October 10, 1871: Octavius Catto, the Forgotten Hero

October 10, 1871, 150 years ago: Octavius Valentine Catto is murdered in Philadelphia. He was an abolitionist and educator, and also an early black baseball player.

He was born on February 22, 1839 in Charleston, South Carolina. He and his mother, the former Sarah Isabella Cain, were members of the DeReef family, a prominent mixed-race family that had lived free for decades in that city whose resistance to the abolition of slavery would lead to it hosting the 1860 Democratic National Convention and the first secession convention later that year. His father, William T. Catto, was a slave who had bought his freedom, and been ordained as a Presbyterian minister. He took his family north to Baltimore and then Philadelphia.

In 1853, at age 14, Octavius began attending a previously all-white school, Allentown Academy in Allentown, Monmouth County, New Jersey. (It's about 40 miles northeast of Philadelphia, and 60 miles southwest of New York.) After 1 year there, he attended Philadelphia's Institute for Colored Youth, where he was praised by principal Ebenezer Bassett for "outstanding scholarly work, great energy, and perseverance in school matters." He later taught English and math at the ICY.

During the American Civil War, he joined with Frederick Douglass and the Union League, headquartered in Philadelphia, to form a Recruitment Committee to sign black men to fight for the Union and, with victory, the abolition of slavery. He helped raise 11 regiments that were sent to the front. He was commissioned in the U.S. Army with the rank of Major, but did not see combat himself.

After the Civil War, predating the Montgomery Bus Boycott by 90 years, Catto fought for the desegregation of Philadelphia's trolleys and streetcars. Moved by his action, Representatives Thaddeus Stevens and William D. Kelley, both of Pennsylvania, pushed through Congress a bill desegregating public transit. This would last nationally until the Plessy v. Ferguson case in 1896, but the various vehicles in Philadelphia remained integrated.

Octavius Catto was among the generation of young American men who had begun an athletic career by playing cricket, but switched to its cousin, baseball -- then, usually spelled as two words, "base ball." In 1865, he and fellow ICY graduate Jacob C. White Jr. founded the Pythian Base Ball Club. They were named after the Knights of Pythias, to which several of its members belonged, named for the Greek myth of Damon and Pythias, a legendary story of friendship and dedication.

Initially, the Club was made up of young black professionals from what would later be called the Northeast Corridor, Boston to Washington, but mostly Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington. In 1867, the Club played its 1st season, playing home games at Philadelphia's Fairmount Park, and went undefeated. They did so again in 1868.

On September 4, 1869, in what is the earliest known recorded game between an all-black team and an all-white team, the Pythians sustained their 1st defeat, to the Olympics of Washington. A few days later, they played another all-white team, the Philadelphia City Items, a team sponsored by a newspaper, and won. Both times, the local newspapers, including the defeated City Item, praised the Pythians for their performance and their class.

These games took place toward the end of the season of the Cincinnati Red Stockings, the world's 1st openly professional baseball team; and 2 months before the 1st American football game, played nearby between Rutgers and the school that would later be known as Princeton. The following year, 1870, the 15th Amendment to the Constitution was ratified, granting all men age 21 and up the right to vote, regardless of race.

October 10, 1871 was Election Day in Philadelphia. Like most black men at the time, Octavius Catto was a Republican, of the party of the Great Emancipator, Abraham Lincoln, and of the current President, who had been the leading Union General, Ulysses S. Grant. White Protestants were mainly English and Republican. White Catholics were mainly Irish and Democratic. (This was before the great waves of Italian and Slavic immigrants arrived to broaden the ethnic range of Catholic America.) So, with the exception of the question of helping the poor and immigrants, it was then the Republicans who were the liberals, and the Democrats who were the conservatives. This was a long time ago: 150 years. A century and a half.

In previous elections, Catto had been harassed on the way to voting, and, anticipating this, he had a gun on him. So did Frank Kelly, a Democrat who, as far as I can determine, did not previously know Catto, and so his motive, while prejudicial, was probably not personal.

Kelly shot Catto 3 times at the corner of 9th & South Streets, a few steps from Catto's home at 812 South Street. Kelly was acquitted of the murder. Apparently, despite being a Northern city, in Philadelphia, at that time, a white man could get away with murdering a black man.

Catto was just 32 years old. He was buried at Eden Cemetery, the oldest surviving cemetery for black people in America, in suburban Collindale, Pennsylvania.

Also buried there is opera singer Marian Anderson, a Philly native whose concert at Constitution Hall in Washington, for Easter 1939, was canceled by its owners, the Daughters of the American Revolution. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt not only resigned from the DAR, but she talked her husband, President Franklin D Roosevelt, into allowing her to perform at the Lincoln Memorial, live over the national radio networks. Over 75,000 people attended, the biggest crowd to come to the Memorial until the 1963 March On Washington.

Catto's tombstone is engraved, "THE FORGOTTEN HERO." With the passage of time, he was, indeed, forgotten. Sojourner Truth lived on until 1883, Frederick Douglass to 1895, and Harriet Tubman to 1913, and were able to continue to speak for themselves, in interviews, articles and books. By the time the modern Civil Rights Movement began in the 1950s, their names were looked to as inspirations. But Catto, even though he had done his era's equivalent of a bus boycott, and in a city far larger than Montgomery, Alabama, was not cited as an influence.

Despite being a baseball nut, and living close enough to Philadelphia to have visited many times, I had never heard of Octavius Catto until I was in my late 40s.

In 2006, a movement began to get him a statue. In 2018, the statue, named "A Quest for Parity," sculpted by Branly Cadet, was placed on the south side of City Hall, at the geographic center of the City of Philadelphia.

It is that city's 1st statue in honor of a specific black person. Think about that for a moment: Philadelphia is one of America's leading cities in the African-American experience, and yet a fictional white character, Sylvester Stallone's Rocky Balboa, had a statue before any black person. True, there are statues of Wilt Chamberlain and Julius Erving outside the Wells Fargo Center arena, but those were erected and dedicated by the 76ers, not the City government.

I had hoped that the Catto statue would be on the north side of City Hall, so he could stare down the statue across the street, that of the infamously racist Police Commissioner (1967-71) and Mayor (1972-80) Frank Rizzo. Instead, it faces his old neighborhood. It's academic now: The Rizzo statue was removed in 2020.

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October 10, 1891, 130 years ago: Stefano Magaddino is born in Castellammare del Golfo, Siciliy, Italy. A cousin of New York organized crime figure Joseph Bonnano, he arrived in Brooklyn in 1909, and eventually found the Buffalo-Niagara Falls area ripe for the picking.

"Don Stefano," also known as "The Undertaker," was the longest-running Mob boss in American history. From his base in Buffalo, he extended west to Cleveland, and also had Toronto and Montreal under his thumb. He was an original 1931 member of "The Commission," which Lucky Luciano set up to be the governing body of the American Mafia. But a split in the Buffalo Mob ended his power in 1968, and he died in 1974, at age 82 -- without having spent any time in prison.

October 10, 1896, 125 years ago: Louis Gustav Wilke is born in Chicago. He coached one of the great early amateur basketball teams, the AAU Phillips 66ers -- a "company team" that got around amateur rules by getting its players jobs with the Phillips Petroleum Company of Bartlesville, Oklahoma. In the 1929-30 and 1930-31 seasons, he led them to a record of 98-8.

