Carrick Ryan On Trump

This past June 23, Carrick Ryan, a former federal agent turned blogger -- and not to be confused with Irish comedian Ryan Carrick -- wrote this on Facebook:

I must admit, there's a part of Trump that's kind of impressive.

He convinced the party of Reagan to advocate for tariffs and market intervention.

He convinced the party of law and order to celebrate the first convicted felon President, and the pardoning of violent insurrectionists.

He convinced the party of family values that it didn't matter if he cheated on his pregnant wife with a pornstar.

He convinced millions of women to vote for him even when they've heard him brag about sexually assaulting them.

He's convinced Epstein conspiracy theorists to somehow accuse anybody but him, despite mounting circumstantial evidence of his complicity.

He's convinced evangelical Christians to vote in the least religious President in U.S. history.

And now, he's convinced isolationists, who called Obama a "neocon" and cheered the "end of foreign wars," to now openly support yet another foreign war.

But he's not a salesman. A salesman actually gives you what he's selling. Trump is a con man, someone who promises big but never comes through with the goods.

What has Trump promised that he's actually delivered?

Did he build the wall? And did Mexico pay for it?

Did he "lock her up"?

Did he enact a "Muslim Ban"?

Did he repeal Obamacare?

Did he eliminate national debt? Or add to it?

Did he end the war in Ukraine or Gaza?

Did he decrease the cost of groceries?

Did he keep the U.S. out of foreign wars?

Did he make America great again? Or a global pariah?

I've done a lot of fraud investigations in my time, and there's almost always a devastating moment when someone realizes with horror they've been conned. But there's also always a few that just don't want to believe it... no matter how much evidence you show them. And the con man usually just continues to con them, until they've fleeced them of everything that they've got.

*

So when do those he's fooled -- some once, some twice, some three times -- accept that they were fooled?

In two weeks?

July 7, 2005: The London Bombings

Tavistock Square

July 7, 2005, 20 years ago: Islamist terrorists carry out 4 suicide bombings during the morning rush hour in London. They targeted Underground (what the British call their subway system) stations at Aldgate, Edgeware Road and Russell Square, and on a double-decker bus in Tavistock Square.

The bombs went off at 8:49 AM, 3:49 AM U.S. Eastern Time. Not counting the bombers themselves, 52 people were killed, and over 700 were injured.

It was the deadliest terrorist attack in London's history, in spite of the "best" efforts of the Irish Republican Army, its various offshoots, and their Unionist opponents. And no enemy force had killed so many people in London since the last airborne bombing by Nazi Germany's Luftwaffe during World War II, over 60 years before.

A police investigation determined that what became known as "the 7/7 Bombings" were planned in Leeds, in Yorkshire, and raids arrested members of the terror cells involved. Like their American counterparts, the FBI, Britain's MI5 do not mess around.

Every year since, in commemoration, just before 11:30 AM -- 6:30 AM, U.S. Eastern Standard Time -- every train in the United Kingdom pulls to a stop, and its crews and passengers observe a minute's silence, the traditional British tribute for a solemn commemoration.

July 6, 1975: The Tragedy of Ruffian

Ruffian, before an earlier race at Belmont Park

July 6, 1975, 50 years ago: Another sport has set up an equivalent to the "Battle of the Sexes" that tennis had 2 years earlier. Only this time, it didn't seem so ridiculous, mainly because the male competitor wasn't running his mouth.

He couldn't: Like his female opponent, he was a horse.

Of course, when Billie Jean King beat Bobby Riggs, there was a chance that Riggs, then 55 years old, could have had a heart attack and dropped dead. But he didn't.

This time, the competition did end in tragedy.

*

Every now and then, there is a racehorse about whom the sport's observers say loves to run, was born for it. Ruffian was the 1st filly about whom it was said. Foaled on April 17, 1972 at Claiborne Farm in Paris, Kentucky, she was a granddaughter of 1957 Preakness Stakes winner Bold Ruler, making her a niece to 1973 Triple Crown winner Secretariat. Her other grandfather was 1953 Preakness and Belmont Stakes winner Native Dancer. (This was not surprising: Both grandfathers can count dozens of winning horses among their descendants.) She was large for a filly, and ran 5 races as a 2-year-old, winning them all.

