November 4, 2001: The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty

November 4, 2001, 20 years ago: Game 7 of the World Series, at Bank One Ballpark (now Chase Field) in Phoenix. Although the record has been tied, this remains the latest date that a Major League Baseball game that counts has ever been played.

Arizona had never won a World Championship in any sport. But then, being such a hot place, it took them a while to get untracked. While the 48th State had been a Spring Training site since the 1920s, it wasn't until the NBA expanded in 1968, with the birth of the Phoenix Suns, that they reached the major leagues. They had usually been good, and had reached the NBA Finals in 1976 and 1993, but had never won the title.

The climate -- the old joke is "but it's a dry heat" -- made Arizona an unlikely place to be home to a hockey team. There had been minor-league teams, and then, in 1974, the Phoenix Roadrunners were created for the World Hockey Association. They lasted only 3 years.

In 1988, the NFL version of the St. Louis Cardinals moved, becoming the Phoenix Cardinals, with the name changed to the Arizona Cardinals in 1993. That opened Phoenix up as a market, and in 1996, the Winnipeg Jets moved to become the Phoenix Coyotes, with the name changed to the Arizona Coyotes in 2014. It wasn't hard to notice that, in that city, the Roadrunners had been replaced by the Coyotes.

In 1995, Major League Baseball expanded, with the Arizona Diamondbacks to begin play in 1998. They won the National League Western Division in only their 2nd season. In 2001, their 4th season, they won the Pennant.

In contrast, New York was a city of championships, and the New York Yankees had won the World Series 26 times, including the last 3 seasons and 4 of the last 5. And while Arizona needed a title because they'd never had one, New York needed it to help it heal after the terrorist attack on September 11. The Yankees won their Division, then needed a stirring comeback to defeat the Oakland Athletics in the American League Division series, before dispatching the 116-win Seattle Mariners for the Pennant, setting up the 2001 World Series.

*

At this point, the team then known as the Anaheim Angels, the Houston Astros, and the team then known as the Montreal Expos had never won a World Series. The San Francisco Giants had not won once since 1954, when they were still in New York; the Boston Red Sox since 1918; the Chicago White Sox since 1917; and the Chicago Cubs since 1908.

The Angels, the Astros, the Expos the Colorado Rockies, the Tampa Bay Rays, the Texas Rangers had never won a Pennant. The White Sox had not done so since 1959, and the Cubs since 1945. The Astros were still in the National League. And the Expos were still in Montreal.

All of those statements were true at the time. They are not anymore.

Both the Yankees and the Mets have moved into new ballparks since then. So have the Cincinnati Reds, the San Diego Padres, the Philadelphia Phillies, the St. Louis Cardinals, the Minnesota Twins, the Washington Nationals, the Atlanta Braves and the Texas Rangers. Fully 1/3rd of MLB's teams in just 20 years.

David Ortiz was a not-all-that-fat, not-all-that-interesting slugger for the Twins. Albert Pujols, CC Sabathia and Jimmy Rollins were rookies. Zack Greinke, Max Scherzer and Buster Posey were in high school. Buster Posey was 14 years old; Clayton Kershaw and Stephen Strasburg were 13; Madison Bumgarner and Freddie Freeman were 12, and Giancarlo Stanton was about to turn 12; Jose Altuve and Gerrit Cole were 11; and Nolan Arenado and Mike Trout were 10. Christian Yelich, Aaron Judge, Mookie Betts and Bryce Harper were 9; Corey Seager, Clint Frazier and Carlos Correa were 7; Gleyber Torres was 4; and Juan Soto was 3.

Current Yankee manager Aaron Boone was playing for the Cincinnati Reds. Current Diamondbacks manager Torey Lovullo was coaching in the Cleveland Indians' organization.

Lindy Ruff of the Devils was the head coach of the Buffalo Sabres. Barry Trotz of the Islanders was the head coach of the Nashville Predators. Tom Thibodeau, now the head coach of the Knicks, was an assistant coach with them. Gerard Gallant of the Rangers was an assistant coach for the Columbus Blue Jackets. Robert Saleh of the Jets was a graduate assistant at his alma mater, Michigan State University.

Steve Nash of the Nets was playing for the Dallas Mavericks. Ronny Deila of New York City FC was playing for Odds Ballklubb in his native Norway. Gerhard Struber of the Red Bulls was playing for LASK in Linzer in his native Austria. Luis Rojas, recently fired from the now-vacant manager's job with the Mets, was playing in the Florida Marlins' farm system. Joe Judge of the Giants was playing at Mississippi State University. And Walt Hopkins of the Liberty was in high school in Sparks, Nevada.

