A few quick updates before we get to our list of great Game 1s in World Series history.
Molly and I chatted with Joey Votto on this week’s The Joy of Baseball podcast. It was exactly as good as you would expect — Joey’s the absolute best.
And soon, we’ll have a special World Series Joy of Baseball podcast with Lindsey Mitchell Storc, sister of the Brewers’ Garrett Mitchell. She shares her story of growing up with Garrett as her best friend, the overwhelming pride she feels watching him overcome Type 1 diabetes to become a big-league hero, and the terror and jubilation that come with being in the stands when your brother plays in big games. Lindsey is just fantastic.
The folks over at the Cotton Bureau apparently love bringing back some of their classic T-shirts—and for this Halloween, they have released special editions celebrating our PosCast battle over fruit pie. You might remember that Mike holds the indefensible position that fruit pie is inedible and a pox on society. He’s literally against apple pie.
I haven’t asked him how he feels about puppies.
Anyway, we have fought about this many, many times, and a few years ago, to settle the score, we released our “Fruit Pie is Delicious” and “Hot Fruit is Disgusting” tees.
Needless to say, more people bought the Fruit Pie is Delicious shirt because, you know, fruit pie IS delicious … but the count was much closer than it should have been.
So, until November 5, Cotton Bureau will sell many color versions of the shirts, and I guess they're now offering long tees, hoodies and sweatshirts too.
Here are the Delicious T-shirts.
Here are the Disgusting T-shirts.
Mike and I will be giving away a couple of these shirts as well … stay tuned.
There are now just 102 days left until the release of FIFTY SEASONS … and that means we're starting to put the tour together. The plan this time around is to hit some cities that I haven’t hit on my tours before, which is exciting. Also, this book — unlike my past books — comes out in the dead of winter, so, you know, that’s less exciting. But I’m Cleveland-born; I can handle a little snow and ice and slush and cold wind and, um, you know, now that I think of it, I haven’t been to Hawaii for a book event yet.
If you are a bookstore owner or someone who puts book events together — or know someone who does — and would like to make a pitch for a tour event, please feel free to reach out to our book publicist guru Jamie, particularly if you are in, um, Hawaii, San Diego, Miami Beach … no, joking, anywhere is great.
And preorders for FIFTY SEASONS are open.
Game 1 of the World Series is tonight, and I’m pumped up because I just have this feeling that this will be a classic Series. I don’t know where that feeling comes from, but I just think the Brewers and Rays are similarly built, and they each have a wonderful energy, and they have both broken away (at least somewhat) from the 2020s style of baseball.
They were 1-2 in baseball in batting average.
The Rays strike out less than any other team in baseball.
The Brewers had the highest on-base percentage in baseball.
They are each top five in such old-timey stats as stolen bases, sacrifice hits and singles.
The Brewers finished dead last in the National League in home runs but were second in runs scored.
The Rays finished with the league’s best record but somehow had a losing record in blowout games decided by five or more runs.
They just don’t look quite like any of the other teams. They chart their own course. They are playing a new kind of Moneyball. Or maybe it’s an old kind of Moneyball. There’s a little bit of Whitey Herzog in each team.
Of course, it’s not 1982 — even if the Brewers are in the World Series. There are still going to be a bunch of strikeouts and a bunch of relief pitchers, and I imagine there will be plenty of home runs too. But these teams are something a bit different from what we’ve grown used to, and players like Jackson Chourio and Junior Caminero and Jacob Misiorowski and Chandler Simpson and a dozen others are so much fun to watch. I love it, and I hope this series goes seven and captures America’s attention. I believe it can.
With that, as promised, here are the five most thrilling World Series Game 1s in baseball history:
No. 5: Boston 11, St. Louis 9 (2004)
Here’s something I think about quite a lot: The ultra-famous Miracle on Ice game in 1980 — when Mike Eruzione scored the goal, and Jim Craig stood on his head, and Al Michaels shouted, “Do you believe in miracles? Yes!” — was not for the gold medal. The U.S. had to beat Finland to win the gold medal*, and that was something of an upset too. Finland was good. They had beaten Canada and had played close with the Soviets. The U.S. did win, of course, but that game is mostly lost to history.
*Here’s another thing many people don’t remember — the Soviets played in the bronze medal match against Sweden, a really good team that tied the U.S. in an earlier round. The Soviets mashed Sweden 9-2. They were pretty mad.
In the same way, the 2004 World Series is mostly lost to history. What everyone remembers, rightfully so, is the Red Sox’s incredible comeback against the Yankees. Dave Roberts’ stolen base. Big Papi’s heroics. Johnny Damon’s grand slam. Curt Schilling’s bloody sock. The one thing most people tend to remember about the World Series between the Red Sox and the Cardinals is that Boston never trailed, even for a single inning.
But the Cardinals were GOOD. That team won 105 games. The middle of that lineup featured three Hall of Famers — Albert Pujols, Larry Walker, and Scott Rolen — and one near-Hall of Famer in Jim Edmonds. The Cardinals finished second in baseball in ERA. It’s easy enough to look back and think that Boston couldn’t possibly lose that series after exorcising all those Yankees demons — just as it’s easy to go back and think that the U.S. hockey team couldn’t possibly lose the Gold Medal match after beating the Russians — but, of course, they COULD have lost.
And Game 1 was a frenetic classic.