As a 3-year-old, she ran 5 races, and won them all. This included the Triple Tiara, the fillies' version of colts' Triple Crown: The Acorn Stakes, at Belmont Park, just outside New York City in Elmont, Long Island, New York; the Mother Goose Stakes, also at Belmont; and the Coaching Club American Oaks, at Saratoga Race Course in Saratoga Springs, in the Adirondack Mountains of northern New York State.

An "oaks" is the female version of a "derby." The Mother Goose Stakes has since been dropped from the Triple Tiara. Now, it's the Acorn Stakes, the Coaching Club, and the Alabama Stakes, which is run at Saratoga. The Kentucky Oaks, run annually the day before the Kentucky Derby, is a prestigious race for fillies, but is not part of the Triple Tiara, which is probably why Ruffian was not entered into it. And while fillies are eligible for the Triple Crown races, very few run in them: The Kentucky Derby has had just 3 female winners in 151 races, the Preakness Stakes 6 out of 150, and the Belmont Stakes 3 out of 157.

Ruffian had been working her way up in length, as young racehorses tend to have done for them. Until her 8th race, the Acorn Stakes on May 10, 1975, she had never run as long as a full mile. But in winning the Coaching Club and taking the Triple Tiara on June 22, she had run a mile and a half -- the same length as the Belmont Stakes, whose length has given it the name "the true test of champions."

It wasn't just that she was undefeated: She won big. Her 10 races were won by an average distance of 8.3 lengths. She won the Mother Goose by 13 1/2. And in every stakes race she ran, she set a new record for that race. This was the closest thing that fillies had ever had to Secretariat, who had blown away the competing colts to win the Triple Crown 2 years earlier.

The question was asked: Could the best filly in the country defeat the best colt in a match race?

Match races are rare. There had been 4 big ones in the 20th Century:

* 1920: Belmont Stakes winner Man o' War over the previous year's Triple Crown winner Sir Barton, at Kenilworth Park in Windsor, Ontario, across the river from Detroit.

* 1923: Preakness and Belmont winner Zev over Epsom Derby winner Papyrus, at Belmont Park.

* 1938: West Coast champion Seabiscuit over the previous year's Triple Crown winner War Admiral (a son of Man o' War), at Pimlico in Baltimore.

* 1955: Preakness and Belmont winner Nashua over Kentucky Derby winner Swaps, at Washington Park in Chicago in 1955.

So a match race between Ruffian and a leading colt would be the first major match race will full television coverage.

Her trainer, Frank Whiteley, had preferred to take her up to Saratoga, and run her against colts in the Travers Stakes, America's leading Summer thoroughbred race. "Prove the point one time, and that'll be it," he said. But her owners, Stuart and Barbara Janney, overruled him, because the money from a match race against the top colt in the country was too good to pass up. Stuart did insist that it take place on her usual home track, Belmont.

So it was set up for Sunday, July 6: Ruffian, wearing Number 2, would take on Foolish Pleasure, wearing Number 1. Foolish Pleasure, bred, foaled and trained in Florida, was a first cousin of Ruffian: Each was a grandchild of Bold Ruler.

Foolish Pleasure won the Kentucky Derby by making a late charge to beat Avatar, finished 2nd to the not-quite-aptly-named Master Derby in the Preakness, and finished 2nd to Avatar in the Belmont. Given this record, he was probably the best 3-year-old thoroughbred colt in the country, but it was hardly definitive.

Foolish Pleasure

There was another issue: Both horses had the same jockey, Jacinto Vásquez, a 31-year-old native of Panama. He had to make a choice, and he chose Ruffian, which spoke volumes. After all, he probably knew each horse as well as its owners and trainers, and he was certainly the only person who knew the tendencies, and the emotional makeups, of both horses.

So Braulio Baeza, 35 and also from Panama, was hired to ride Foolish Pleasure. He had won the 1961 Belmont Stakes aboard Sherluck, both the Kentucky Derby and the Belmont in 1963 aboard Chateaugay, and the 1969 Belmont aboard Arts and Letters. So he was certainly familiar with Belmont, its track and its atmosphere. His win aboard Chateaugay made him the 1st Hispanic jockey to win the Kentucky Derby. If he wasn't the best possible choice, he was certainly a very good one.

