardinals

October 27, 2011, Busch Stadium, St. Louis, Missouri

Texas leads series 3-2

There were two strikes when David Freese sent the line drive to deep right. That's what probably made it most painful of all for the Rangers. They were literally one strike away from their first championship, in their 40th season in Texas. And instead of getting that last strike, Rangers closer Neftali Feliz gave up a deep line drive to right field that had Nelson Cruz drifting back.

Oh, right, Cruz was back there. Cruz hadn't yet been relegated to full-time DH duty by 2011 - he was only 30 years old, after all - but he had a big enough sample size for people to realize that his future did not lie in the outfield. The Rangers had a chance to take him out, too - Endy Chavez had pinch-hit for the pitcher the previous inning, so it would have been no problem to do a double-switch to keep Chavez's glove in the game. Plus, Chavez had a history of making series-saving catches against the Cardinals. There was really no reason at all for Cruz to still be back there.

But back there he was. He tried to jump for Freese's hit, but barely missed it, and it hit the wall. And then, the real trouble began, because of instead of dying at the wall, the ball bounced back past Cruz and into mid right field. That allowed Albert Pujols and Lance Berkman - neither of whom were going to win a footrace, unless it was against each other - to both score, and it allowed Freese to make it safely to third for the biggest triple of the 21st Century. And the stunned Rangers were left to wonder how they had blown it again.

Because this wasn't the first lead the Rangers had blown in Game 6. They had blown leads in the 1st, 4th, and 6th innings, too. So you had to admire the Cardinals' resiliency. You could knock them down, but they got right back up again.

The top of the 5th was looking especially big right about now. The Rangers scored once to take a 4-3 lead and ended up loading the bases with two outs. That brought up Colby Lewis, their starting pitcher, which brought up a decision. Lewis had been pitching well, but this was a chance for a knock-out blow, a way to put the game to bed early. It must have been tempting to pinch-hit for Lewis and let the bullpen take care of the rest. But manager Ron Washington didn't have anybody warming up, and if the pinch-hitter failed, and quickly, the reliever wouldn't have been ready in time. So he let Lewis hit, and Lewis struck out, and the lead stayed at 1.

We've already established the Cardinals were resilient, and that showed in the bottom of the sixth. They loaded the bases in the bottom of the sixth with just one out, knocking Lewis out of the game, and reliver Alexi Ogando promptly walked Yadier Molina to tie the game. Busch Stadium was rocking, and not for the last time of the night, and Ogando couldn't find the strike zone. But his catcher, Mike Napoli, bailed him out by picking Matt Holliday off of third base. (You remember Matt Holliday, right?) Immediately after the pickoff, Ogando threw a wild pitch, which would have scored a run if not for Napoli's throw; after walking Nick Punto (Nick Punto!), Ogando was mercifully removed and Derek Holland helped the Rangers escape the inning.

And then came the 7th inning, which started with back-to-back home runs from Adrian Beltre and Cruz. See, the Rangers had a little bit of resiliency of their own. They added another run for a 7-4 lead, and at that point, if the Rangers themselves weren't counting the outs, you know their fans were.

Allen Craig hit a home run in the bottom of the 8th for the Cardinals, but that was only one of the three runs they needed. After three straight St. Louis singles loaded the bases with two outs, Rafael Furcal grounded out to reliver Mike Adams, and the Rangers were three outs away.

And that brought us to the bottom of the 9th, and a 1-2 count on Freese, and a deep line drive to right. You could knock the Cardinals down, but they got back up again. And they almost ended it on the next batter, when Molina hit a sinking liner to right, but Cruz made a nice running catch to keep the game alive.

And the Rangers kept countering. This time it was Josh Hamilton, batting in the top of the 10th with one on and one out, hitting the first pitch he saw out to deep right for the Rangers' second two-run lead in as many innings. Once again, the Cardinals fought back, only for the Rangers to respond. A pair of heavyweights trading haymakers.