The Yankees, the Baltimore Ravens, the Los Angeles Lakers and the Colorado Avalanche were the defending World Champions in their sports. The Heavyweight Champion of the World was Lennox Lewis. The Olympic Games have since been held in America, Greece, Italy, China, Canada, Britain, Russia, Brazil, Korea and Japan. The World Cup has since been held in Japan, Korea, Germany, South Africa, Brazil and Russia.

The idea that people of the same gender could get married, and receive all the legal rights and benefits of "traditional marriage," was still a pipe dream. But the idea that corporations were "people," and entitled to the legal rights thereof, was just plain ridiculous. Only 2 Justices then on the U.S. Supreme Court are still on it now: Clarence Thomas and Stephen Breyer.

The President of the United States was George W. Bush. Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, their wives. and the widow of Lyndon Johnson were still alive. Barack Obama was a State Senator in Illinois. Joe Biden was in his 6th term as a U.S. Senator from Delaware. Kamala Harris was running the Family and Children's Services Division for the City of San Francisco. And Donald Trump was doing what he always does: Acting like an egomaniacal idiot. When the World Trade Center was destroyed 2 months earlier, he called up a New York TV station, and bragged that his Trump Building, formerly known as 40 Wall Street, was now the tallest building in Lower Manhattan.

The Governor of the State of New York was George Pataki. The Mayor of the City of New York was Rudy Giuliani. The Governor of New Jersey was Donald DiFrancesco. For the team in question, the Governor of Arizona was Jane Dee Hull, and the Mayor of Phoenix was Skip Rimsza.

The current holders of those offices? Kathy Hochul was a Member of the Town Board of the Buffalo suburb of Hamburg, New York; Bill de Blasio was making his 1st run for public office, getting elected to the City Council from a District in Brooklyn; Phil Murphy was an executive with Goldman Sachs; Doug Ducey was the CEO of Cold Stone Creamery -- I'm guessing ice cream sells pretty well in the Dry Heat State -- and Kate Gallego was attending Harvard University.

There were still living veterans of World War I, the Mexican Revolution, the Bolshevik Revolution, and the Irish War of Independence. There were still survivors of the Galveston Hurricane of 1900, the General Slocum fire of 1904, the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906, and the sinkings of the Titanic in 1912 and the Lusitania in 1915.

The Prime Minister of Canada was Jean Chrétien, and of Britain, Tony Blair. The monarch of both nations was Queen Elizabeth II -- that hasn't changed. Manchester United was then the holder of England's Premier League title, Liverpool of its FA Cup, and Bayern Munich of the European Cup.

Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the United Nations, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The Pope was John Paul II. The current Pope, Francis, was Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Archbishop of Buenos Aires. There have since been 4 Presidents of the United States, 5 Prime Ministers of Britain, and 3 Popes.

The films Training Day, Riding In Cars With Boys, Donnie Darko, Amélie, Monsters, Inc., Jet Li's The One, Shallow Hal, and the 1st Harry Potter film premiered. New TV shows included The Amazing Race, Crossing Jordan, Star Trek: Enterprise, Alias, Scrubs, According to Jim, Reba, Smallville, The Bernie Mac Show, and Pardon the Interruption. The Number 1 song in America was "Family Affair" by Mary J. Blige -- not a new version of the song of the same title by Sly & The Family Stone that had hit Number 1 in 1971.

Inflation was such that what $1.00 bought then, $1.56 would buy now. A U.S. postage stamp cost 34 cents, and a New York Subway ride $1.50. The average price of a gallon of gas was $1.46, a cup of coffee $2.02, a McDonald's meal (Big Mac, fries, shake) $5.37, a movie ticket $5.66, a new car $21,478, and a new house $214,200. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed the preceding Friday at 9,323.54.

The tallest building in the world was the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Mobile phones were now common, but they weren't yet "smart phones." Wikipedia and the iPod had debuted earlier in the year, and the Xbox was released a few days later. But there was, as yet, no iPhone, no iPad, no Facebook, no Twitter, no YouTube, no Pinterest, no Skype, no Instagram, and no TikTok.

In the Autumn of 2001, between the 9/11 attacks and Game 7 of the World Series, American troops attacked Afghanistan, due to the Taliban having provided sanctuary for Osama bin Laden. The Ukrainian Air Force, understandably nervous, mistakenly shot down a Siberia Airlines flight, killing everyone on board. An Indonesian fishing boat loaded with refugees sank, killed 353 people. President Bush established the Office of Homeland Security, and signed the Patriot Act into law. Letters tainted with anthrax spores were mailed to public officials.

