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Greatest Sports Moment or Accomplishment?

Posted By: Joe Russell
Date: Friday, 15 April 2011, at 5:58 a.m.

In Response To: Greatest Sports Moment or Accomplishment? (Rory)

I agree that these are probably the two most noteworthy achievements in sports history, considering the difficulty and political climate that existed at the respective times. One of the most thrilling I have ever seen, thought it pales in comparison to the Miracle on Ice, was Kirk Gibson's 1988 World Series home run. Gibson was really banged up, he had injuries to both legs and a stomach virus. There was no way he could or should play. The leg injuries were serious and he could hardly walk and even then it was with a significant limp. He asked Lasorda to let him go onto the batting cage in the bowels of the stadium and take a few swings. The report came back from the batting cage coach; 'he can barely swing and can not put any weight on his front leg, he can not follow through, he would be lucky to make contact.'

In the bottom of the ninth, with Mike Davis on first and two outs, Gibson begged Lasorda to put him in. Lasorda gambled on him. I remember thinking it was a hopelessly bad decision, possibly one of the dumbest things I had ever seen. Oakland's future Hall of Fame closer, Dennis Eckersley, was pitching and he was almost unhittable for a healthy batter. Gibson limped slowly and painfully up to the plate. He quickly got behind in the count, 0–2, stumbling on his swings and looking just like the coach that watched his practice cage batting said he would look. He laid off a pair of outside pitches that were called balls and meekly fouled off a pitch to work the count to 2–2. On the sixth pitch of his at bat, a ball, Davis stole second. With an awkward, almost casual swing, Gibson using mostly one arm and all upper-body smacked a 3–2 backdoor slider over the right-field fence. He hobbled around the bases and pumped his fist as his jubilant teammates stormed the field. The Dodgers won the game, 5–4, and would go on to win the World Series, 4–1. Gibson never played another game of the series.

'I don't believe what I just saw, 'I don't believe what I just saw!!; in the immortalized words of Jack Buck.

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