Once again, the Cardinals fought back. The first two batters of the bottom of the 10th singles. Pitcher Kyle Lohse, pinch-hitting, bunted them over. A grounder from Ryan Theriot scored one, but now there were two outs. Again the Rangers were one out from winning, and the Cardinals were on the canvas. Again, one out away turned into one strike away as Scott Feldman got Berkman to a 2-2 count. And again, the Cardinals bounced up off the canvas and delivered a counterpunch, this time with a single to center that tied the game.

The Rangers were in shock. The Cardinals were in raptures. Busch Stadium was shaking. And though it wasn't technically over yet, it might as well have been. The Rangers went down mostly quietly in the top of the 11th. Maybe the fight had been beaten out of them. Leading off the bottom of the 11th was that man again, David Freese. Cruz wasn't in right anymore, finally replaced by Esteban German, a defensive replacement coming two innings too late.

But German, couldn't do anything about the ball Freese hit next. Chavez couldn't have done anything either, for that matter, nor Cruz. Hamilton started back in center, turned his body as the ball drifted, then stopped, took one look at where the ball was headed, then started jogging back to the dugout before it even landed.

Fans scrambled for the ball on the grassy hill beyond center. Joe Buck channeled his father. Fireworks went off beyond the stadium's walls, their light bouncing off the Gateway Arch. The Cardinals leapt out of the dugout in joy. Freese jogged around the bases - you can run a little slower on a home run than on a triple - and then met his teammates at home plate. The Cardinals had thrown the last, decisive punch.

The Rangers were spent. They had twice been one strike away from a championship and let it slip away. And they couldn't put up much of a fight as the Cardinals rode the wave to a comfortable win in Game 7. It was the Cardinals' 11th title, the second-highest total in baseball history. The Rangers are still looking for their first.

Game 6, 2011 World Series Overall Rank: 2 Top 10 Swing: 286 Top play: David Freese's game-tying triple (WPA of 54% for St. Louis) Loser's largest WE: 96 Bottom of the 9th, 1 out, Texas up 7-5, Albert Pujols batting for St. Louis Average LI: 1.71 Highest leverage moment: 6.47 (B10, 2 outs, runners on first and second, Texas up 9-8, Lance Berkman batting for St. Louis)

  

2011 World Series: About last year

The Teams
National League: St. Louis Cardinals (90-72) - 18th World Series (Won 10 previous times)
American League: Texas Rangers (96-66) - Second World Series


What Happened
So that was it, then. The Cardinals kept trying to come back from deficits in the sixth game of the World Series, but they had finally run out of outs. David Freese's two-out line drive was hit right at Texas right fielder Nelson Cruz, and it was going to be the final out of series, and the Cardinals' season of comebacks will end one comeback short. Cruz had to just run back and to his left - not the easiest catch, but one he should have easily made.

But Cruz didn't run back and to his left. He drifted. Maybe he misread the ball, or maybe he thought he was closer to the wall than he was, but Cruz didn't get all the way back on the ball, and it sailed over his head, hitting the wall. Two runs scored, and Freese slid into third, and the Cardinals jumped up and down in exhilaration while the Rangers noticeably slumped their shoulders in shock. They were one strike from a championship. Instead, they had to play on ... and try to keep Freese at third.



Freese stayed there, and the teams entered the 10th. The Rangers took the lead again, as Josh Hamilton hit a massive home two-run home run. Once again, the Rangers had a two-run lead with three outs to go to clinch the championship. And once again, the Cardinals came back. They had already scored once when Albert Pujols came up to bat with two outs and a runner on second. That's when Texas manager Ron Washington made all major league managers, past and present, alive and dead, gasp in shock: he walked Pujols to put the game-winning run on base.

It defied all logic. It broke all the rules of managing, both written and unwritten. And ... it kinda made sense. That's how good Pujols had been that series, including his three home run game in Game 3. With the World Series on the line, Washington decided he'd rather face anybody else. And it almost didn't work, as Lance Berkman hit a single that scored the game-tying run and sent Pujols to third. Pujols stayed there, though, and the teams went on to the 11th.

And then David Freese did what Washington was afraid Pujols would do. He ended this incredible, indescribable game with a home run.


