Worst Moments in Yankee Stadium History
For reasons unclear to me, this year the Major League All-Star Game, which used to be a nice, little mid-season diversion and a chance to showcase the game's best players, has been replaced with a big, fawning, obsequious celebration of all things Yankee. It's a Bronxapalooza. Every media outlet in the country is joining in on the unctuous toadying to the point there's nowhere you can hide from the everyone's list of The Great Moments in Yankee Stadium history. Babe Ruth. Gehrig. Mr. October. College football. Boxing. Concerts. Popes. Giambi's porn 'stache. Everywhere they're joining in on the groveling at the steps of the House That Ruth Built as they await the opening of The House That the New York Government's Woefully Misplaced Priorities Built. Everywhere, that is, except here.
The Worst Moments in Yankee Stadium History:
11. Gotham Bowl
The 1962 game featured Nebraska against Miami and was played in front of only 6,100 people. Still it was a much bigger success than the previous Gotham Bowl game when Oregon State played no one in front of zero people because organizers couldn't line up an opponent. Apparently fear of the Joker was keeping people away and the game was never held again.
10. Suzyn Waldman's On Air Clemensgasm, 2007
"Oh my goodness gracious!!!"
9. Upper deck dive
August 10th, 2005. Scott Harper, and 18 year old dickhead from Armonk, NY plunges 40 feet from the upper deck onto the backstop in the 8th inning of a game against the White Sox. Security waits until the final out before hauling him off to the hospital, then court. The last inning gives Scott time to think about the role of booze in his future.
8. Game 7 of the 1926 World Series
Babe Ruth, who had by this time had bloated his stomach and fried the synapses of his brain with Constitutionally-outlawed liquor, got caught stealing with two outs in the 9th and the Yankees down by a run to end the series. Ironically enough, the game was saved by the Cardinals Grover Alexander who was even drunker, a point which was overlooked when Ronald Reagan played him in the movie of his life.
7. Game 5 of the 1960 World Series
Game 5 was pivotal in arguably the biggest gag job in WS history. The Yankees lost 5-2 as their starter, the immortal Art Ditmar, couldn't get out of the 2nd inning. Eventually New York handed the series to Pittsburgh on Bill Mazeroski's Game 7 walkoff even though they outscored the Pirates 55-27.
6. Babe Ruth's final appearance
June 13th, 1948. All the years of gluttony, whore-chasing, boozing and providing fodder for bad Red Sox writers had finally caught up to the Bambino. And as he spoke to the crowd, his cancerous voice sounded like Demi Moore. But unlike Lou Gehrig's farewell years earlier, in the eyes of Yankee fans, Ruth had outlived his usefulness and they simply wanted him to get the speech over with so they could get on with the game.
5. Crooked Boxing
In 1927 geriatric former champ Jack Dempsey beat a heavily favored Jack Sharkey on a series of illegal punches that were allowed. Then in 1930, Sharkey knocked out Max Schmeling but that punch was ruled illegal and Schmeling was declared the winner, and the nickname Jack "The Gambler's Patsy" Sharkey was born.
4. Game 7 of the 1955 World Series
Prior to this series, the only time the Dodgers won a title while in Brooklyn, they were such the Yankees' bitch that it should've been written on their butt cheeks in prison ink. New York won Games 1 & 2, lost the next three in Brooklyn, then took Game 6 and it looked like history was repeating itself, until Dodgers starter Johnny Podres shuts them out in the deciding game. The fact that Mickey Mantle hits .200 with 1 RBI doesn't stop li'l 3 year old Bob Costas from falling in love with the drunken monkey.
3. Ray Chapman is killed
On August 17, 1920, the Cleveland Indians shortstop took a spitball in the head from Yankees starter Carl Mays and was pronounced dead at a NYC hospital. As a result, MLB bans the spitball, requires umpires to replace dirty balls, and sits on their hands for 30 years before adopting the batting helmet. None of which does a bloody thing for Chapman.
2. Game 6 of the 2004 ALCS
Curt Schilling took on the challenge of coming to Boston. He took on the pressure of saying he came here to erase "an 86 year curse." He took the blame for getting shelled in Game 1. He took a chance of a radical procedure on his ankle. He took the ball in Game 6. And he proceeded to take the Yankees' still-beating heart out of their collective chest and eat it while they watched helplessly. And took their air of invincibility away for good.
1. Game 7 of the 2004 ALCS
It might seem like piling on to put Game 7 and Game 6 at the top of the same list. But there's no other choice. Game 6 will forever be Schill's moment. But 7 was the was the moment that life changed for the Yankees and their fans forever. Those of us who stood in front of our TVs, basking in the glow of their misery like wilderness survivors warming ourselves before a fire, were treated to a glimpse of Billy Crystal sobbing like he'd been maced and en masse had a Suzy Waldman moment. The night will forever live as a 9.8 on the Shadenfreude Scale.
Bonus pick: The Costanza Era
Pick any moment. The time George talked the team into switching to cotton uniforms. The Kung Pao Shrimp incident. The time he got Mr. Steinbrenner hooked on eggplant calzones from Paisano's but then gets caught trying to take his tip out of the tip jar because the counter guy didn't see him put it in there so he gets banned from the place... you get the picture. Costanza had a lot of mishaps.