October 25, 2002
THE WINNING TEAM:
Ripken's moment tops Aaron's record-breaking HR (Associated Press, October 23, 2002)Cal Ripken Jr. breaking Lou Gehrig's consecutive games streak was voted baseball's most memorable moment in fan balloting.The milestone by the Baltimore Orioles' shortstop in 1995 received 282,821 votes, out of more than 1.1 million cast.
This is just silly: everyone knows baseball's greatest moment was Ronald Wilson Reagan striking out Tony Lazzeri. Posted by Orrin Judd at October 25, 2002 11:07 AM
Since the contest was billed as "most memorable moment" I feel I can only designate moments I've seen and remember. Also, I think the idea is to pick something that resonates in the national consciosness...for example, Willie Mays' catch in the '54 Series was great, but I once saw Griffey Sr. make an even more amazing catch in a meaningless September game at Yankee Stadium. With all of that out of the way, for those of us born after 1960, there are 4 iconic "moments: Aarons' 715th, Fisk's homer in Game 6 in '75, the ball going through Buckner's legs in Game 6 in '86, Gibson's HR in Game 1 in '88...Of those, I'd go with Fisk's homer....the image of him waving the ball fair and then dancing down to first is, in the words of the contest's sponsor, priceless...
The silliness of the contest is demonstrated by the high finish of "Ryan's 7th no-hitter." I dare anyone to tell me anything memorable about it...who the other team was, what year it happened, etc....
Well, it's memorable if it's passed down as
a thing to know. The Gettysburg Address
is remembered, even if none of us heard it.
Clearly, the most memorable baseball
moments were Merkle's Boner, Ruth's
calling the shot, Gehrig's farewell, Ruth's
farewell, Thompson's homer and Ford's
perfect game. Those are the ones told and
retold.
Larsen, not Ford
Posted by: oj at October 26, 2002 5:36 AM