Game 6 was just one game, but it was the best World Series game in a decade. The 2011 World Series only happened a year ago, but it's the game that stands out, and deservedly so. There were a couple other great games in the series; Game 2, for example, was scoreless until a lone Cardinals run in the 7th, but the Rangers scored twice in the ninth to win it. But Game 6 is what stands out. It's true now, one year later, and it will likely be true 50 years from now. It was just one of those games.

MVP
Freese. He had the two huge hits in Game 6, plus the game-tying double early in Game 7. An easy pick. 

Scores 
(Home team shaded; winners in Bold)

Texas	2	2	7	4	4	9	2
St. Louis	3	1	16	0	2	10 (11)	6

The List
I'm ranking all the World Series, from worst to best. Here are the ones I've done so far:

5. 2011 - St. Louis (N) def. Texas (A) 4-3
6. 1912 - Boston (A) def. New York (N) 4-3 (1 tie)
7. 1992 - Toronto (A) def. Atlanta (N) 4-2
8. 1947 - New York (A) def. Brooklyn (N) 4-3
9. 1972 - Oakland (A) def. Cincinnati (N) 4-3
Numbers 10-19
Numbers 20-29
Numbers 30-39
Numbers 40-49
Numbers 50-59
Numbers 60-69
Numbers 70-79
Numbers 80-89
Numbers 90-99
Numbers 100-107

Game 7s
Simultaneously, I'll rank all the Game 7s. The ones that have appeared in my countdown so far:

3. 1960: Pittsburgh 10, New York (A) 9
5. 1997: Florida 3, Cleveland 2
6. 1912: Boston (A) 3, New York (N) 2 (game 8)
7. 1946: St. Louis (N) 4, Boston (A) 3
9. 1925: Pittsburgh 9, Washington 7
10. 1926: St. Louis (N) 3, New York (A) 2
11. 1962: New York (A) 1, San Francisco 0
12. 1979: Pittsburgh 4, Baltimore 1
13. 1955: Brooklyn 2, New York (A) 0
14. 1952: New York (A) 4, Brooklyn 2
15. 1971: Pittsburgh 2, Baltimore 1
16. 1940: Cincinnati 2, Detroit 1
17. 1972: Oakland 3, Cincinnati 2
18. 1987: Minnesota 4, St. Louis 2
19. 1958: New York 6, Milwaukee 2
20. 1986: New York (N) 8, Boston 5 
21. 1968: Detroit 4, St. Louis 1
22. 1931: St. Louis (N) 4, Philadelphia (A) 2
23. 1973: Oakland 5, New York (N) 2
24. 2002: Anaheim 4, San Francisco 1
25. 1982: St. Louis 6, Milwaukee 3
26. 1947: New York (A) 5, Brooklyn 2
27. 2011: St. Louis 6, Texas 2
28. 1965: Los Angeles (A) 2, Minnesota 0
29. 1964: St. Louis 7, New York (A) 5
30. 1957: Milwaukee 5, New York (A) 0
31. 1967: St. Louis 7, Boston 2
32. 1945: Detroit 9, Chicago (N) 3
33. 1909: Pittsburgh 8, Detroit 0
34. 1934: St. Louis (N) 11, Detroit 0 
35. 1985: Kansas City 11, St. Louis 0
36. 1956: New York (A) 9, Brooklyn 0

2010 World Series: A Giant win

The Teams
National League: San Francisco Giants (92-70) - Third World Series
American League: Texas Rangers (90-72) - First World Series

What Happened
Quick, say something that happened in the 2010 World Series. QUICK! It was only two years ago, after all. It should be easy.

I watched almost every pitch of that World Series, and the only two things I remember were Rangers pitcher Cliff Lee running off the mound in the seventh inning of Game 7 and Giants closer Brian Wilson screaming and crossing his arms after the last out of the series. That's it. It was just two years ago, and that's all I can remember. So what happened?