Dorothy McGuire, and Isaac Stern, and Bertie Mee died. Rowan Blanchard was born. Bukayo Saka was born 8 weeks before the game in question; Billie Eilish, 6 weeks after.

That's what the world was like during the 2001 World Series.

*

Game 1 in Phoenix was bad for the Yankees. They struck first, but Curt Schilling settled down. The D-backs scored a run in the 1st, 4 in the 3rd and 4 in the 4th, to knock Mike Mussina out of the box. Arizona 9, New York 1.

Game 2 was less embarrassing for the Yankees, but no better. Randy Johnson limited them to 3 hits. Andy Pettitte gave up a home run to Matt Williams, making him the 1st player to hit home runs in World Series play for 3 different teams. (He had done so for San Francisco in 1989 and Cleveland in 1997.) Arizona 4, New York 0.

Game 3, in The Bronx. It was October 30. Never before had a game that counted started this late in the year. This Series was the 3rd time one had gone to October 28. The Yankees needed to turn it around. They did. Jorge Posada hit a home run to back Roger Clemens, who allowed only 3 hits. New York 2, Arizona 1.

Game 4. It was the 1st time a Major League Baseball game that counted was played on Halloween. And, just perfect for the occasion, the Moon was in its full phase. Mark Grace, long the 1st baseman for the Chicago Cubs, who had fallen short with them in the postseason in 1989 and 1998, was now with the Diamondbacks, and was caught on TV saying, "Full Moon! You know what that means: Strange things happen!"

Schilling went back out for the Diamondbacks. Orlando "El Duque" Hernández started for the Yankees. Both had their good stuff. But it was 3-1 Diamondbacks going to the bottom of the 9th. Arizona manager Bob Brenly sent his closer, Korean submarine righthanded Byung-Hyun Kim, to get the last 3 outs.

But with the Yankees down to their last out, albeit with Paul O'Neill on base, Tino Martinez hit a drive toward the bleachers. The ball bounced off the outstretched hand of a fan, but still well over the fence. (This was not another "Jeffrey Maier incident.") Tie game. I've often wondered about that fan: On the one hand, you were there for a great moment in Yankee history. On the other hand -- or off it -- you had a chance to catch the ball, and not only didn't you, but you probably hurt said hand in the process!

Derek Jeter came to bat in the bottom of the 10th, with Kim still on the mound. The clock struck midnight. The scoreboard read, "WELCOME TO NOVEMBER BASEBALL." At 12:03 AM, Jeter cranked a screaming line drive to right-center. It JUST got over the fence. New York 4, Arizona 3. The old ballyard, in its 77th season of play (over 79 years, as it was renovated in 1974 and '75), was shaking.

A fan, knowing that the game could go to extra innings, and thus last beyond midnight, and knowing that somebody would be the hero, pulled out a sign he had made, reading, "MR. NOVEMBER," and held it up as Jeter rounded the bases.

Game 5. The 1st official MLB game with a date of November. Neither starting pitcher showed any ill effects: Not Mussina from his Game 1 pounding, not Miguel Batista from not having pitched in 12 days. But the game went to the bottom of the 9th, with the Diamondbacks leading 2-0.

Brenly sent Kim back out. He gave up a leadoff double to Posada, then got the next 2 outs, to bring the Yankees to their last out. The batter was Scott Brosius. The Yankees traded for him because of his glove, but he got a lot of key hits for them. He played 4 seasons for the Yankees. In all 4 seasons, the Yankees won the Pennant. In all 4 seasons, he hit at least 1 home run in the World Series. He did it again, sending the ball deep to left field. Tie ballgame. Again, the old Yankee Stadium shook, leaving some to wonder if it could survive the passion of Yankee Fans.

Kim had now given up 3 home runs, that were crushing in emotion if not quite in distance. Even Yankee Fans felt for him. Brenly took him out, and brought in Albie Lopez. The game went to the 12th inning, and Alfonso Soriano singled home Chuck Knoblauch. New York 3, Arizona 2, also the difference in games.

In the entire history of the World Series, from 1903 to 2000, only twice had a team down to its last out in the bottom of the 9th, trailing by 2 runs, come from behind to win: The 1911 New York Giants, who ended up losing the Series to the Philadelphia Athletics, anyway; and the 1929 A's, who did it to the Chicago Cubs in the clincher. Now, the Yankees had done it on back-to-back days.

