The Greatest Play From the 1960 World Series…

…that doesn’t involve a home run!

Avid baseball fan, friend (and former softball teammate) Gary Sciulli is passionate about a play that happened in the 1960 World Series.  In the 7th game.  And a home run is not involved.

Here is the setting: Top of the ninth.  Pirates are winning 9-8.  One out.  Gil McDougald is the Yankee runner on third.  Mickey Mantle is on first.  Yogi Berra is the batter.  Harvey Haddix is pitching.  Berra hits a screaming bouncer down the first base line.  Pirates first baseman is Rocky Nelson.  He had to hold Mantle to the base so he is in the perfect position to glove the ball.  Nelson only has to take a step to the bag and Yogi is out.  Mantle is a few feet off first.  The force is now off.  Mantle somehow is able to return to the base and get his hand on the base under Nelson’s tag.  He is safe and McDougald scores to tie the game at 9-9.  If Mantle had been put out, the double play would have ended the game.  Instead of Bill Mazeroski’s home run being the one remembered, the three-run shot by reserve catcher Hal Smith in the bottom of the eighth to put the Pirates up 9-7 is the one we would remember (but that one is really not statue-worthy).

When you watch the video, you’ll see Rocky Nelson turn and look toward second base before Mantle comes back to the bag.  In 66-year hindsight what he should have done is run right at Mantle and try to tag him out.  Double play.  Game over.  If Mantle could have stayed alive in a rundown long enough for McDougald to cross the plate, the game is still tied.  The ability of Mantle to come back to the base is what makes the play memorable.  Let’s say that Mantle is doubled up.  Here’s what would (or would not) have happened:

  • No need for Mazeroski to bat in the bottom of the ninth.  If he doesn’t hit that home run, he probably doesn’t get in the Hall of Fame.  There would not be a statue and there would not be a North Shore street named after him.  Great glove, great guy, but a .260 lifetime hitter.  That home run got him in the HOF.
  • Ralph Terry, the Yankees pitcher who gave up the home run to Maz, doesn’t have to go through the rest of his life knowing he threw a pitch a little too high to a high ball hitter at the worst time possible.

Regarding the Mazeroski at bat, Gary points out that Terry’s first pitch to Maz was high.  Catcher Johnny Blanchard called time and went to the mound.  He probably told Terry not to pitch high to Maz.  Next pitch—history is made (and we never get tired of watching Yogi Berra in left field turning around and running back to the dugout as the ball leaves the yard).
Here is the Mantle play at first base.  How does he get back in there??



More on Gil McDougald

Gil McDougald was usually a second baseman.  He played shortstop in Don Larson’s 1956 World Series perfect game and threw out Jackie Robinson after a hard hit ball caromed off third baseman Andy Carey.  That second inning play was the closest the Dodgers came to getting a hit.

The 7th game of the 1960 World Series was Gil’s last Major League appearance.

One play.  So many moving parts.