What happened is the Rangers didn't show up. Their vaunted offense hit only .190 for the series, and their pitchers had a collective ERA of almost 6.00. Lee, their ace, was brought in specifically for this series, to help give the Rangers a championship. He was pounded like a piñata in Game 1, getting knocked out in the fifth. After an 11-7 win in Game 1 - a game that wasn't even that close - the Giants scored seven runs in the 8th inning of a 9-0 Game 2 win.

The Rangers came home to Texas battered and beaten, but they looked like they had shifted the momentum with a 4-2 win in Game 3. But Madison Baumgarner, the Giants fourth starter, threw a three-hit shutout in Game 4, and Tim Lincecum beat Lee in a battle of the aces in Game 5. The Giants were World Champions for the first time since relocating to San Francisco.

Defining Game
Game 5. The final game of the series turned became the pitching duel that everybody hoped Game 1 would be, with aces Lee and Lincecum trading zeroes for most of the game. Entering the seventh, there had only been five hits in the game, but Edgar Rentaria's two-out three-run home run made it 3-0 Giants. Nelson Cruz hit a solo shot in reply for the Rangers in the seventh, but it wasn't enough, and the 3-1 win gave the Giants their championship.

MVP
Renteria. His Game 5 home run that clinched the series was his second of the series. It was also the second time in his career he had the game-winning RBI in the clinching game of the World Series. He also batted .417 for the Giants. For his heroic efforts, the Giants rewarded him by not re-signing him that offseason. Thanks, I guess.

Scores
(Home team in Bold)

Texas	7	0	4	0	1
San Francisco	11	9	2	4	3

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The List
I'm ranking all the World Series, from worst to best. Here's the ones I've done so far:

98. 2010 - San Francisco (N) def. Texas (A) 4-1
99. 1937 - New York (A) def. New York (N) 4-1
Numbers 100-107

One strike away

Imagine, then, being a Texas Rangers fan right now. You took the magic carpet ride all the way to the World Series, the second straight year you got there, you end up one strike away from the championship, and then, that line drive off the right field wall.

But no worries. The next inning, you have your franchise's very own Kirk Gibson moment when Josh Hamilton and his injured groin gave your team the lead again in the top of the 10th. Again, you find your team one strike from a championship. Again, the sinking feeling of a hit to the outfield. Only this time, there's no coming back.

Sure, that was only Game 6 of the World Series, but nobody expected the Rangers to bounce back to win Game 7. Teams suffering that kind of tragedy don't just bounce back easily. Look at the '86 Angels. Even though Dave Henderson's home run came in Game 5, that series was done. It took them 16 years to recover from Dave Henderson's home run. Donnie Moore never did. Look also at the team that knocked those Angels out, the '86 Red Sox. Bill Buckner's error happened in Game 6 of the World Series; they had a chance to win in Game 7, but they didn't, and Buckner's error terrorized those fans for 18 years before they finally won it all.

The Rangers have quite a bit in common with those two teams, too. That's not a good thing. Obviously, all three were one strike from ultimate victory before stunningly watching it fall away. But they all also had a chance at immediate redemption; all three took an early lead in the next game after their devastating losses. But their losses seemed preordained, and so it shouldn't have been too much of a surprise that they lost the next day.

So now the challenge begins for the Rangers. Making it to two straight World Series is impressive; two straight shows that you're a good team and not a fluke. But it will be tough from here on out. It might not be tough to return to the big stage. What will be tough is when they're in the clinching game, with the lead, needing three outs to go. That's when the memories of Game 6 will come back. The players will feel it then. And they'll wonder if they'll have what it takes.

It might take a year, or two years, or a decade, or a generation. Some day, the Rangers will get over it. But don't be surprised if it takes a while, when most, if not all, of the players from this year's team are gone, so that there's nobody left who has a memory of what happened that night in St. Louis.

I could be wrong, of course. The Rangers could regroup, bounce back next year and win the whole thing. I kind of hope they do. But I also kind of expect they won't. It's not easy to get over an emotional swing like that. David Freese did more than hit a game-tying triple and a game-winning home run in a World Series game. He might have knocked the Texas Rangers out of commission for a decade.