The Yankees had more momentum than any team could dare ask for. All they had to do was win 1 out of 2 in Phoenix, and they would have Title 27.

They couldn't win Game 6. The Diamondbacks crushed Pettitte, and "Big Unit" Johnson slapped the Yankees down. Arizona 15, New York 2. It was the worst loss in the Yankees' postseason history.

*

November 4, 2001. Sunday night. Game 7. Bank One Ballpark in Phoenix. It started as a duel between 2 of the greatest pitchers of the era -- and, in hindsight, the era's 2 most controversial pitchers: Roger Clemens for the New York Yankees, and Curt Schilling for the Arizona Diamondbacks. 

Both lived up to the occasion and the matchup, and pitched very well: Schilling held the Yankees to 1 run on 4 hits over the 1st 7 innings, while Clemens held the Diamondbacks to 1 run on 7 hits before Yankee manager Joe Torre called on Mike Stanton to get the last 2 outs in the top of the 7th.

Diamondback manager Bob Brenly stuck with Schilling for the top of the 8th, with the game tied 1-1 It looked like a mistake, as Soriano hit a home run. It was 2-1 Yankees, and it looked like Soriano had become one of the biggest World Series heroes ever: He was now the man who had hit the 2nd-latest home run in World Series history, behind only Bill Mazeroski's bottom-of-the-9th homer to beat the Yankees for the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1960. (Remember: This was Game 7, and Joe Carter's Series-clinching homer of 1993 was in Game 6.)

Brenly brought Johnson, who'd already beaten the Yankees in Games 2 and 6, in to relieve. Less than one day's rest? It's Game 7: Win or lose, there's no tomorrow, and you've got until late February to rest.

Torre relieved Stanton by sending supercloser Mariano Rivera out for a 2-inning save. He'd gotten away with that 5 times in this postseason. This was the 6th time he'd tried it. It was still 2-1 Yankees in the bottom of the 9th, and Mariano needed to get just 3 more outs to give the Yankees their 4th straight World Championship, their 5th in the last 6 years, their 27th overall.

Mark Grace led off with a single to center. Brenly sent David Dellucci in to pinch-run for him. Damian Miller grounded back to Mariano, who threw to 2nd to start a double play -- and threw the ball away. Tying run on 2nd. World Series-winning run on 1st.

At this point, I already knew the game was lost. As Doris Kearns Goodwin, who grew up on Long Island as a Brooklyn Dodger fan and then became a Red Sox fan while in graduate school at Harvard, put it, "There's always these omens in baseball." Mariano had gotten the job done so many times. He would get it done many more times to come. This time, it was not meant to be.

Brenly rolled the dice, and went for the win in this inning, sending Jay Bell up to pinch-hit for the Big Unit. Bell bunted, and Mariano threw to 3rd to get Dellucci on a force. The tying run was still on 2nd, the World Series-winning run was on 1st, but now there was 1 out. Just need to get 2 more.

Mariano wouldn't get his next 2 outs until April 3, 2002 -- 5 months later, or 148 days.

Brenly sendt Midre Cummings in to pinch-run for Miller at 2nd. Tony Womack doubled down the right field line. Cummings scored the tying run. Bell reached 3rd with the run that could win the Series, and could score on as little as a sacrifice fly, or an error.

Craig Counsell, who had been the man who drove in the tying run and scored the winning run for the Florida Marlins in Game 7 of the 1997 World Series -- at this point, the only World Series won since 1995 by a team other than the Yankees -- came up with the chance to be the hero again. Mariano hit him with a pitch. Not known as a purpose pitcher, Mariano was, for one of the very few times in his career, rattled.

Up stepped Luis Gonzalez. A man whose seasonal home run totals had been 13 at age 23, 10 at 24, 15 at 25 (okay, he was playing his home games in the Houston Astrodome), 8 at 26 (1994, strike-shortened season), 13 at 27, 15 at 28 (the last 2 as a Chicago Cub, and remember that the wind blows in at Wrigley Field half the time), 10 at 29 (back in Houston, still in the Astrodome), and then...

He hit 23 home runs at age 30. Yes, he was now playing for the Detroit Tigers at Tiger Stadium, but this was also 1998. The year of whatever it was that Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa were using to hit 70 and 66 home runs, respectively. Gonzalez hit 26 at 31, and 31 at 32. Very good, but no big deal -- until you realize that those last 2 years were with the Diamondbacks, playing their home games at "The BOB," which, like the Astrodome but unlike most other indoor stadiums, is a bad ballpark for hitters.

