It was 25 years ago today...

It is hard to believe that it was 25 years ago that Joe “touched them all”. I remember the moment. I remember thinking, win or lose, we were ok. Pat Hentgen was to be our starter in game 7 and he had a great start in game 3. But, I’m happy with the way it ended. No matter how many times I’ve watched this, I’m still amazed that Carter was able to hit that pitch out.

I few years ago I interviewed Hentgen, and I was able to ask him something I always wondered about:

I remember thinking when Joe Carter came to bat in game 6 “oh well, even if we don’t win, you would be pitching the next day” all would be good. Do you ever think about that you could have been pitching game 7?

Oh of course. That whole day is like, I was charting the game and I could tell you those numbers were starting to get a little scribbly towards the end there. We were down by 2 going into the 9th. You know Joe pulls those balls all year long and pulls them foul. So when he hit that ball I was in the corner of the dugout, I’ll never forget it, I had my back to left field. I had my back to the foul pole, when he hit it, I remember just thinking ‘Stay fair, stay fair’, because I felt it was hard enough hit to go out. And it just stayed fair that day for whatever reason.

But yeah I thought about how it would have went down. And how, you play 174 games or whatever and it comes down to one game. It would have been pretty exciting , I’ll tell you. I know one thing in those situations managers never let the starting pitcher get in any trouble. The minute I would have had some trouble going we’d have had Harry Wholestaff in there. Every guy would have been available.

It was Joe’s second home runs of the series. Joe drove in a run in the first with a sac fly. He hit a 2-run shot in the second game, a 6-4 loss. He had a .596 WPA for the game. We scored 3 runs in the first. Each team got a run in the 4th. We made it 5-1 in the 5th inning and things looked good.

Unfortunately, we had a very rough 7th inning. Starter Dave Stewart, gave up a walk, a single, then a 3-run homer to Lenny Dykstra. Stewart threw 120 pitches. Cito was a slow hook in his first go around with the Jays.

Danny Cox came in. He wasn’t good. He gave up 3 hits, 1 walk and 2 runs, while getting just 1 out. Al Leiter came in to get the last 2 outs of the inning and pitched a scoreless 8th, around a Dykstra walk and stolen base. Duane Ward pitched a quick 9th.

Our 9th couldn’t have set up better. The top of the order was up. Ricky Henderson lead off with a walk. Devon White hit a deep fly out. Paul Monitor singled, and we had the tying run on second. And then, well...you know. Mitch Williams remains my favorite reliever of all time.

Paul Molitor was series MVP, he hit .500/.571/.1.000, with 10 runs, 8 RBI, 2 doubles, 2 triples and 2 home runs. Roberto Alomar also had a great series, hitting 0480/.519/.640, with 5 runs and 6 RBI. Tony Fernandez drove in 9 runs, with a .333/.423/.381 line. Duane Ward had 2 saves and a win. The win was in game 6.

And, of course, Carter. He hit .280/.250/.560 with 8 RBI, three that were really important. He had 3 sac flies, which is why the OBP is lower than his BA. I never thought it was fair that sac flies count against you in OBP.

One of the great moments in World Series history and likely the greatest moment in Blue Jays history.