Some thoughts on the World Series

So the World Series is starting today. I'm excited about it. Based on the demographic numbers I've seen from the rest of the playoffs, I might be the only person who can say that sentence who A) is under 50 and B) doesn't live in St. Louis or Texas. It's absolutely sad that baseball has seen its ratings drop and its audience get older as the years have passed. In fact, look at it graphically:



OK, I admit, I mostly just wanted to show off my chart-building skills in Excel. Such as they are. Anyway, that chart shows a pretty steady decline for the World Series in share (the red line) and television rating (the yellow line) since 1984. (Why 1984? That's the first year for ratings I found on Wikipedia, and I didn't want to bother looking up the other years.)

So why the drop? A lot of people blamed the strike of 1994, which cancelled the World Series and showed America that the world wouldn't end if the World Series didn't happen. But as you can see, the ratings had started to trend downward slightly before 1994 (which is represented by the awkward gap in the chart). So what else caused it? I like to blame Fox, which started covering the World Series in 2000, but the drop had already started by then, too.

Here's where people give the excuse that modern Americans have more choices than ever, that in 1984 people had 10 channels to choose from, while now they have 210 to choose from, and because of that, it's impossible to expect similar ratings as two decades ago. And sure, that's a legitimate argument. But the Super Bowl hasn't exactly been hurt by that.

(True, true, the Super Bowl is one single game as opposed to anywhere between 4 and 7. But to me, that explains why the Super Bowl has higher ratings than baseball, not why baseball's have dropped so dramatically.)

So that's my long-winded way of asking one question: Why, exactly, are the ratings dropping? How about time of game? I haven't found good numbers to place into a pretty graph like the one above, but a very common complaint is how much longer baseball games are now. A lot of the blame goes to the success of the Yankees and Red Sox, teams that take pitch after pitch after pitch to extend games, but blame can also be placed on a shrinking strike zone.

Any problems with extended games is exacerbated in the postseason, when players start to feel the pressure. A good example was the great final game of the season this year, when Boston was trying to avoid its collapse. Reliever Antonio Aceves came in for Boston after the rain delay in the seventh inning, then hit a batter with his first pitch and gave up a hit on his second. Facing his third batter, he looked for the sign, and shook it off. The shook his head again, and again, and again. He stepped off, then shook off another sign. Then another. It became painfully obvious that he wanted nothing to do with that situation, didn't want to throw ANY pitch.

It's a little unfair of me to single out Aceves like that, but he's a microcosm of how pitchers react to stressful situations in the postseason. Combine that with managers nowadays calling every pitch and pickoff attempt and step-off. It adds up to never ending innings and postseason games that end way past bedtime for all but the most hard core of fans.

It's too bad. Baseball is my favorite sport by far, and I really want to pass on my love to my son. But it will be hard if I have to put him to bed before the end of any World Series game because it's going on until 11:30 at night. It's a problem that baseball needs to solve, and soon.

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As far as this year's series, I don't know who is going to win. I could do exhaustive research, but really, the winners the past 10 years or so have been more or less random. It's not the best team that wins, but the luckiest. I hope Texas wins, mostly because they never have before and the Cardinals have won plenty. But what I hope for more than that is a memorable, exciting series, one with crisp, well-played games that draw in more fans for the greatest sport in the world. And I hope for the first seven-game World Series since 2002. I hope that isn't too much to ask.

2010 ALDS: Switching roles

Pregame
Most people probably didn't predict a Tampa-Texas playoff series at the beginning of the 2010 season, but it wouldn't have been such a stretch to do so. Though they hadn't been to the playoffs in 11 years, the Rangers had been creeping closer to the top of the AL West in recent years, coming off back-to-back second-place finishes. With a strong pitching staff added to their typically strong lineup, the Rangers got over the top in 2010, winning the division by nine games.

Tampa Bay, meanwhile, returned to the playoffs after a year away, holding off the Yankees down the stretch to win the AL East. Featuring many of the same players from their World Series team of 2008, plus the well-respected Joe Madden as manager, the Rays were favorites in the first round against the Rangers.

