Mine would have to be at Fenway Park a few years ago.
Mike Piazza hit a blast of a home run that still gives me chills thinking about it.
The second it left the bat, the entire stadium, Mets and Red Sox fans alike, stood up and excaimed “OHH MY GAWWD!”
This moonshot was hit so hard and so high, it was as straight as a laser beam and never had time to lose altitude before it clanged off the top of the giant coke bottle sign on top of the Green Monster in left field. It was headed for the Back Bay if that sign hadn’t stopped it (no, not really).
I’ve seen McGuire knock out lights on the scoreboard at Shea, but that was a line drive and paled in comparison.
Keyspan Energy has a sign on a light stanchion in left-center at Shea that supposedly earns a million dollars to the charity of the player’s choice if they hit it. This shot would have hit three-quarters of the way up that sign. Amazing!
I caught an interesting game in Col at Coors Field last season. Detroit entered the bottom of the 5th with an 8-0 lead. Rockies went on a tear to win 10-8.
I never watched baseball until a few years ago. Now I find myself making a handful of games across the country every year. Last year I visited… @SF, @ChiSox, @Col, @Pitt. This year will be @ChiCubs, @Wash and maybe @Det.
One was not “official”, since it got rained out, but it was the Pirates and Dodgers at Three Rivers in 1991. Andy Van Slyke hit a home run in the first inning that didn’t count because of the rain out.
The other was only “great” if you were a Reds fan. In 1992, I went to Riverfront to watch the Reds and Braves play. Glenn Braggs hit a grand slam off of Steve Avery in the first inning. What was maybe even more exciting to me was sitting 15 rows from the top and still being able to hear Rob Dibble pop the catcher’s mitt. :wow: That sucker could throw some gas.
Thursday night sellout
Pedro beaned Sheffield
Halsey matched Pedro on the mound
Ramirez had 2 bombs
Jeter fell into the stands
Sheffield played 3rd base
Cairo’s double and Flaherty’s game winning single
The whole upperdeck was anarchy from the 6th inning on. Most intense regular season baseball game I have ever been to.
I don’t know if there was a sober person up there.
I would say it was probably the #2 sporting even I have attended behind the Charlotte Cincy game my freshman year (99)
Even after the game Yankees and Redsox fans were able to agree on something, how amazing the game was.
The only bad part was I didn’t get home until 3am, and had to be back in the Bronx for work by 9am and I had a 2 hour commute from where I live.
Fenway, July 1991 against the Tigers. I’m sitting a couple rows over from Pesky pole. Clemens on the hill, gives up back to back homers to Cecil Fielder and Rob Deer. Plunks John Shelby, who charges the mound with the bat in hand. Sox catcher John Marzano, former all state linebacker, tackles Shelby from behind. After everything looks calm, Fielder and three weeks into his mlb career Mo Vaughn are jaw to jaw, with three guys holding each back. That could have been some rumble.
Old school Charlotte Knights fans, remember 1993? Sam Horn kept Jim Thome from winning the triple crown in the IL. Manny Ramirez was called up after he had 90 something RBIs in 60 AA games. Playing rightfield, trying to make a Willie Mays basket catch around his waist, Manny got his glove in front of his face just in time to block his teeth from getting knocked out. I remember thinking, “oh he’s young, his play in the field will get better”. Twelve years later, not much has changed.
I also stayed all the way to the end of a 15-0 blowout at Knights Castle. The manager (might have been Jerry Manuel) let a 5’8" second baseman pitch the ninth. Funny as hell to watch.
I’m jealous of those stories. My best memory was the Greeensboro Bats hitting a walk off home run last year in thier final home game at the almost 80 year old War Memorial Stadium. It was like a cheesy Hollywood script, very surreal.
I need to go out and get some Major League memories now!
The second greatest moment for me had to be at Shea.
It was the Division Series between the Mets and D-backs. We had seats in the upper deck just behind first base.
In the bottom of the 10th with the score tied 3-3, Todd Pratt comes to the plate for the injured Mike Piazza. He smacks a ball that looks like it was destined for the warning track but it kept carrying. Then I realize, of all people racing back after the ball, it had to be Steve Finley. I’m shouting, “NOOOOO!” The ball arrives at the top of the wall, Finley goes up, and it seemed like the entire stadium went silent while we held our breath. The ball goes over the wall, Finley’s glove flexes back over the wall but when he comes down and looks in his glove, he hangs his head and the crowd explodes!
They started playing the intro to Van Halen’s “Running with the Devil” and switched to “Rock & Roll, Part II” by Gary Glitter" (you all know the song). Nobody moved from their seat and stood there dancing and clapping to the music. When I bent over to grab my stuff to go, I was overcome with what felt like vertigo and began to lose my balance. As I stood up, I realized it wasn’t vertigo. The entire upper deck of Shea was actually bouncing to the beat. It felt like an earthquake and I wouldn’t be surprised if the deck was flexing several inches. If I still had a beer, it would have been sloshing all over the place. I didn’t know whether to be happy or scared.
Todd Pratt would figure in another great moment about a week later. Same seats and Robin Ventura hit his “Grand Slam Single.” It was a miserable, rain soaked game and the Mets would eventually blow it with their backs against the wall in Atlanta, when Kenny “the gutless wonder” Rogers couldn’t throw a damned strike and walked in the winning run.
