Most Important Day in Baseball History?

[jmowreader]

Poll question: Most Important Day in Baseball History?

[abq e streeter]

1. Most important? None of the above..Most amazing athletic performance in human history? Dock Ellis

throwing a no-hitter on acid leaves everything else in the dust.

[jobycom]

2. Depends on whether you are judging him on his pitching performance

or on whatever he really thought he was doing. I mean, was it a great performance if he really believed he was throwing daisy seeds into a small funnel to create a rainbow skyline off the fourth moon of Alteron, and just accidentally managed to get most of the seeds in the strike zone of a home plate he didn't know was there? No one could hit him because your wind up for tossing a daisy seed into a funnel is very unlike your wind up for a curve ball, even if both cause the pitched object to plunge in a dramatic arc.

[nomorenomore08]

3. According to his own recollections, he certainly knew he was pitching a baseball game.

It's just that the proportions/distances, etc., he perceived were quite different from normal - which may explain why he surrendered 8 walks.

[rurallib]

20. delete

[era veteran]

34. We shot tanks at night in W Germany on Sandoz

Can't miss, most fun of all time.

[abq e streeter]

35. Cool-------beats the acid vs. mescaline softball game in college

Although that was pretty damn fun too. ( Mesc team here; we lost)

[MilesColtrane]

4. September 20, 1845

The Knickerbocker Rules are published.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knickerbocker_Rules#External_links

[jobycom]

5. Nolan Ryan staying in the game after taking a Bo Jackson line drive in the mouth.

Okay, it wasn't a line drive, it was a bouncer, but it was amazing.

I have to set it up, for anyone who missed it. Nolan Ryan was the fast ball strikeout king of all time, and Bo Jackson struck out a lot. He also hit fast balls a mile when he connected. He hit one Nolan Ryan pitch so hard it hit the empty seats in center field while still rising. Ryan joked that if the seats hadn't been in the way the ball would have never stopped.

So it was always a good matchup, is my point. So Ryan, who was 43, takes the mound against Bo in the matchup that most people had come to the game to watch, and Ryan delivers a pitch (no idea what) that Bo swings at with all his might. He tops the ball, it hits the ground, and it slams off the bounce straight into Ryan's face. Ryan falls to ground, the ball bounces who knows how many feet in the air before falling to the ground, and Bo, on his way to first for an easy single, stops dead in the baseline to watch Ryan. He even takes a step towards the mound and freezes, obviously more concerned about Ryan than anything happening in the game. I'll always love the guy for that, for having his priorities straight.

Ryan gets up, picks up the ball, and throws Bo out at first. Blood is pouring out of his lower lip. They treat it and glue it or whatever they do, and mostly stop the bleeding, but his shirt is drenched in blood. The Rangers start to pull him out of the game, but Ryan refuses to go. He steps up on the bag, grabs the ball, and waits for the next batter. They leave him in.

I don't even know who the next batter was, but he steps into the box and looks at Ryan, hunkering on the mound, his throwing arm dangling, his right shoulder hunched in that "I'm about to hurl this ball faster than you've ever seen a ball hurled" hunch, his lip still spilling blood down his chin, and the batter calls time and backs out of the box. He's starying at Ryan the way most people stare at their first zombie, and for the same reason. The ump makes him get back in the box, and just stands there, in terror, as Ryan hurls three pitches straight down the middle. He never even sees the pitches, he can't take his eyes off Ryan.

Ryan walks to the dugout, changes his shirt, and pitches the next inning like nothing happened. He stays in to face Jackson again in the game, and fires four straight fast balls down the center. Bo tips one, but can't come close to the other three. Ryan signed the bloody shirt to "To Bo. It's always a challenge to face you," after the game, and sent the shirt to Jackson. :)

The stuff of legends. Both of them.

[WildEyedLiberal]

25. That is a seriously fantastic baseball story

Thanks :thumbsup:

[jobycom]

39. Picture.

That's what the next batter faced on the mound. :o

[givemebackmycountry]

36. I was a kid when Ryan was a raw rookie with the NY Mets and I lived in NYC.

I was an adult when I saw Ryan pitch in Arlington Stadium (the old one) against Jackson and the Royals.
It was 1989 or 1990?
We were so far out in the cheap seats I may very well have been in Ft. Worth.
Couple of years later, I saw Ryan pitch when Texas visited Kauffman stadium in Kansas City.