The Division Series wasn't a good series to be the home team. Hosting the first two games, Tampa Bay was twice blown away by the Rangers, a team that had never won a playoff series. The series then moved to Texas, where the Rangers had never won a home playoff game. That streak stretched to six straight losses when Tampa won games 3 and 4 to send the series back to Tampa for the deciding game.

To pitch in the deciding game, Texas picked Cliff Lee, who they had acquired from Seattle midseason specifically to pitch in games like this. Lee had earned the win in Game 1, giving up only 1 run in 7 innings pitched. Going up against him was Tampa Bay's ace, David Price. Though Price had lost Game 1 to Lee, he had a good postseason pedigree, as it was his clutch relief performances that led Tampa Bay to the 2008 World Series.

The Game
Tampa Bay entered Game 5 as the team with the reputation of doing all the little things it takes to win a game - taking the extra base, timely suicide squeezes, hit-and-runs, nothing was off the table for the Rays. Meanwhile, the Rangers' reputation was one of power, power, and more power.

So it wasn't a surprise when the Rangers scored first; the real surprise was how they did it. After Elvis Andrus led off the game with a single, he stole second base with one out. AL MVP Josh Hamilton grounded out to the right side, but Andrus surprised everybody by flying around third and not slowing down on his way to score the game's first run.

With how improbably they had scored the first run and with their ace on the hill, Texas was flying high. Tampa tied the game in the third, but Texas got another run in the fourth using their legs rather than their power. Nelson Cruz, who had hit a two-out double, surprisingly tried to steal third. The Rays were especially surprised, throwing the ball away, and Cruz trotted home while the ball rolled into left field.

The next surprise came in the sixth. With Ranger runners on first and second and one out, Ian Kinsler hit what should have been an inning-ending double-play grounder, but he beat the throw to first. Meanwhile, Vladimir Guerrero, the Texas designated hitter who was one of the slowest players on the field, followed Andrus' lead and didn't slow down around third, coming home to score the game's third run.

So the Rangers had a 3-1 lead - with two players having scored from second on a routine ground out - and had their ace on the mound. For all intents and purposes, it was over. Lee allowed only one base runner after Guerrero scored the game's third run. Meanwhile, just to remind people how they got this far in the first place, Texas added two more runs on a deep home run by Kinsler in the ninth.

The two runs extra runs were nice, but they were completely unnecessary. Lee cruised through the ninth, and the Rangers had their first win in a postseason series.

Postgame
The Rangers moved on to play their traditional postseason nemesis, the Yankees, in the ALCS. After the Yankees won Game 1, Texas took Game 2, in the process ending their seven game postseason home losing streak. The Rangers then won two of three in New York before finishing off the series in six games. Texas' magic ran out in the World Series, as their powerful lineup was cut down by the sensational pitching of San Francisco.

The Rundown

17. Texas 5, Tampa Bay 1 (2010 ALDS)
18. San Francisco 3, Atlanta 1 (2002 NLDS)
19. N.Y. Yankees 5, Oakland 3 (2001 ALDS)
20. Seattle 3, Cleveland 1 (2001 ALDS)
21. Chicago 5, San Francisco 3 (1998 NL Wild Card tiebreaker)
22. N.Y. Yankees 7, Oakland 5 (2000 ALDS)
23. Los Angeles 4, Houston 0 (1981 NL West Division Series)
24. Montreal 3, Philadelphia 0 (1981 NL East Division Series)
25. N.Y. Yankees 7, Milwaukee 3 (1981 AL East Division Series)
26. Seattle 9, California 1 (1995 AL West tiebreaker)
27. Chicago 5, Atlanta 1 (2003 NLDS)
28. Houston 12, Atlanta 3 (2004 NLDS)
29. N.Y. Mets 5, Cincinnati 0 (1999 NL Wild Card tiebreaker)
30. Cleveland 8, Boston 3 (1948 AL tiebreaker)
31. Houston 7, Los Angeles 1 (1980 NL West tiebreaker)