He served as Chairman of the AAU Basketball Committee, and on the U.S. Olympic Committee. He died in 1962, and was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1983.

Also on this day, what became The New York Times Book Review begins publishing. The Times

announced in its inaugural edition, "We begin today with the publication of a Supplement which contains reviews of new books... and other interesting matter... associated with news of the day."

This follows the purchase of the Times, earlier in the year, by Adolph Simon Ochs, who turned it from a bit of a joke into America's "paper of record." In 1904, he built the building at 42nd Street, 7th Avenue and Broadway, at the southern end of Longacre Square, that would give the intersection its new name. The building received the address of One Times Square. He moved it to another building a block away, at 229 West 43rd Street, overlooking the Square, in 1913, running the paper until his death in 1935.

The paper was then run by his son-in-law, Arthur Hays Sulzberger, until 1961. He handed the paper to his own son-in-law, Orvil Dryfoos. But he had a heart attack and died just 2 years later. Arthur's son became publisher, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger. "Punch" Sulzberger ran the paper through the Vietnam, Watergate and Reagan years, including publishing the Pentagon Papers in 1971.

In 1992, he handed control to his son, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr. Under his command, the Times moved to its new 1,046-foot New York Times Building at 620 8th Avenue, between 41st and 42nd Street, across from Port Authority Bus Terminal, in 2007. In 2018, "Pinch" Sulzberger handed the publisher's title to his son, Arthur Gregg Sulzberger. "A.G." is thus the great-great-grandson of Adolph Ochs.

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October 10, 1904: For the first time, and by no means for the last, an American League Pennant comes down to New York and Boston. The last day of the season features a doubleheader at Hilltop Park, at 165th Street & Broadway in Manhattan's Washington Heights.

The New York Highlanders, forerunners of the Yankees, need to sweep the Boston Americans, forerunners of the Red Sox, in order to win. Otherwise, Boston will win it. Hilltop Park seats about 16,000, but there's perhaps 30,000 jammed into the confines, including thousands of standees roped off in the massive outfield area.

Pitching the 1st game for the Highlanders is Jack Chesbro, who has already won 41 games, which remains the single-season record for pitching from 60 feet, 6 inches away. And that's pronounced CHEESE-bro, not CHEZ-bro.

With the score 2-2 in the top of the 9th and Lou Criger on 3rd base, Chesbro throws a spitball – then a legal pitch – but it’s a wild pitch, going over the head of his catcher, Jim "Deacon" McGuire, and Criger scores the Pennant-winning run. The Yankees win the nightcap, 1-0, but it’s meaningless, as the Red Sox-to-be win the Pennant.

But, faced with the prospect of losing a postseason series not just to the champions of what they view as "an inferior league," but to the other New York team, the National League Champion New York Giants refuse to participate in the World Series. Manager John McGraw, on this day, issues a statement that it was his decision, not that of owner John T. Brush, to refuse to play the AL Champions, regardless of who they turned out to be. The 1904 World Series is called off, and it will be 90 years before such a thing happens again – over a very different kind of stupidity, and a more egregious one at that.

Brush and McGraw were so shamed in the press for chickening out that they agreed that they would participate in any future World Series – and they participated in 14 before moving to San Francisco, their total now 20.

Today, over a century later, the Red Sox organization does not claim a forfeit win and call themselves the 1904 World Champions, which would give them 9 World Championships, rather than 8. But they might as well -- after all, who can stop them, and how? 

And yet, the plaque at Polo Grounds Towers lists the Giants as World Champions for 1904, as well as for 1905, 1921, 1922, 1933 and 1954 -- but not for 1888 and 1889, possibly because those titles were not won at that location, but rather at a different location with a facility called the Polo Grounds.

After 1904, the Americans/Red Sox would win 4 more Pennants in the next 14 seasons. The Highlanders/Yankees would have to wait another 17 years before winning their 1st, but then, they would pretty much keep winning them for the next 43 years.

John Dwight Chesbro, a.k.a. Happy Jack, won 41 games that season, and 198 in his Hall of Fame career for the Pirates and the Yankees (and, for the very last game of his career, the North Adams, Massachusetts native came home and pitched and lost one for the Red Sox). Sadly, he is mainly remembered not for all the games he won, but for one he lost, basically for one bad pitch that he threw. He died in 1931, age 57.

A shocking percentage of the 1904 Americans died young, what with that being the pre-antibiotic era, although the man named Denton True Young, a.k.a. Cy Young, lived to be 87. The last survivor of the 1904 Americans, and the 1903 team that won the 1st World Series, was shortstop Freddy Parent, a New England native, from Biddeford, Maine, who lived on until 1972, at the age of 96. The last surviving 1904 Highlander was 2nd baseman Jimmy Williams (no relation to later Red Sox manager Jimy Williams), who died in 1965.

October 10, 1920: Perhaps the most eventful game in World Series history unfolds at League Park in Cleveland. In the bottom of the 1st inning, Brooklyn Dodger pitcher Burleigh Grimes – 1 of 17 pitchers who will soon be allowed to continue throwing the spitball because it was their "bread-and-butter," or what we would call today his "out pitch," though the pitch will be outlawed for everyone else – gives up hits to Charlie Jamieson, Bill Wambsganss, and Indians center fielder/manager/legend Tris Speaker. Tribe outfielder Elmer Smith then hits the 1st grand slam in Series history.

In the 3rd‚ Jim Bagby comes up with 2 on, and crashes another Grimes delivery for a 3-run blast‚ the 1st home run ever by a pitcher in Series play.

In the 5th, with Pete Kilduff on 2nd and Otto Miller on 1st with nobody out, Dodger reliever Clarence Mitchell hits a line drive at 2nd baseman Wambsganss. One out. "Wamby" takes a couple of steps and tags Kilduff before he can get back to 2nd base.  Two out. Then he tags the off-and-running Miller, before he can see what’s happening and get back to 1st base. Three out. An unassisted triple play. And, 98 years later, this remains the only triple play of any kind in World Series history.

The Indians win, 8-1, and their 1st appearance in the World Series will soon be a successful one. But Wambsganss, suddenly nationally famous, will later lament that he had a pretty good career (and a case can be made that he was right), but that, for most people, he might as well have been born the day before this game and died the day after. As it turns out, Wamby died on December 8, 1985, in a suburb of Cleveland, where he'd lived all his life, making him 89 years old.

Also on this day, the Chicago Cardinals -- founded as the Normal Athletic Club in 1898 -- play their 1st game in the new league they'd help found, the American Professional Football Association. The APFA would become the NFL in 1922.

They play the league's other Chicago team -- not the Bears, who are still the Decatur Staleys in Downstate Illinois at this point, but the Chicago Tigers, at Cubs Park, which was renamed Wrigley Field in 1926. The game ends in a 0-0 tie.

Neither of these teams plays in Chicago today: The Tigers folded at the end of the season, and the Cardinals moved to St. Louis in 1960 and Arizona in 1988.

October 10, 1921, 100 years ago: Game 5 of the World Series. Waite Hoyt outpitches Art Nehf again, and the Yankees beat the Giants 3-1. But it will be Game 2 of 1923 before the Yankees win another Series game.