At age 34, Gonzalez hit 28 homers. At 35, 26. At 36, 17. At 37, 24. At 38 and 39, 15 both times. He closed his career with 8 homers at age 40 in 2006. Respectable numbers -- if they were achieved honestly.

In 2001, at age 33, the year of Barry Bonds hitting 73 home runs, Luis Gonzalez hit 57 home runs. That's 26 more than he had ever hit before, and 29 more than he would ever hit again. People talk about Brady Anderson hitting 50 in 1996, when he'd only topped 16 once before, had never topped 21, and would never top 24 again nor 19 but once, and they suspected steroids.

What Luis Gonzalez did on the night of November 4, 2001 did not suggest steroids. Just as Bobby Thomson said that, 50 years earlier, he didn't need help to know that Ralph Branca was going to throw a meaty fastball. Doesn't mean Thomson didn't take advantage of the help that the Giants had been offering for the last few weeks. And it doesn't mean that Gonzalez hadn't been using steroids since 1998.

Gonzalez hit a looper into center field for a base hit. Bell scored the run that won the World Series for the Diamondbacks, in only their 4th season. Arizona 3, New York 2.

At the time, I was terribly disappointed. But not crushed. The Yankees had given me countless memories to treasure since the start of the 1996 season, including in Games 4 and 5 of this World Series. And there were a lot of really good players on that Diamondback team who had played for a long time, some with awful teams, and had struggled to get to this point, and (I thought) really deserved it. Grace with the Cubs. Johnson with the Mariners. Schilling with the Philadelphia Phillies. Gonzalez with the Astros. Bell and Womack with the Pirates. Matt Williams with the San Francisco Giants and the Cleveland Indians.

For the Yankees, Paul O'Neill and Scott Brosius retired, and Tino Martinez and Chuck Knoblauch were allowed to leave via free agency. In this game, O'Neill went 2-for-3, including a single in his last at-bat in the 7th inning; Knoblauch flew out pinch-hitting for O'Neill in the 8th; Brosius went 0-for-3; and Tino went 1-for-4.

So 4 starters, nearly half the Yankee lineup, had to be replaced. While the Yankees did win the next 5 American League Eastern Division titles, including a glorious Pennant win in 2003, this game had a true "end of an era" feel, emphasized by Buster Olney, then of The New York Times, when he titled his book about the 1996-2001 Yankees, and especially this game, The Last Night of the Yankee Dynasty.

Some Yankee Fans were heartbroken. Not me. I was over it fairly quickly, and by Opening Day 2002, I was really optimistic again.

Over the next few years, things would change, and make this defeat something to get really angry about. Williams would be revealed as a caught steroid user. Gonzalez would call a press conference and angrily deny that he had used them, after a newspaper article danced around the question of whether he did. Although never publicly revealed to have been caught, people have often wondered about Johnson and Schilling, chosen the co-Most Valuable Players of this Series.

And, of course, accusations have also been leveled at some of the Yankees from this Series, including Clemens (the proof has still never been publicly revealed), Knoblauch (who admitted taking human-growth hormone, or HGH, but also said that it hurt more than it helped, which doesn't take him completely off the hook, but hardly makes him a cheater on the level of, say, David Ortiz), and Andy Pettitte (the one thing that can be proven was a brief moment the next season, which didn't help the Yankees win a Pennant).

But no one suggests the D-backs' win was "tainted." Indeed, until the non-steroid cheating scandals of the 2017 Houston Astros and the 2018 Boston Red Sox (linked by the presence of Alex Cora), the only team whose World Series wins or Pennants are said to not be fairly won are the Yankees.

Take out all suspected cheaters, and declare their World Series wins vacant, and, between 1996 and 2013, you've got the '02 Angels, the '05 White Sox, the '06 and '11 Cardinals, the '08 Phillies; , and the '10 and '12 Giants. That's it: 7 out of 18. Extend it to 2018, and there go the '18 Red Sox, so it becomes 10 out of 23.

Unless you're prepared to vacate the titles won by the Diamondbacks in 2001; the Marlins in 1997 (Gary Sheffield) and 2003 (Ivan Rodriguez); and the Red Sox in 2004, 2007 and 2013 (David Ortiz, Manny Ramirez for the 1st 2), then don't tell me the Yankees cheated.

In a small bit of irony, Jay Bell later worked in the Yankees' organization. He managed the Tampa Yankees of the Class A Florida State League in 2017, the Trenton Thunder of the Class AA Eastern League in 2018, and the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre Yankees of the Class AAA International League in 2019. He now manages in the Angels' organization.