Belmont Park, which originally opened in 1905, had been rebuilt, and reopened in 1968 with a 33,000-seat grandstand, and, with infield seating, necessary for the Belmont Stakes, could seat over 100,000 people. The infield seating was needed again, as over 50,000 people came to see "The Great Match." Another 20 million watched on ABC, obliterating the record for TV viewership of a horse race set at the 1973 Belmont Stakes won by Secretariat.

The odds on Ruffian were 20-1. Horse racing oddsmakers are usually older men, and they seemed sure that there was no way any filly could beat a champion colt. But Vásquez knew better than anyone, because he had ridden both horses, and he chose Ruffian because he genuinely believed she was the better horse. The winner-take-all prize: $350,000. (About $2.08 million in 2022 money.)

The horses broke from the starting gate. But Ruffian did not do so straight, bumping her shoulder on the gate before straightening out. If that had been the worst of it, it would have been a footnote: Even if she had run the race to its conclusion and lost, that probably wouldn't have been considered the reason.

The 1st quarter-mile was run in 22 1/5th seconds, and Ruffian was ahead by a nose. A furlong later, she had a lead of half a length. It was too soon to tell if she would hold the lead the whole way.

Just then, both jockeys heard a sound that they described as a crack. A bird had flown across the infield, distracting Ruffian, and she took a bad step. She had broken both of the sesamoid bones in her right foreleg.

Vásquez, not possessed of X-ray vision, didn't know exactly what was wrong, but he knew horses well enough to know that this was a devastating injury. He tried to pull her up, to get her to stop. But this horse that loved to run, apparently not yet feeling the pain, kept going. This further damaged the leg's bones, and tore its ligaments. Vásquez finally got her to stop, and Baeza guided Foolish Pleasure to a win in what amounted to a walkover.

Ruffian was loaded onto an ambulance, and taken to Belmont Park's veterinary clinic. Surgery on her leg took 12 hours, and she had to be revived twice. The next day's first edition of the New York Daily News, sent to press while Ruffian was still alive, printed a hopeful, if tasteless, secondary headline.

But in her padded recovery stall, she kept flailing her legs, knocking the plaster cast against the wall, until it came loose. Her continued flailing undid all the surgery. The doctors concluded that she could not survive another operation. She was euthanized in the middle of the night. Later editions of newspapers had to print the awful truth. 

This was something relatively new in American sports. There had been deaths on the field of play before, but most of them happened before television came along (as with baseball player Ray Chapman in 1920), or had only happened on local TV, with the footage not preserved due to the high cost of videotape (such as happened to hockey player Bill Masterton in 1968, and a few football players in the 1960s and early '70s). Ruffian didn't die during the race, but she died as a result of it, and the announcers let the audience know that it could happen.

Some of the 20 million people watching on TV were women who had never watched a horse race before, not even with Secretariat, but were watching because Ruffian was a girl going up against the best of the boys. Many of the viewers, men and women alike, swore they would never watch another horse race.

Sure enough, in spite of 2 more Triple Crown winners in the decade -- Seattle Slew in 1977 and Affirmed in 1978, and the dramatic story of the 1980 Kentucky Derby (more about that in a moment), TV viewership of horse racing severely declined. So did live attendance, as the growth of cable TV led to more sports viewing opportunities without having to leave your house.

Up until the dawn of the TV era, horse racing was the 3rd-most popular sport in America, behind baseball and boxing. Even in 1975, with football having surpassed everything, horse racing was still more popular than basketball and hockey. Now, despite 2 Triple Crown winners in the 2010s, it might not even be one of the top 10 sports.

Ruffian was buried in the infield at Belmont, with her nose pointing toward the finish line. She is the only horse laid to rest there. The following year, the Ruffian Handicap was founded, and was run annually at Belmont until 2009. In 2010, it was moved to Saratoga. In 2014, it was moved back to Belmont. The veterinary clinic at Belmont, where Ruffian died, is now named Cornell Ruffian Equine Specialists, run by Weill Cornell Medicine, of Cornell University.

Foolish Pleasure, forever to be remembered for a race that, officially, never took place, raced as a 4-year-old, and was retired to stud. He died of a stomach ailment at a ranch in Wyoming in 1994.