October 10, 1923: For the 1st time, the brand-new Yankee Stadium hosts a World Series game. The Yankees take a quick 3-0 lead over the 2-time defending champion Giants, but Heinie Groh triples in 2 runs in a 4-run 3rd that drives Waite Hoyt to cover.

A 4-4 tie is broken in the top of the 9th by the Giants, when a shot by Giant outfielder Charles Dillon Stengel rolls to the outfield wall. The sore-legged veteran hobbles around the bases, having lost a shoe while running, to score the winning run against reliever Bullet Joe Bush before 55‚307 spectators, a record for a Series game at the time.

Yes, Casey Stengel. As he told a rookie Mickey Mantle, shocked that he'd played, "What, do you think I was born old?" He was actually a decent player, from 1912 to 1925, a good-fielding right fielder with a .284 lifetime batting average and a career OPS+ of 120. In 1914, playing for the Dodgers, he led the NL with a .404 on-base percentage. One of the few players to win Pennants with both of New York's NL teams, he did so with the Dodgers in 1916 and the Giants in 1921, '22 and '23.

This is also the 1st Series to be broadcast on a nationwide radio network. Graham McNamee‚ aided by baseball writers taking turns‚ is at the mike. Grantland Rice had broadcast an earlier World Series‚ but not nationally. Rice was on hand, though, and wrote a column about Stengel's inside-the-park job, opening with the immortal words, "This is the way old Casey ran." Old? The man who would one day be known as "the Ol' Perfesser" wasn't yet old: He was 33, younger than a lot of great players, then and now.

October 10, 1924: With the score tied at 3-3 and one out in the bottom of the 12th in Game 7 of the World Series, Senators' backstop Muddy Ruel lifts a high catchable foul pop-up which Giant catcher Hank Gowdy misses when he stumbles over his own mask. Given a second chance, Ruel doubles. Earl McNeely then hits a grounder that strikes a pebble, and soars over the head of rookie Giant 3rd baseman Freddie Lindstrom, and drives home Ruel with the winning run making the Senators World Champions.

Walter Johnson, who had brilliantly toiled 18 seasons for a team known as "Washington: First in war, first in peace, and last in the American League," and had lost Games 1 and 4, pitched the 9th through 12th innings in relief, and not only had finally won a World Series game, but had won a World Series.

The Senators had their 1st World Championship in 24 years of trying. Outfielder George "Showboat" Fisher was the last survivor of the 1924 Senators, living until 1994, age 95. It took 95 years for another Washington baseball team has won another postseason series, but Nationals, having squandered National League Eastern Division titles in 2012, '14, '16 and '17, won the 2019 World Series.

October 10, 1926: For the 1st time, Yankee Stadium hosts a Game 7 of the World Series. The Yankees trail the St. Louis Cardinals 3-2 in the bottom of the 7th inning, but Cardinal starter Jesse Haines, a future Hall-of-Famer, develops a blister on his hand, and can’t pitch any further.

Rogers Hornsby, the great-hitting 2nd baseman who doubles as the Cardinal manager, brings in another future HOFer, Grover Cleveland Alexander. Old Alex (also nicknamed "Pete") had pitched and won Game 6 yesterday, but celebrated afterward, and legend has it that he was really hungover.

Even if he wasn't, he had gone the distance the day before. And he was 39, and an alcoholic, and also suffered from epilepsy, and was troubled by what he had seen in World War I (which, along with his epilepsy, he tried to treat with his drinking.) One of the greatest pitchers of all time, and he would retire with a total of 373 victories, tied for 3rd all-time with Christy Mathewson (sharing 1st all-time in National League wins, as Walter Johnson’s 417 were all in the American League and Cy Young's 511 were split between both Leagues), but he was now a shadow of his former self.

And he comes in with a 1-run lead, the bases loaded, and a dangerous hitter at the plate, Tony Lazzeri. Although just a rookie at the major-league level, Lazzeri had hit 60 home runs in a Pacific Coast League season, and would have been the American League's Rookie of the Year had the award existed in 1926. Lazzeri hits a long drive down the left-field line, but just foul. That brings the count to 0-and-2.  Alexander fires in, and Lazzeri strikes out.

It is the most famous strikeout in baseball history -- unless you want to count "the mighty Casey" in Ernest Thayer's poem "Casey At the Bat" -- and, according to legend, it ended the World Series, turning Alexander into a bigger hero than ever.

Except it didn't end the game. There were 2 more innings to play. Alexander got through the 8th, and with 1 out to go in the 9th, he walked Babe Ruth. Then, for reasons known only to him – Yankee manager Miller Huggins said he hadn't given him the signal to try – the Babe tried to steal 2nd base. Catcher Bob O’Farrell threw in, and Hornsby slapped the tag on him.

The Babe was out, the game was over, and for the 1st time in 40 years – since the Cardinals, then known as the Browns, won the 1886 American Association Pennant and defeated the Chicago team now known as the Cubs in a postseason series – a St. Louis baseball team was World Champions.

This was also the 1st time the Yankees had played a Game 7 of a World Series, and they lost it. Actually, the Yankees' record in World Series Game 7s isn't especially good. They've won in 1947, 1952, 1956, 1958 and 1962; they've lost in 1926, 1955, 1957, 1960, 1964 and 2001, for a record of 5-6. At home at the old Yankee Stadium, it was even worse: 1-3. But they've still won more World Series in a Game 7 than all but 6 franchises have won Series regardless of how long they've gone – and the number drops to 4 if you only count the Series they've won in their current cities.

Alexander was a hero all over again, true, but it was a last stand. He helped the Cards back into the World Series in 1928, but this time the Yankees knocked him around. He spent much of his retirement trading his story of how he struck out Lazzeri for drinks.

In 1945, interviewed for John P. Carmichael’s book My Greatest Day In Baseball, he told of meeting Lazzeri on the street in New York, and telling him, "Tony, I'm getting tired of fanning you." And Lazzeri told him, "Perhaps you think I'm not." Alexander's health problems killed him in 1950, aged only 63.

Incredibly, he outlived Lazzeri. Lazzeri would rebound from this strikeout to help the Yankees win 5 World Series, bridging the 1920s Ruth-Gehrig Yankees to the 1930s Gehrig-DiMaggio Yankees. But he, too, had epilepsy. In 1946, he suffered a seizure at his home, fell down the stairs, and broke his neck. He was just 43.

And, unlike Alexander, he did not live long enough to see his election to the Baseball Hall of Fame. He was finally elected in 1991, 53 years after Alexander was so honored. Sadly, for all each man did, each had a hard life, and each is still best remembered for that one at-bat. This is due in large part to the 1952 film The Winning Team, starring Ronald Reagan as Alexander, Doris Day as his wife Annie, and Frank Lovejoy as Hornsby.

The last survivor from the 1926 World Champion St. Louis Cardinals was infielder George "Specs" Toporcer -- so nicknamed because he was one of the few players to wear glasses on the field in that era -- a Manhattan native who died in 1989 on Long Island, age 90.

