Baseball's 'Greatest Game' And Some Left Off the List

The Mets and Braves played an iconic game in 1985.

Major League Baseball has unveiled its choice for greatest game of the last 50 years: Game 6 of the 1975 World Series between the Boston Red Sox and Cincinnati Reds. The game produced the indelible image of catcher Carlton Fisk frantically trying to wave his game-winning home run fair as it sailed over Fenway's Green Monster.

I remember watching this game on TV as it stretched on toward four hours, an almost unheard of length at the time, even for a 12-inning game. I was pulling for the Sox (I always thought the Big Red Machine was more hype than substance) and was trying to will Fisk's ball fair from my bedroom in a Milwaukee suburb.

I have no quibble with this choice or most of the others on MLB's list of the top 20 games. I wonder, though, if there weren't games from before 1975 that deserved inclusion. It's also interesting that all but one of the games on the list are from the postseason (the 50-year cutoff left Bill Mazeroski's walk-off home run to give the Pittsburgh Pirates the title over the New York Yankees in 1960 out in the cold).

There are two regular season games that stick out in my mind. One was the Fourth of July 1985 contest between the Atlanta Braves and New York Mets. Thanks to TBS, which at the time beamed nearly every one of the team's games to a national audience I was able to watch it till the wee hours.

This game had everything: It lasted 19 innings, Keith Hernandez hit for the cycle, pitcher Rick Camp hit the only home run of his career to tie the game in the 18th inning, and that same pitcher was at the plate as the tying run when the game ended.