In 1980, Jacinto Vásquez accomplished something that he hadn't done even with Ruffian: He won the Kentucky Derby aboard a filly, Genuine Risk. The 2 Kentucky Derbies he won would be the only Triple Crown races he won.

In 1976, Baeza rode Honest Pleasure, another first cousin of Foolish Pleasure, to a 2nd-place finish in the Kentucky Derby. After finishing 5th in the Preakness with Honest Pleasure, he finished the season, and retired with 3,140 wins.

That year, he was elected to the National Racing Hall of Fame. So was Ruffian. Vásquez kept racing until 1996 -- racing into one's 50s is not unusual for a jockey -- and retired with 5,231 wins. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1998. As of July 6, 2025, Baeza is 85, and Vásquez is 81.

The racing magazine The Blood-Horse ranked Ruffian as the top female thoroughbred racehorse of the 20th Century -- but only 35th overall on their list of the top 100 thoroughbreds. Foolish Pleasure was ranked 97th.

A film titled Ruffian was made in 2007. Sam Shepard played Whiteley, Nicholas Pryor played Stuart Janney, Christine Belford played Barbara Janney, Vladimir Diaz played Vásquez, Francisco Torres played Baeza, Frank Whaley played Sports Illustrated racing writer William Nack, and original track announcer Dave Johnson, needing only to provide a repeat of his announcing, not needing to show his older face, played himself.

There would not be another match race in America until July 23, 1988, at Ak-Sar-Ben Racetrack in Omaha, Nebraska. (Ak-Sar-Ben, also the name of an adjacent sports arena, is "Nebraska" spelled backwards. Both the arena and the track have since been demolished.) Again, it was a "Battle of the Sexes," but neither horse had won any Triple Crown races. The colt Who Doctor Who beat the filly Explosive Girl by 3 1/2 lengths.

Donald, Jackie, Colin, Bill and Me

Donald Trump doesn't really care about the specifics of what he calls "The One Big, Beautiful Bill." He just wanted a win, something he could sign on the 4th of July, as a show.

I'm reminded of the 1st Rocky movie, where Duke Evers (Tony Burton) tells his fighter, Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers), of Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone), "He doesn't know it's a damn show! He thinks it's a damn fight!"

It's all a show to Trump. As long as he can keep the show going, he can stay in power.

He doesn't care about the specifics, but he also doesn't care about how many people in the "United States of America" -- including those who voted for him, but in this case especially in rural areas -- will be hurt, and even die, as a result of the Big Ugly Bill's Medicaid cuts, all so he and his fellow filthy rich guys can have the biggest tax cut of all time.

He never cared about the people who bought his MAGA lies. As James Carville says of Republicans in general, Trump only wanted one thing from them: Their votes, to put him in power, and then to keep him in power.

*

In his autobiography, which he titled I Never Had It Made, and didn't have published until after his death, Jackie Robinson, the 1st black player in modern baseball, brought to the Brooklyn Dodgers by team president Branch Rickey, looked back on what he considered the highlight of his career: Standing on the foul line with his teammates, hearing the National Anthem, "The Star-Spangled Banner," at Yankee Stadium before Game 1 of the 1947 World Series. They had made it, and they had done it together.

But there's a big difference between having made it, and having it made. He compared that moment to his thoughts at his present time, 20 years later, after events showed him that America had not yet become the country his 1947 efforts suggested it could become, and after he had come to accept that the Republican Party, to which he belonged, no longer seemed to want him:

There I was, the black grandson of a slave, the son of a black sharecropper, part of a historic occasion, a symbolic hero to my people. The air was sparkling. The sunlight was warm. The band struck up the National Anthem. The flag billowed in the wind. It should have been a glorious moment for me as the stirring words of the national anthem poured from the stands.

Perhaps, it was, but then again, perhaps, the anthem could be called the theme song for a drama called The Noble Experiment. Today, as I look back on that opening game of my first World Series, I must tell you that it was Mr. Rickey's drama and that I was only a principal actor.

As I write this twenty years later, I cannot stand and sing the Anthem. I cannot salute the flag; I know that I am a black man in a white world. In 1972, in 1947, at my birth in 1919, I know that I never had it made.

After the 2016 backlash against his kneeling during the Anthem before games, San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, soon to be blacklisted (though never officially banned) from the NFL,  shared a similar sentiment:

I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color. To me, this is bigger than football, and it would be selfish on my part to look the other way. There are bodies in the street, and people getting paid leave and getting away with murder.

Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry wrote of a parallel world for the episode "The Omega Glory," one in which a planet developed the same way Earth did, until a nuclear war. According to Spock (Leonard Nimoy), the evidence shows that "the Asiatics won." But, in a world rendered primitive again, these "Koms," descendants of Communists, had finally, perhaps over 1,000 years later, had the tables turned, and the "Yangs," descendants of Americans or "Yankees," had won.

The Yangs had a Stars-and-Stripes, what Johnny Cash would have called a "ragged old flag," and a copy of the Constitution of the United States. But time had dulled their words: "We the People" had become "E pleb nista," and they no longer knew what "the holy words" meant. Captain James T. Kirk, played by William Shatner, a Jewish man from Canada, showed them.

Bill Shatner (left) as Kirk, and Roy Jenson as Cloud William.

Jenson was also Canadian.

On this Independence Day, let us recall that our "best words" were written for everyone, and both their protections and their responsibilities must apply to everyone, or they mean nothing. If Bill Shatner, a Jewish Canadian actor of the 20th Century, playing a 23rd Century starship captain from Iowa, can figure it out, then nearly all of us can.

But can we? Trump has divided us. Indeed, "E pleb nista" doesn't sound like "We the People," but it is reminiscent of "E pluribus unum," one of the nation's mottos. Translated from Latin, it means, "Out of many, one." Trump has turned us into a nation of about 340 million unums (unii?), with precious little pluribus.

For the last few years, the tradition in our family is to go from our hometown of East Brunswick, New Jersey to see the 4th of July Parade in neighboring Milltown in the morning, and then return to Milltown in the evening for the fireworks.

I won't be doing that this time. As of this writing, I have already "missed" the Parade. I will not be attending the fireworks. I cannot stand and sing the Anthem. And I have not recited the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag since the Summer of 1988, when a previous Republican demagogue, George H.W. Bush, made it a club to use over the head of his Presidential election opponent, Michael Dukakis.

Through his efforts to end birthright citizenship, through his denunciations of anybody who doesn't support him, Donald Trump has divided America into patriots and MAGAs. And you cannot be both. You either love America, or you love Trump.

Three things have kept America free, and Trump has perverted all of them:

* The right to vote. If not for voter suppression in 2016 and 2024 -- and an attempt in 2020, which failed -- Trump would not have come out on top.

* Civilian control of the military: Trump has forced out the Generals who have told him what he cannot do, and he is giving unconstitutional orders.

* Separation of church and state: Trump has seen to it that there is one god, and he is it, and if you worship anyone or anything other than him, then this god will not have mercy on your soul.

News flash, one you won't see in any major American media outlet: Trump is no god. And he is President in name only. He holds the office and its powers, but he does not represent America.

In 2026, the year of the 250th Anniversary of our independence, we must elect a Congress that will hold him accountable. In 2028, we must elect a President and a Congress that will undo the damage he has done.

Until then, I can only echo what Jackie Robinson said. I know that I am a patriot in a MAGA-ruled country. In 2025, in 1988, at my birth in 1969, I know that I never had it made.

Those words in the Constitution: "They must apply to everyone! Or they mean nothing! Do you understand?"

Donald Trump does not understand, and he would not if he could.

Do you?

I can't answer that question for you.

Disaster In Toronto Drops Yanks From 1st

The Yankees just got swept in a 4-game series, away to those pesky Toronto Blue Jays. Not good.

Carlos Rodón started the Monday night game, allowing 2 runs over 5 innings. Thanks in part to a home run by Jazz Chisholm, he left with a 3-1 lead over the Jays and their starter, "warrior god" Max Scherzer. But because Carlos Rodón had thrown 96 pitches, Aaron Boone wasn't allowed to leave him in, and he replaced him with Mark Leither Jr., who allowed 3 runs in the 6th.

The Yankees stranded a runner on 1st with 1 out in the 7th. Cody Bellinger led off the 8th with a home run, and the Yankees had men on 1st & 2nd with 1 out, but scored no more. They got a runner on with 2 out in the 9th, but couldn't get him home. Blue Jays 5, Yankees 4.