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October 10, 1931, 90 years ago: With John "Pepper" Martin tying a World Series record with 12 hits, the St. Louis Cardinals defeat the Philadelphia Athletics, 4-2 in Game 7, and take the Series, denying the A's the chance to become the 1st team to win 3 straight Series.

Burleigh Grimes, as I mentioned the last pitcher legally allowed to throw a spitball, and still very much at it 11 years after that epic game in Cleveland, had a shutout going in the 9th, but tired, and Cardinal manager Gabby Street had to call on Bill Hallahan to nail down the win. "Wild Bill" did not live up to his nickname, and finished the A's off.

The A's would not win another Pennant for 41 years, and that would only come after moving twice. By that point, the Cards had won another 8 Pennants.

Infielder Ray Cunningham, who played just 3 games that season, and not at all in the Series, plus 11 more games the next season before fading, was the last survivor of the 1931 World Champion Cardinals, dying in 2005, age 100.

October 10, 1937: The Yankees defeat the Giants, 4-2 in Game 5 at the Polo Grounds, and win their 2nd straight World Series, their 6th overall. This moves them past the Giants and the A's to become the team with the most Series won. They have never seriously been threatened as such.

This is the last game in a Yankee uniform for the aforementioned Tony Lazzeri. "Poosh-em-up Tony" went 1-for-3. Joe DiMaggio and Myril Hoag hit home runs, to make a winner out of Lefty Gomez. The Yankees released Lazzeri, making him a free agent and allowing him to sign with anyone he wanted. He signed with the Cubs, and won another Pennant in 1938, but lost to the Yankees in the World Series.

As for the Giants, here is a team that had Hall-of-Famers in Mel Ott, Carl Hubbell and player-manager Bill Terry, and had won their 3rd Pennant in the last 5 seasons, but had only won the Series in 1 of them, and would only win 1 more over the next 72 seasons. So not only did the club not get the credit it deserved at the time, but the franchise has never really been the same, either.

The last survivor of the 1937 Yankees was Tommy Henrich, who died in 2009, at the age of 96.  He was also the last survivor of the Yankee World Championship teams of 1938, 1939, 1940 and 1941.

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October 10, 1941, 80 years ago: Dallas Earl Smith is born in Hamiota, Manitoba, Canada. A defenseman, he made 4 All-Star Games with the Boston Bruins, and 4 Stanley Cup Finals with them, winning in 1970 and 1972. He was invited to play for Team Canada in the 1972 "Summit Series" with the Soviet Union, but declined, because his farm needed his attention. He is still alive, and a member of the Manitoba Hockey Hall of Fame.

October 10, 1945: The Detroit Tigers beat the Chicago Cubs, 9-3 at Wrigley Field, to win Game 7 and the World Series. Hal Newhouser, the American League's Most Valuable Player this year and last, strikes out 10. Bloomfield, New Jersey native Hank Borowy, who had helped the Yankees win the '43 Series, and had already won 20 games in the regular season and 2 in this Series, has nothing left to give, and gives up 6 runs in the 1st inning.

With several players still in the service, this game marks the end of the World War II era in baseball. This also remained, for 71 years, the last World Series game the Chicago Cubs have ever played. Left fielder Ed Mierkowicz was the last survivor from the '45 Tigers, while shortstop Lennie Merullo was the last survivor from the '45 Cubs.

From Merullo's death on May 30, 2015 until October 25, 2016, there were no living people who had played in a World Series game for the Chicago Cubs.

October 10, 1946, 75 years ago: Game 4 of the World Series at Fenway Park. This is the only Series game in which 3 teammates got at least 4 hits: St. Louis Cardinals Enos Slaughter (including a home run), Whitey Kurowski and Joe Garagiola. Wally Moses of the Boston Red Sox also got 4 hits, but the Cardinals win, 12-3, and tie up the Series.

Also on this day, William Allen Thompson is born in Greenville, South Carolina. A safety, Bill Thompson made 3 Pro Bowls, and helped the Denver Broncos win their 1st AFC Championship in 1977, although they lost Super Bowl XII. He is the only man in NFL history to recover 4 fumbles and return them for touchdowns, and the Broncos have inducted him into their Ring of Fame.

Also on this day, Peter Joseph Mahovlich is born in Timmins, Ontario. At 6-foot-5 and 210 pounds, he really shouldn't have been called "Little M," but his brother Frank, 6-foot-1 and 205, was already an NHL superstar and known as "Big M" by the time Pete arrived with the Detroit Red Wings in 1966.

In 1969, Pete was traded to the Montreal Canadiens, and he was joined by Frank a year later. (They'd also been teammates in Detroit, after Frank won 4 Stanley Cups with the Toronto Maple Leafs.) Together, they won Stanley Cups in 1971 and '73. Frank was already 33 and in decline at the time of the 1972 Canada-Soviet "Summit Series," but Pete was not yet 26 and approaching his prime, and was chosen for Team Canada, scoring a shorthanded goal in Game 2 to help save his countrymen. He also played on Canada's 1976 Canada Cup winners, the 1st time hockey had anything resembling a World Cup.

Pete also won Cups with the Habs (without Frank) in 1976 and '77, and continued playing until 1982, scoring 288 goals. He is now a scout for the Florida Panthers.

Also on this day, John Prine is born in Maywood, Illinois, outside Chicago. He died on April 7, 2020, from COVID-19. As far as I know, he had nothing to do with sports, and I only know one of his songs, but it should have been written decades earlier, as a memo to Pete Townshend, Jimi Hendrix and so many others:

There oughta be a law, with no bail:

Smash a guitar and you go to jail.

With no chance for early parole.

You don’t get out ‘til you get some soul.

It breaks my heart to see these stars

smashing a perfectly good guitar.

I don’t know who they think they are

smashing a perfectly good guitar.

Also on this day, Walter Charles Dance is born in Redditch, Worcestershire, England. As far as I know, the man who (having dropped his first name) played Lord Tywin Lannister on Game of Thrones has nothing to do with sports.

Also on this day, the Noakhali Riots break out in India. The process of independence would ultimately, on August 15, 1947, lead to the mostly-Hindu nation of India and the all-Muslim nation of Pakistan, and the violence would get worse after that.

Eventually, in 1971, East Pakistan, separated from the rest of the nation by India, would be the independent nation of Bangladesh, and this is where Noakhali is. Muslims killed about 5,000 Hindus, and thousands of others were forcibly converted. Hundreds of women were raped.

No less than Mohandas Gandhi himself went there to try to convince people to stop, but he failed. The violence continued for a week, and about 75,000 people were made refugees as a result.

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October 10, 1951, 70 years ago: The Yankees defeat the New York Giants, 4-3 in Game 6 at Yankee Stadium, and win their 3rd straight World Series, their 14th World Championship. The Giants had taken 2 of the 1st 3 games in this Series, but the Yanks took 3 straight to win.

Joe DiMaggio goes 1-for-2 with 2 walks. In the bottom of the 8th, he laces a double to left-center off Larry Jansen. It turns out to be the last at-bat of his career, as he announces his retirement 2 months later.

His intended center field successor, Mickey Mantle, had gotten hurt in right field in Game 2, and missed the rest of the Series, and the knee he injured would never be the same again, the beginning of a cloud over his career that would only grow. The "other" great rookie center fielder, Willie Mays of the Giants, had a poor Series, and would spend most of the next 2 seasons in the Army in the Korean War. But both Mantle and Mays would be back, and would resume building their legends.

