| | There have been other ignominious ways to end a series.
Babe Ruth once ended a World Series -- Game 7 of the 1926 Series -- when he tried to steal second base with two outs in the ninth inning while trailing 3-2. He was 31 years old at the time and not exactly Lou Brock on the basepaths.
But a bases-loaded walk with the game tied in the bottom of the 11th inning?
|  | | Kenny Rogers works in the 11th inning of Game 6. |
"Everything you've done in the past, they'll forget about and remember this," Kenny Rogers said after he threw a full-count pitch to Andruw Jones that was high and outside. Very high and very outside. Not really close to the plate.
In fact, Rogers threw six pitches to Jones. Atlanta's center fielder took the bat off his shoulder only once, grounding a foul ball weakly down the third-base line.
"I was just going out there, taking pitches until he threw me a strike," Jones said. "He didn't, and I took a walk."
In the clubhouse after the Mets' loss, Turk Wendell gave Rogers a big bear hug. Wendell had tears in his eyes. Sometimes it's easier to cry than to get angry.
"I'm a big boy," Rogers said. "I can handle it. God thinks I can handle a lot. He can lay off me now."
Of course, Rogers will get ripped in the New York media. Some of the more loutish Mets fans may be ready to greet him at LaGuardia Airport when the team returns from Atlanta.
All because of six pitches in the 11th inning.
Rogers began the season with Oakland and was pitching well for the A's. The team was in the thick of the playoffs. In late July, the A's traded him anyway. Why? At the time, ESPN's Peter Gammons reported that Oakland general manager Billy Beane asked Rogers if he wanted to stay since the team was in the wild-card race. Rogers said no. Many of the veterans in the Oakland clubhouse were reportedly pleased that Beane shipped Rogers out of town.
So, perhaps you feel Rogers got his due after turning his back on his A's teammates at midseason. However, don't confuse a painful defeat with a disgraceful defeat. There have been others.
In 1985 when the Royals blew out the Cardinals in the seventh game of the 1985 World Series, Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog -- still incensed over a bad call from the previous night -- lost his cool after Kansas City took a 10-0 lead. He was ejected. And then pitcher Joaquin Andujar was ejected. Starting pitcher John Tudor cut up his hand when he punched a ceiling fan. That was more hits than the team managed off Bret Saberhagen that night.
Turn the clock back to 1934. The Cardinals beat the Tigers in Game 7, 11-0. In the sixth inning, Ducky Medwick of the Cards slid hard into third baseman Marv Owen. The two nearly came to blows, which got the Tiger Stadium crowd a little ticked off. When left fielder Medwick took the field, the fans pelted him with fruit and soda bottles. The game was delayed five minutes. Medwick returned to the field. More fruit. More bottles. More garbage. More delay -- 20 minutes in total. Finally, commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis ordered the Cardinals to take Medwick out of the game.
The only thing hurled at Rogers on Tuesday night were cheers of joy from the Atlanta crowd. They didn't care that Rogers made $5 million this year and couldn't throw a strike over the plate with the bases loaded. The only numbers they cared about were Braves 10, Mets 9. It was the first playoff game that ended with a bases-loaded walk.
"We had chances to die and we didn't," Braves manager Bobby Cox said. "There's more than one way to win a ballgame."
Indeed. Cox himself remembers Game 7 of the 1991 World Series. His Braves lost that game 1-0 to the Twins in part because rookie second baseman Chuck Knoblauch deked Lonnie Smith on Terry Pendleton's double in the seventh inning. Smith, stealing on the play, momentarily lost sight of the ball and paused. He should have scored but didn't. The Twins won in the 10th.
This series -- and especially this game -- had some of the same twists and turns.
"It's been two weeks of constant mental anguish and torture,
just not knowing what's going to happen," Braves reliever John
Rocker said. "Games hinging on one pitch, night after night after
night."
The final five games of the series were all decided by one run. The Mets were dead in Game 4. They were gone in Game 5. They were certainly gone in Game 6 after Al Leiter lasted just 25 pitches, got no batters out and allowed five runs. Seven times previously a pitcher had started a postseason game and left without recording an out. But none of them gave up five runs.
It was arguably the worst start in postseason history. But, miraculously, the Mets came back. The invincible Kevin Millwood proved vincible after all, as the Mets knocked him out with three runs in the sixth. John Smoltz, who always excels in October, proved fallible as well. Heck, when Melvin Mora delivered a pinch-hit RBI single in the eighth, the Miracles had the lead.
Melvin Mora? The kid had turned into Roberto Clemente.
But then John Franco faltered. Still, the Mets struck back. Then Armando Benitez relived his postseason nightmare, failing to finish off the Braves in the bottom of the 10th.
There have been other ways to lose a final game of a series. Who can forget Tony Fernandez's error in the 11th inning of Game 7 in the 1997 World Series? Wild Thing Williams serving up Joe Carter's home run in 1993? And now, Kenny Rogers' ball four to Andruw Jones.
"I told them they played like champions," Mets manager Bobby
Valentine said. "We don't have a trophy, but they did everything
they had to."
Except throw one more strike.
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