Thursday Thireen

The Thirteen Greatest Sports Stories

13. Kirk Gibson walk-off homer
Two outs, bottom of the ninth, man on first for the Los Angeles Dodgers, future Hall of Famer Dennis Eckersley on the mound for the Oakland Athletics. Gibson, soon to be named NL MVP, is summoned to pinch-hit despite hamstring and knee problems. He works the count to 3-2. Jack Buck makes the TV call: “Gibson swings, and a fly ball to deep right field. This is gonna be a home run! Unbelievable! A home run for Gibson! And the Dodgers have won the game 5-4. I don’t believe what I just saw. I don’t believe what I just saw.” Gibson’s only at-bat of the Series sends the Dodgers on their way to winning the championship.

12. Postponed by earthquake
Four minutes into ABC’s setup of Game 3 of the ’89 Bay Area World Series at San Francisco’s Candlestick Park, Al Michaels interrupts analyst Tim McCarver. “I’ll tell you what, we’re having an earth---!” he says before the signal gets knocked off the air. More than 60,000 fans and the rest of the city were rocked by the 7.1 earthquake, which collapsed part of the Bay Bridge. Michaels won a News Emmy for his coverage of the earthquake, which left 67 dead and did an estimated $6 billion in property damage. The World Series resumed 10 days later, won in a sweep by Oakland.

11. Christian Laettner jumper sends Duke into ’92 NCAA Final Four
Grant Hill throws the ball three-quarters of the way upcourt. Laettner, at the free throw line, makes the catch, pivots, takes one dribble, fakes right to clear his defender, spins left and shoots the fadeaway — all in less than 2.1 seconds to beat the final buzzer. The 17-foot jumper caps an overtime thriller as Duke beats Kentucky 104-103 in the East Regional final and goes on to successfully defend its ’91 NCAA title.

10.Pete Rose banned
Baseball’s all-time hits leader (4,256) bet on the game while managing the Cincinnati Reds and accepted a lifetime ban from then-commissioner Bart Giamatti in August 1989. Rose became a pariah, reduced to autograph shows at any and all venues — except inside a major league park. The player excluded even from consideration for the Hall of Fame denied for almost 15 years that he bet on baseball, then acknowledged it in his January 2004 autobiography.

9.Tiger wins first Masters
In the Deep South, at a club whose members do not look like him, on a hallowed course where legends Jones, Hogan, Nicklaus and Palmer carved out shots for history, Tiger Woods earned a victory “for the ages” in winning the green jacket in 1997 at The Masters in Augusta, Ga. The game of golf has not looked the same since.

8.N.C. State upsets Houston
Jim Valvano in a daze, trying to find someone to hug, is as unforgettable an image as Lorenzo Charles, moments earlier, dunking after grabbing Dereck Whittenburg’s desperation heave to give North Carolina State the 1983 NCAA men’s basketball title. How improbable was it? N.C. State was the first champion with 10 losses, had lost six of eight in one stretch of the regular season and only qualified for the NCAA tournament by winning the ACC tournament. But the Wolfpack never gave up.

7. BALCO-steroids in baseball
The celebration of ballooning home -run figures from the last decade of the 20th century into the early years of the 21st gives way to the dirty little secret of untested ballplayers taking advantage of substances boosting their natural talents. The innocence of the nation’s pastime devolves into the steroid era.

6.Dale Earnhardt’s death
The Intimidator won seven NASCAR championships, had career earnings in excess of $40 million and after 20 attempts captured the Daytona 500 in February 1998. But three years later at Daytona International Speedway, racing in his black No. 3 Chevrolet, gunning it in the final lap and probably realizing teammate Michael Waltrip would finally win his first Daytona 500, Earnhardt slammed into the wall on the final turn while fighting for position. Rescuers had to cut Earnhardt out of the car, but doctors said he had died instantly from head injuries. He was 49.

5. Armstrong wins seven consecutive Tours de France
In 1996, Lance Armstrong was the top-ranked cyclist in the world when he was diagnosed with testicular cancer that had spread to his brain and lungs. Aggressive chemotherapy worked, and in 1999 he began his Tour de France title run that ended in 2005 only by retirement.

4. Red Sox win World Series
It took 86 years, included insufferable losses to the hated New York Yankees and monumental gaffes seemingly replayed constantly, but the Fenway Park faithful finally danced in the streets when their beloved Boston Red Sox won the 2004 World Series in a sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals. Manny Ramirez, David Ortiz, Curt Schilling, et al., ended the agony that tormented Ted Williams, Carl Yastrzemski, Luis Tiant, et al. And who knows? This could be their year, too!

3. ’94 World Series canceled
The most high-profile strike in professional sports, beginning Aug. 12, 1994, cost baseball fans the ultimate enjoyment to any season — but cost the sport more in lost prestige, trust and adulation. The 232-day strike over issues regarding a salary cap, spanning the 1994 and ’95 seasons, was baseball’s eighth work stoppage but the first to wipe out the postseason.

2.Bill Buckner error
If only Boston relievers could have held the 5-3 advantage with two outs in the bottom of the 10th inning of Game 6, the 1986 World Series would have been over and the Red Sox would have had their first title since 1918. But Calvin Schiraldi gave up three consecutive singles to make it 5-4. Bob Stanley relieved and threw a wild pitch, allowing in the tying run. Few remember all that. What is remembered: Mookie Wilson’s soft grounder down the first-base line that went underneath the glove and through the legs of sore-ankled Buckner, allowing Ray Knight to score the winning run for the New York Mets, who go on to win and take Game 7. Thus are born endless references to having a “Bill Buckner moment.”

1. Ripken breaks record
On Sept. 6, 1995, with President Clinton in attendance, Oriole Park at Camden Yards rocked when native son Cal Ripken Jr. broke the ironman record of 2,130 consecutive games played set by the Iron Horse, Lou Gehrig. With a home run for good measure, and a midgame romp around the field, Ripken helped restore luster to a sport torn apart by the 1994-95 players strike and subsequent owners lockout. The streak of 2.632 consecutive games played ran from May 30, 1982 to Sept. 19, 1998. Ripken enters the Hall of Fame on July 29.