Bobby Brown, who died earlier this year, was that last surviving '51 Yankee.

October 10, 1956: Game 7 at Ebbets Field. A pair of Jersey boys start: Johnny Kucks of Hoboken, Hudson County, for the Yankees; Don Newcombe of Elizabeth, Union County, for the Dodgers. The

New York Post’s headline reads: 

Kucks vs. Newk and…
THERE’S
NO
TOMORROW

(Sorry, I looked for a photo of it online, and couldn't find it.)

The Post is right: Win or lose, this is it for one of the best seasons in New York baseball history, as the Yankees had Mantle's Triple Crown & MVP season; the Dodgers had a fantastic Pennant race, over the Reds, Cardinals and Braves, edging the Braves by 1 game, a season highlighted by no-hitters from Carl Erskine and former Giant nemesis Sal Maglie; and the World Series had Don Larsen's perfect game in Game 5 and a 1-0 10-inning Dodger win in Game 6. This is Game 7. This is it.

The Yankees turn out to be "it": They shell Newk, with 2 homers from Yogi Berra and a grand slam from Bill "Moose" Skowron. Kucks hardly needs to pitch a shutout, but does, and the Yankees win, 9-0. The Dodgers had been World Champions of baseball for 372 days.

The last out turns out to be the last play in the career of Jackie Robinson: He strikes out swinging, but Yogi drops the ball, a flash of the Mickey Owen & Tommy Henrich play 15 years earlier. His weight up and his speed down, but his instincts as keen as ever, Robinson sees what's happening, and runs to 1st base. But, as I said, his great speed is gone, and Yogi quickly picks up the ball, and throws him out. Jackie retires 2 months later.

What no one knows at the time -- not Robinson, not even Dodger owner Walter O'Malley -- is the extent of the finality of this game. It is not just the end of a terrific baseball season. It is the last Subway Series game for 44 years -- 33 years if you count the 1989 "BART Series."

It is the last home game in a World Series for a National League team from New York for 13 years. And it is the last postseason game that Ebbets Field, or Brooklyn, will ever host. The next season, the Giants will announce they are moving to San Francisco, and the Dodgers will announce they are moving to Los Angeles. "There's no tomorrow," indeed.

There are now 4 surviving Yankees from the 1956 World Champions: Ralph Terry, Bobby Richardson, and 2 players who barely played that season, Billy Hunter and Lou Skizas.

October 10, 1957: Game 7 of the World Series. Warren Spahn, the only remaining Brave from the 1948 Boston Pennant winners, is the intended starter for the Milwaukee Braves, but he's got the flu. So manager Fred Haney turns to Lew Burdette on 2 days' rest.

Lew comes through, notching his 3rd win and 2nd shutout of the Series, as the Braves beat the Yankees 5-0. A 4-run 3rd inning does the job, including a double by Eddie Mathews, followed by a single by Hank Aaron. The last out, in front of a stunned 61,207 at Yankee Stadium, is Skowron grounding to Mathews, who steps on 3rd base for a force play.

It was stunning because most people outside the Upper Midwest -- the Braves' "territory" at the time included Wisconsin, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and States that would later belong to the Twins, such as Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota and even northern Iowa -- didn't give the Braves a chance. Some Yankees had actually called Milwaukee "Bushville" for the way they'd reacted to their team, after having been a minor-league town for half a century.

Many years later, in 2012, John Klima would title his book about the '57 Braves Bushville Wins! The Wild Saga of the 1957 Milwaukee Braves and the Screwballs, Sluggers, and Beer Swiggers Who Canned the New York Yankees and Changed Baseball. It's a wonder he had room for the actual book.

Burdette, a 30-year-old righthander from West Virginia, is named the Series MVP, having tossed 24 consecutive scoreless innings -- longest in Series play to that point except for Babe Ruth's 29 2/3rds -- and posted a 0.64 ERA in his 3 Fall classic victories. Oh yeah: The losing pitcher in Game 7 was the previous season's Series hero, Don Larsen.

At the time, the Yankees were criticized for having traded Burdette to the Braves in 1951, for All-Star pitcher Johnny Sain. However, Sain helped the Yankees win 3 World Series; the Braves won just 1 with Burdette.

Amazingly, considering how long their careers lasted, this was the only World Championship won by either Aaron or Spahn. But it was the 2nd for Red Schoendienst, Del Rice and Nippy Jones, who had been on the 1946 Cardinals. And Mathews would win another, closing his career with the 1968 Tigers.

This remains the only World Series ever won by a Milwaukee team, 64 years later. Despite all that talent, the Braves lost the Series in 1958, and never got back into the Series until 1991. From 1914 (in Boston) to 1995 (in Atlanta), this was the only World Series they won in a span of 81 years.

Indeed, from 1898, when they won the Pennant of the only major league then available, to today, 123 years, they've won just 3 World Championships. That's 1 every 41 years. I like to joke about the Mets, but they've won 2 in 54 years -- 1 every 27 years. The Red Sox, since 1918? 3 in 98 years -- 1 every 33 years. No matter what city they're in, the Braves are underachievers. And the Brewers, having won only 1 Pennant in 51 seasons, haven't helped Milwaukee improve their record.

There are 6 players still alive from the '57 Braves: Shortstop Felix Mantilla, Newark native infielder Bobby Malkmus, infielder Mel Roach, outfielder John "Thumper" DeMerit, and pitchers Taylor "T-Bone" Phillips and Joey Jay (who only appeared in 1 game that year, but would go on to become the ace of the 1961 Reds, and won their only victory in that year's World Series against the Yankees).

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October 10, 1961, 60 years ago: An expansion draft is held to stock the New York Mets and the Houston Colt .45's (forerunners of the Astros). Houston's 1st selection is Giants infielder Eddie Bressoud, but they soon trade him to the Red Sox for shortstop Don Buddin. He doesn't last a full season with the team, either.

The Mets' 1st pick is also a Giant, catcher Hobart "Hobie" Landrith. Asked why, manager-to-be Casey Stengel says, "You gotta have a catcher. If you don't have a catcher, you're gonna have a lot of passed balls."

Landrith washes out, and the Mets choose Clarence "Choo Choo" Coleman as their catcher for the rest of their 1st season. This proves to be a mistake. Landrith plays all of 24 games for the Mets before he becomes the player to be named later in the trade with the Baltimore Orioles that gets them... Marv Throneberry. He played 1 more season in the majors, and that was it.

Hobie Landrith, the original Met, grew up in Detroit, played 14 major league seasons, batted .233 lifetime, and never played for a postseason team. He worked for Volkswagen, married and had 5 children, and is now 91 years old.

October 10, 1964: The Yankees and Cardinals are tied 1-1 in Game 3 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium, going into the bottom of the 9th. Barney Schultz, a knuckleballer, comes on to relieve for the Cardinals. In the on-deck circle, Mickey Mantle watches Schultz warm up, times Schultz's knuckler in his head, and says to Elston Howard, standing there with him, "You can go back to the clubhouse, Elston. This game is over."