Nolan Ryan has been with me for a good portion of my life.

[jobycom]

38. I saw many a game from those Arlington cheap seats.

I used to laugh every time I heard someone suggest they should play more afternoon games. Ever sit in those metal seats in the Dallas sunshine for four hours? You didn't need sunscreen, you needed mayonaise.

[tigereye]

6. PIrates 1960 World Series win over Yankees (well, around here, anyway)

Cal Ripken's 2,131st consecutive game on September 6, 1995? Without steroids, and for the same team?

[KamaAina]

15. I was going to say "Monday night"

in a similar vein.

[Blue_Tires]

7. a tie between 10-cent Beer Night

and Disco Demolition Night

[KamaAina]

14. Also, the Senators' last game before departing for Texas

they had to forfeit because fans were prying seats out of RFK with crowbars around the fifth inning.

[Bossy Monkey]

8. I just remember that when Cal Ripken broke the Iron Man record, Chris Berman shut up.

With all the love in the world for Berman, that was an amazing accomplishment.

[CBGLuthier]

9. The Day Ty Cobb Died

The Georgia Peach finally rotted to his nasty little pit on the day I was born. Whenever Ty Cobb is mentioned I point out how happy I am that I never had to share the air of the earth with that miserable, racist prick.

Otherwise the obvious answer is April 15, 1947 when Jackie Robinson first played in the majors. That had an impact throughout all of American society that is still felt to this day.

I bet Ty Cobb hated it.

[Blue_Tires]

10. That Tommy Lee Jones movie was one of the alltime underrated sports movies

[jobycom]

19. Yeah, it is. nt

[tigereye]

13. yeah, Jackie Robinson to the majors should definitely be up there!

[Blue_Tires]

23. worth posting:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2zezizK98U

[flvegan]

11. October 27, 2004

Curse of the Bambino ends.

[joeybee12]

12. Beat me to it...all others pale in comparison...

it's also one of the most important dates in the history of mankind!!!!

[alcibiades_mystery]

29. October 25, 1986

;-)

[meow2u3]

16. 1969: the Miracle Mets win the World Series

No one gave the Mets a snowball's chance in Hell. The Mets pulled one of the most shocking upsets in baseball history when the sports "experts" favored the vaunted Orioles in 4.

I was 9 when this historic moment occured; in fact, my sister got out her tape recorder and taped the play-by-play of every game!!!

[Brother Buzz]

18. Sept. 10, 1963 - Polo grounds

Alou brothers -- Felipe, Matty and Jesus -- Sept. 10, 1963, the three brothers played in the same game, batting in succession against the Mets in the eighth inning in the Polo Grounds.


In the Mets 4-2 victory over the Giants at Polo Grounds, Carlton Willey retires the side in order getting all three Alou brothers -- Jesus, Matty and Felipe -- to make an out. The Dominican trio become the first three siblings to bat consecutively in the same inning.

[HERVEPA]

17. Jackie Robinson Major League Debut - 1947

[El Supremo]

26. Yes. By far.

[Auggie]

32. Absolutely -- no question

[proteus_lives]

21. Gehrig speech.

[CBR]

22. The year 1883...

since then, "They are the oldest continuous, one-name, one-city franchise in all of professional American sports..."

[MilesColtrane]

24. (self delete)

Thought you were talking about the Mets.

[El Supremo]

27. Second most important date: April 6, 1973

Ron Blomberg of the New York Yankees became the first designated hitter in Major League Baseball history,

[MrSlayer]

28. Disco Demolition Night is a classic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disco_Demolition_Night

[El Supremo]

30. Another one: August 31, 2004

Indians 22, Yankees 0. Yankees worst loss of all time.

[HuckleB]

31. It hasn't occurred yet.

[El Supremo]

33. Next year when Barroid Bonds is found guilty for lying about steroids?

[HuckleB]

37. Only if MLB goes back to recognizing Hank Aaron as the Home Run King.

No, it will be, well, possibly forever.

I'm a Brewers fan, if that give you a clue.

:hi:

[El Supremo]

40. He and Roger Maris are still the the kings in my book.

Not Bonds, McGwire or Sosa.

[HuckleB]

41. You'll get no disagreement from me.

:toast: