MLB Network's 20 greatest games

While I remember games before this, I became a die-hard baseball fan in 1993 and have been passionate ever since.

The list of the greatest games in those 17 years for me would be include:

1993 World Series, Game 6
2001 World Series, Game 7
2003 ALCS, Game 7

I think those 3 are head-and shoulders above the rest. The also-ran list would include:

1995 World Series, Game 6
1997 World Series, Game 7
1995 Yankees-Mariners ALDS, Game 5
2007 Padres-Rockies 163rd game
2002 World Series, Game 6
2001 World Series, Game 4
2001 World Series, Game 5
1996 ALCS, Game 1

For the regular season category, how about the Red Sox-Devil Rays game in 1999 or so when Pedro beaned Gerald Williams to open the game, he charged the mound, and then Pedro retired the next 25 in a row. Meanwhile, there were 3-4 bench-clearing brawls (every time Brian Daubach came up?), Carl Everett almost hit for the cycle and Pedro's no-hitter was broken up in the 9th? That was one of the most insane games of all time.

For the Kansas City Royals post-1993 category, it's gotta be Opening Day 2004, when Mendy Lopez hit the 3-run pinch hit homer, before Beltran cranked the walk-off. I think the Royals won about 50 more games that year total.

 

I blame Schiraldi. He was the closer. He had two on and nobody out, and he let the Mets back in the game.

 

I blame Clemens for not getting on the roids early enough to let him finish the game.

 

I think that these two games get lost because the Series ended up being a sweep, but Games 2 and 3 in 2005 were terrific baseball games. In Game 2, the Astros tied it up with two runs in the ninth off of Bobby Jenks, who had been lights out in the playoffs as a rookie. But then Scott Podsednik, who didn't hit a home run all year after testing had been instituted, goes deep to put the White Sox up 2-0.

Then it goes back to Houston for Game 3, and that game goes 14 innings before Geoff Blum, perhaps the least used player on that White Sox team, hits a home run that stands up as the game-winner. Game 4 was a 1-0 nail biter that went into the eighth inning at 0-0.

And in the playoffs that year, you had Pujols' home run off of Lidge and A.J. Pierzynskyi taking first base on a phantom dropped third strike that saved the White Sox from possibly going down 2-0, at home, in the ALCS to the Angels.

 

This was a great game.

Game 2 of the 2008 ALCS was dramatic with a few lead changes.

 

Go back and look at it, the ball did not bounce in the batters box, it actually never bounced at all. Gedman just flat out missed it. Wilson jumped out of the way awkwardly which might have contributed, but any catcher should have caught it. Not close to a wild pitch.

 

Gedman could still hit some then, but by fall '86 he was a lardass and quickly becoming a defensive liability. IIRC, he tested the waters as a free agent after the season but found no takers (granted, this was the collusion era). He reupped with the Sox for '87, but wasn't eligible to play until May 1 under free agent rules, and his career entered its fatal nosedive.

 

I thought the ball had bounced.
But that is still a wild pitch. Anytime a catcher has to go a foot to his right...bringing the mitt across his body... it's a wild pitch.
John Bench wouldn't have caught that pitch.

 

Thing nobody talks about is what a quality at bat it was. Wilson fouled off several pitches. It was a 10-pitch AB.

 

That was the other thign I was reminded of watching the clip on Youtube. Great at-bat by Mookie

 

We got that on TV in my neck of the woods because they were playing the Sox. I was watching it in the office, and I remember the moment Lopez hit it, I threw my arms up because I knew it was gone. Not only did he hit the damn thing, he took it out in dead-center, some 420 feet or so. Has to be the longest home run Mendy Lopez ever hit.

That was probably the last bit of pure baseball bliss KC has endured since. That was coming off the miraculous 03 season. Tony Pena quit, and Beltran was soon traded, and that was that. But that was one hell of a home opener.

 

The Astros were full of classic games for a couple years there. The 2004 NLCS was every bit as great as the ALCS between the Sox and Yankees -- right down to Edmonds' walk-off bomb in Game 6 vs. Ortiz's in Game 5 -- but was overshadowed for obvious reasons.