Schultz threw Mantle one pitch. Mickey deposited it in the upper deck in right field. Yankees 2, Cardinals 1 -- which was also now the Yankees' lead in the Series. It was Mickey's 16th home run in World Series play, surpassing the record he shared with Babe Ruth. He would hit a 17th in Game 6 and an 18th in Game 7, but the Cards would come back and win the Series. Still, Mickey would often speak of this homer, his only walkoff homer in postseason play, as the highlight of his career.

Whether Ruth called his shot in the 1932 World Series is still debated, but Mickey sure called his shot here. He was asked how many others he called. "Well, I called my shot about 500 times," he would say with a laugh. "This was about the only one that worked."

Mickey would later call this home run the highlight of his career. It was understandable: Not only did it win a World Series game, something only 4 other players had ever done with a home run to that point (Tommy Henrich of the '49 Yankees, Dusty Rhodes of the '54 Giants, Eddie Mathews of the '57 Braves and Bill Mazeroski of the '60 Pirates), but it was against the Cardinals, the team he grew up rooting for as a boy (since they were the closest team to Commerce, Oklahoma, over 300 miles away).

October 10, 1968: Mickey Lolich wins his 3rd game of the Series – matching Harry Brecheen as the only lefthander ever to do it thus far – and the Detroit Tigers win their 1st World Series in 23 years (to the day), beating the indomitable Bob Gibson and the defending champion St. Louis Cardinals in Game 7, 4-1 at Busch Memorial Stadium.

Mike Shannon hits a home run for the Cardinals, Jim Northrup's triple over the normally sure-fielding Curt Flood in the top of the 7th makes the difference. In the bottom of the 7th, Roger Maris, the Cardinals' right fielder pops up to short, closing an 0-for-3 day. It is the last at-bat of his career, as he has already decided to retire.

After the race riot and near-miss for the Pennant in 1967, after 23 years without a Pennant (let alone a title), after 11 years without a World Championship in any sport (since the 1957 NFL Champion Lions), and after 16 years without a Pennant for their legendary star Al Kaline, Detroit needed this World Championship very badly. With Kaline, Lolich, Northrup and Willie Horton being the stars of the Tigers' comeback from 3-games-to-1 down, the '68 Tigers remain the most beloved team in the history of Michigan sports, ahead of any Lions, Pistons, Red Wings, Michigan Wolverine or Michigan State Spartan team.

Lolich, who would retire with 217 wins and as the all-time strikeout leader among lefthanders with 2,832, was criticized for being fat. He was the original "hefty lefty." He was 6 feet even, and is usually listed as having been 210 pounds. Seriously, that was considered fat for a pitcher in 1968. Paging David Wells. Paging CC Sabathia. And on the right side, paging Bartolo Colon. Paging Rich Garces.

There are 13 surviving members of the 1968 Tigers, 52 years later: Lolich, Horton, Denny McLain, Dick Tracewski, Mickey Stanley, Don Wert, Jim Price, John Hiller, Tom Matchick, Fred Lasher, Wayne Comer, John Warden and Daryl Patterson.

October 10, 1969: This is the day on which the 2000 film Frequency begins, a sort-of time travel story involving a fireman father (Dennis Quaid) and a cop son (Jim Caviezel) who must solve a mystery across time and a ham radio set, while the Mets pursue their "Miracle" World Series, which becomes a plot point in the film. The film's "present" begins on October 10, 1999.

In 2016, a TV show was based on it. The "past" was in 1996, a 20-year difference instead of 30 years. There was no subplot involving the Yankees' postseason run. The father (Riley Smith) was still named Frank Sullivan, but he was also a cop, not a fireman; and the cop child was a woman instead of a man, Raimy Sullivan (Peyton List).

*

October 10, 1970: Game 1 of the World Series. The game is played at Cincinnati's new Riverfront Stadium, making it the 1st Series game ever played on artificial turf. So this is a date which lives in infamy. The year's biggest musical sensation, the Jackson 5 (including 12-year-old Michael), sings the National Anthem.

The Baltimore Orioles come from 3-0 down to beat the Cincinnati Reds 4-3, on home runs by Boog Powell, Elrod Hendricks and Brooks Robinson. Brooks will be the big star of this Series, but due to his defensive wizardry, his many offensive contributions (including a few in this Series) have been nearly forgotten.

Also on this day, the Buffalo Sabres make their NHL debut. They play away to the Pittsburgh Penguins, who will become their arch-rivals, and beat them 2-1 at the Civic Arena. They are coached by George "Punch" Imlach, also their 1st general manager, who had coached and managed the Toronto Maple Leafs (who became another Sabres rival, also due to proximity) to 4 Stanley Cups in the 1960s.

The Sabres have usually been a good team, but have only made the Stanley Cup Finals twice, losing in 1975 and, controversially, in 1999. They played at the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium until 1996, moving a short walk away to the arena now known as the KeyBank Center.

October 10, 1971, 50 years ago: The San Francisco 49ers, after 25 seasons at Kezar Stadium, play their 1st game at an expanded Candlestick Park. They lose 20-13 to their arch-rivals, the Los Angeles Rams.

Also on this day, Upstairs, Downstairs – or, as it could be called today, “Downton Abbey Classic” – premieres on ITV. It tells the story of the Bellamy family, wealthy residents of London's posh Belgravia neighborhood, and their "downstairs" servants, between 1903 and 1930.

It runs for 5 seasons. In America, it later airs on PBS, perhaps becoming the definitive Masterpiece Theatre series.

October 10, 1973: As Vice President Spiro Agnew is pleading no contest to income-tax evasion and resigning his office, Tom Seaver holds off the Reds, the Mets win, 7-2, and the fans storm the field at Shea Stadium to celebrate the Mets' 2nd Pennant in 5 seasons.

October 10, 1976: Giants Stadium opens at the Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, New Jersey. For the 1st time in their 52-season history, the New York Giants football team has a home field where they get priority for scheduling.

What they don't get is exclusive use. The New York Jets will move in for the 1984 season. The football team at Rutgers University will also use it for home games too big for their 23,000-seat on-campus stadium from 1976 to 1992, for their entire 1993 season when their stadium is rebuilt, and occasionally from 1994 onward.

Other college football games will be played there, including the short-lived Kickoff Classic and the even-shorter-lived Garden State Bowl. A few high school State Championship games will be played there. Lots of soccer games, including the New York Cosmos (1977-84), the New York/New Jersey MetroStars/Red Bulls (1996-2009), and games of the 1994 World Cup. Lots of concerts. And a 1995 Mass by Pope John Paul II.

October 10, 1977: The Chicago Bears beat the Los Angeles Rams 24-23 at Soldier Field. Joe Namath completes 16 of 40 passes for the Rams. The former Jet hero never plays another professional game.

October 10, 1978: The 75th World Series gets underway at Dodger Stadium. The Yankees were upset at being Las Vegas underdogs despite not only being the defending World Champions, but facing the team they'd beaten the previous season.

The reasoning was that the Dodgers now had an improved bullpen (as if the Yankees didn't), and that the Dodgers would be emotionally lifted by dedicating the Series to their coach Jim Gilliam, who died 2 days earlier, a day after they clinched the Pennant against the Philadelphia Phillies, and whose Number 19 they officially retire on this day.

The Dodgers did make their point in Game 1: Although Reggie Jackson homered for the 4th straight game in Series play, off a Tommy John sinker, Ed Figueroa was knocked out early, and Yankee pitching was tagged by 2 homers from Davey Lopes (mainly a contact hitter and base stealer, but against the Yankees he became a slugger) and 1 by Dusty Baker, and the Dodgers won 11-5.

*

October 10, 1980: After 3 failed attempts, the 4th time is the charm for the Kansas City Royals. George Brett's mammoth home run off Goose Gossage gives the Royals a 4-2 win and a sweep of the American League Championship Series, for the 1st major league Pennant for a Kansas City team – the 1st Pennant won by any KC team since the Blues won the American Association Pennant in 1953.

October 10, 1981, 40 years ago: George Vukovich hits a home run in the bottom of the 10th inning, to give the Phillies a 6-5 win over the Montreal Expos, and send the 1st-ever, Strike-forced National League Division Series to a decisive Game 5 at Veterans Stadium.

Also on this day, Eddie Murphy plays a grownup version of the Our Gang/Little Rascals character Buckwheat on Saturday Night Live for the 1st time, complete with speech impediment. Ironically, the real Buckwheat, Billie Thomas, had died exactly 1 year to the day before, at age 49. The surviving members of the Rascals did not appreciate the performance.

On March 12, 1983, SNL showed a sketch in which Murphy's Buckwheat was assassinated, in a sequence very similar to President Ronald Reagan's shooting 2 years earlier. The following week, "Buckwheat's funeral" was shown, with scenes of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev's funeral the previous November standing in, complete with goose-stepping Red Army soldiers and tanks. Footage of a very somber-looking Princess Diana was inserted, to make it look like she attended.

Eddie also played Buckwheat's assassin, John David Stutts -- 3 names, just like John Wilkes Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald and Mark David Chapman. Stutts said his dog told him to kill Buckwheat, the excuse of David "Son of Sam" Berkowitz. Then Stutts himself was shot and killed while in police custody, like Oswald.

October 10, 1982: The Milwaukee Brewers win their 1st Pennant, the 1st by any Milwaukee team since the '58 Braves, beating the California Angels, 4-3 at Milwaukee County Stadium -- and on the 25th Anniversary of the Braves' World Series win, no less.

The Angels had blown a 2-games-to-none lead, the 1st time this had ever happened in an LCS. In their 1st World Series, the Brewers will play the St. Louis Cardinals, who win their Pennant in 14 years today by beating the Atlanta Braves, 6-2 to complete a sweep. Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium had now hosted exactly 3 postseason games in its 17 seasons. It would be 9 years before it hosted another, but then it would host many more.

October 10, 1987: Princeton University beats Columbia University, 39-8 at Palmer Stadium in Princeton, New Jersey. Columbia thus loses their 35th straight game, a new record for Division I college football.

They would extend the record to 44 the next year, before beating, of all teams, Princeton. But Prairie View A&M, a historically black school outside Houston, would double the disaster: 88 games. The old record, still the Division I-A/Football Bowl Subdivision record, is 34, by Northwestern, which broke their streak in 1982.

I was at this game, and there was a small contingent of Northwestern fans at the top of the east side of the Palmer Stadium horseshoe, holding up a banner reading, "THANK YOU COLUMBIA." I sat on the west side, and saw Princeton's last touchdown scored on an interception by a safety, wearing Number 11, who was so fast, he looked like he was flying.

Just 6 years later, he would be flying. His name was Dean Cain, and from 1993 to 1997, he starred with Teri Hatcher in Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman.

By a weird coincidence, the man who was then the movies' Superman, Christopher Reeve, grew up in Princeton, and graduated from Princeton Day School and was accepted at Princeton University, but chose another Ivy League school, Cornell in Western New York. Cain, who dated Brooke Shields while they both attended Princeton, grew up in Malibu, California, attending Santa Monica High School with acting brothers Rob and Chad Lowe, and Charlie Sheen (but not Charlie's older brother Emilio Estevez).

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October 10, 1990: The Oakland Athletics win their 3rd straight Pennant, the 1st team since the 1976-78 Yankees to do so, beating the Red Sox, 3-1 at the Oakland Coliseum. Red Sox starter Roger Clemens is ejected after arguing with plate umpire Terry Cooney over a ball-four call in the 2nd inning.

Clemens remains the last player to be thrown out of a postseason game. Funny, but, at the time, nobody suspected "roid rage."

October 10, 1996, 25 years ago: The Orioles beat the Yankees in Game 2 of the ALCS, 5-3, to tie the series. The key blow is a 7th inning home run by Rafael Palmeiro. Funny, but when O's fans talk about how the Yankees benefited unfairly from the Jeffrey Maier play the day before, they never follow it up with how they benefited from a home run by a proven steroid user.

The next 3 games will be at Camden Yards, and the O's and their fans are sure they will beat the Yankees and win the Pennant. Instead, they will not win another game that counts until April 2, 1997.

Also on this day, the Phoenix Coyotes play their 1st home game. They get goals from veterans Mike Gartner, Craig Janney and Kris King, and from Shane Doan on his 20th birthday, and beat the San Jose Sharks 4-1 at the AmericaWest Arena (now the Talking Stick Resort Arena) in downtown Phoenix.

The team will move to what's now named the Gila River Arena in suburban Glendale in 2003, and rename themselves the Arizona Coyotes in 2014. Their best performance to date has been in the 2010-11 season, reaching the Western Conference Finals. Despite their recent success and their relatively new arena, they are still struggling financially -- the NHL's salary cap is not a cure-all after all -- and could still move within the next few years.

The funny thing is, the previous major league hockey team in Arizona was the World Hockey Association's Phoenix Roadrunners. Fans of old cartoons would say that it's ridiculous for the Roadrunners to be succeeded by the Coyotes. In real life, though, coyotes are faster.

Also on this day, Cameron Gellman (no middle name) is born outside St. Louis in Clayton, Missouri. He plays Rick Tyler, son and successor of Dr. Rex Tyler as the superhero Hourman, on The CW series Stargirl. (In flashback scenes, Rex is played by Lou Ferrigno Jr., son of the man who once played the Hulk.)

October 10, 1998: El Duque to the rescue. Having pitched for the 2 most demanding bosses in the Western Hemisphere, George Steinbrenner and Fidel Castro, no way was a little bit of Cleveland cold going to stop Orlando Hernandez. He pitches a 4-hit shutout (with 1 inning of help each from Mike Stanton and Mariano Rivera), and the Yankees win, 4-0, and tie up the ALCS at 2 games apiece.

Chuck Knoblauch, whose "brainlauch" in Game 2 put the Yankees on a minor slide, starts a key 4-6-3 double play in the 8th to eliminate the last Indian threat. He is on his way to redemption.

Also on this day, the Nashville Predators make their NHL debut -- 3 years after the League threatened to move the New Jersey Devils to Nashvillee, despite the Devils being in the Stanley Cup Finals (which they won). They host the Florida Panthers at the Nashville Arena (since renamed the Bridgestone Arena), but lose 1-0.

It would take them 6 years to qualify for the Playoffs for the 1st time, and 12 to win a Playoff series. It took them until 2011 to win a Playoff series, but they got better, including making their 1st trip to the Stanley Cup in 2017.

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October 10, 2001, 20 years ago: Eddie Futch dies at age 90. Born in Mississippi, and raised in Detroit at the same time as Alabama-born Joe Louis, he became a Golden Gloves winner, but is better known as a trainer. In 1958, he trained his 1st world champion: Don Jordan, who took the Welterweight title.

Among the fighters he trained were Joe Frazier, Ken Norton, Larry Holmes and Trevor Berbick -- 4 of the 5 men who defeated Muhammad Ali. He also trained Riddick Bowe when he gave Evander Holyfield his 1st professional loss, and Montell Griffin when he did the same to Roy Jones Jr. He also trained Alexis Arguello.

But he's probably best known for not letting a badly beaten, practically blinded Frazier go back out for a 15th and final round in his 3rd fight with Ali, "The Thrilla in Manila," on October 1, 1975. Frazier badly wanted to continue, but Futch said, "The fight's over, Joe. No one will forget what you did here today."

This would be mirrored a year later in the film Rocky when Apollo Creed's trainer Tony "Duke" Evers told him, "Champ, you're bleeding inside. I'm going to stop the fight." Unlike Smokin' Joe, who made a cameo appearance in the ring before that fight, Apollo, foreshadowing his death 10 years later at the hands of Ivan Drago, told Duke, "You ain't stoppin' nothin'!" Frazier listened to Futch, and Ali was declared the winner... and then collapsed in the ring. Did Futch save Frazier from serious injury, or even death... or victory? We'll never know.

October 10, 2005: The Los Angeles Angels of Katella Boulevard, Anaheim, Orange County, California, U.S.A., North America, Western Hemisphere, Planet Earth, Sol System, United Federation of Planets, Milky Way Galaxy, Known Universe, beat the Yankees‚ 5-3‚ to win their Division Series in 5 games. Rookie Ervin Santana gets the win in relief of Bartolo Colon. Garret Anderson homers for L.A., while Derek Jeter connects for the Yanks.

It is a humiliating defeat for the Yankees, who lose to the Angels in a Division Series for the 2nd time in 4 years. Naturally, I blamed Alex Rodriguez. And Randy Johnson. But, the truth is, just about nobody did a good job for the Yankees in this series. It took until the 2009 ALCS for the Yankees to beat the Angels in a postseason series.

October 10, 2011, 10 years ago: Game 2 of the ALCS. In the 11th inning, Nelson Cruz hits the 1st walkoff grand slam in postseason history, giving the Rangers a 7-3 win over the Tigers. (Officially, Robin Ventura's hit to win Game 5 of the 1999 NLCS for the Mets was ruled a single because his teammates, so eager to celebrate, wouldn't let him past 1st base.)

Cruz will be named MVP of the ALCS, setting a new record with 6 home runs in a single postseason series. And the Mets, while he was still in the minor leagues, let him get away. However, in 2013, the steroid police got him.

October 10, 2012: Game 3 of the ALDS. The Yankees come from 2-1 down in the bottom of the 9th when Raúl Ibañez hits a home run. He hits another in the 12th, and the Yankees win 3-2. This remains the most recent postseason walkoff homer by a Yankee -- the 12th overall.

October 10, 2015: One of the most controversial games in Met history is played at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. The Mets lead 2-1 in the bottom of the 7th, thanks to solo home runs by Yoenis Cespedes and Michael Conforto, but Dodger starter Zack Greinke has only allowed 3 other hits.

Thus far, Noah Syndergaard has lived up to his "Thor" nickname. But with 1 out in the 7th -- 8 outs from going up 2 games to none with the next 3 games set for New York -- Enrique Hernández draws a walk. The Dodgers' manager, a guy you might have heard of, named Don Mattingly, sends former Philadelphia Phillies hero and longtime Met nemesis Chase Utley up to pinch-hit for Greinke.
Hernández steals 2nd, and Utley singles him over to 3rd. Terry Collins sends 42-year-old big fat steroid cheat Bartolo Colón in to relieve Syndergaard.

The batter is Howie Kendrick, who lines a shot over Colón's outstretched arm. Daniel Murphy takes it on a hop, and he attempts to start a double play by throwing to shortstop Rubén Tejada, who covers 2nd. But Utley slides late, and his batting helmet, with his head inside it, crashes into Tejada's leg. Tejada goes down, injured and out for the rest of the postseason. Hernández scores, Kendrick is safe at 1st, and the game is tied 2-2.

Mattingly challenges the ruling, to make it even better for the Dodgers: He argues that Tejada never touched 2nd, and that Utley should be safe. The umpires give him the call, enraging Met fans, who already don't like Mattingly, given his Yankee connection; and are sure that Utley should have been called out (and thrown out of the game) for sliding outside the baseline and attempting to purposely injure Tejada.

Now, it's 1st and 2nd with 1 out, and the roof caves in on the Mets. They get Corey Seager to fly out, but Adrian Gonazalez and Justin Turner hit back-to-back doubles, and the Dodgers win 5-2. The series is tied. To the Mets' credit, though, they got themselves together, and won the rest of the games in the series.

When the season is over, it becomes clear that the way to beat the Mets was to stand up to them. In the regular season, the Yankees did. In the NLDS, Chase Utley did. In the World Series, the Kansas City Royals did. Otherwise, nobody did, certainly not the Washington Nationals, and the Mets won the NL East; the rest of the Dodgers didn't, and the Mets won the NLDS; and the Chicago Cubs didn't, and the Mets swept them in the NLCS.

Stand up to the Mets, and you can beat them. As former Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger would say, The Mets lacked a little bit the mental strength.

October 10, 2016: Game 3 of the AL Division Series at Fenway Park. It turns out to be the last game for steroid-cheating Boston Red Sox legend David Ortiz. He draws a walk in the bottom of the 2nd inning, grounds to 1st in the 4th, hits a sacrifice fly to center to drive in a run in the 6th, and draws another walk in the 8th. Despite this, former Red Sock Coco Crisp hits a home run, and the Red Sox lose 4-3 to the Cleveland Indians, who complete the sweep.

The big fat lying cheating bastard ends his career with a lifetime batting average of .286, 2,472 hits, 541 home runs, and an OPS+ of 141. He will be eligible for the Hall of Fame in 2022 -- as will Alex Rodriguez, who was a better player in every way, either with or without performance-enhancing drugs. Take a wild guess as to which of them will get in on the 1st ballot, and which may never get in.

October 10, 2017: The expansion Vegas Golden Knights, who have been surprisingly good coming out of the gate, host their 1st home game at T-Mobile Arena. The NBA's Utah Jazz had played a few games at UNLV's Thomas & Mack Center in the 1984-85 season, and Vegas had previously had teams in the World League of American Football, the Canadian Football League, and the XFL. But this will be the 1st regular season home game of any major league sports team representing Las Vegas, or anywhere in the State of Nevada.

Just 9 days after the mass shooting in Las Vegas that killed 59 people and wounded 600, the pregame ceremonies honor the victims. The Knights play the team that, presuming they stay in the Phoenix area, will be their natural geographical rivals, the Arizona Coyotes, and win 5-2.