Since July 1 is Canada Day, a holiday, the Yankees had the dreaded day game after a night game. Since it was Canada Day, the Blue Jays wore red jerseys and caps instead of their traditional blue. Max Fried was strong for the 1st 3 innings, but allowed 2 home runs to score 4 in the 4th.

He got through the 6th, but, because he had thrown 99 pitches, Boone wasn't allowed to leave him in, and he replaced him with Luke Weaver, who got an out, then allowed a single and a walk. Having reached the 3-batter minimum, Boone took Weaver out, and put Leiter in. This is not a recommended way to run a pitching staff. Leiter allowed an RBI single and a grand slam.

Geoff Hartlieb made his Yankee debut. The righthander from the Chicago suburbs is 31. He made 14 major league appearances over the previous 4 seasons. His career ERA coming into this appearance was 7.47. And Brian Cashman thought him worthy of acquisition? He pitched 1 inning, and allowed 2 singles and 3 walks, 1 of those with the bases loaded, allowing the Jays to score 3 runs, and raising his career ERA -- in 1 inning, mind you -- by 0.15.

The Yankees scored a run in the 9th, but it was meaningless. Blue Jays 12, Yankees 5.

Will Warren started on Wednesday night. Boone decided to save his bullpen, so he left Warren in to be abused by the Toronto bats. Here's the 1st inning's abuse: Single, single, walk, 2-RBI single, 3-run home run, groundout, walk, 2-run home run, flyout, single, strikeout. 7-0 Toronto.

He only allowed 1 more run over the next 3 innings. Ian Hamilton went 2, allowing none; Tim Hill, 1 in 1. The Yankees mounted a grand comeback, scoring 6 runs in the 5th inning, thanks to Giancarlo Stanton finally hitting his 1st home run of the season. They scored a run in the 6th. The Jays scored a run in the 7th, but the Yankees scored 2 in the 8th, including a home run by Aaron Judge. It was 9-9.

But Devin Williams, originally intended as the closer, allowed 2 runs in the bottom of the 8th, and the Yankees went down meekly in the 9th. Blue Jays 11, Yankees 9.

Clarke Schmidt started on Thursday night. But he left due to "forearm stiffness" after 3 innings. Great, just what the Yankees needed: Another injury to a starting pitcher, one who already missed his 1st 3 starts of the season due to injury.

Clayton Beeter allowed 2 runs in 2 innings. George Springer hit a home run off Schmidt, and one off Beeter. Trent Grisham hit a home run, but it proved of no use. Blue Jays 8, Yankees 5.

With that game, the Blue Jays took over 1st place in the American League Eastern Division. The Yankees and the Tampa Bay Rays are both one game behind them.

And now, the Yankees have to go to Flushing Meadow to play the Mets. And, with today being the 4th of July, it's another day game after a night game. Seems a fitting punishment for such a lousy performance in Toronto.

July 4, 1985: The Rick Camp Game

July 4, 1985, 40 years ago: For anybody who watched this baseball game, it was a 4th of July that will never, ever be forgot.

The Atlanta Braves were hosting the New York Mets at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium, and Braves owner Ted Turner, showman that he was, scheduled a postgame 4th of July fireworks show. Paid attendance at the 52,007-seat concrete ashtray just south of downtown Atlanta was 44,947.

But the game was delayed by rain, and didn't start until 9:04 PM. Rick Mahler started for the Braves, and the Mets hit him hard, and he didn't get out of the 4th inning. Dwight Gooden started for the Mets, and, in a year when he seemed to be touched by God, he was no better. A second rain delay came, and Met manager Davey Johnson -- who hit 41 home runs as a 2nd baseman for the Braves in 1973 -- didn't take any chances, and he took Doctor K out.

Did I say Davey didn't take any chances? When they came back from the rain delay, he let Roger McDowell, normally a late-inning reliever, finish the bottom of the 3rd inning. Terry Leach pitched the 4th through the 8th, but Davey brought in Doug Sisk, and he let the Braves score 4 runs in that inning to take the lead, 8-7. This included a Keith Hernandez home run. But future Hall-of-Famer Bruce Sutter blew it in the 9th, and the game went to extra innings. At one point, Davey got thrown out of the game.

The Braves got 2 men on with 1 out in the bottom of the 11th, but the Mets got out of it with a double play. In the top of the 13th, with 2 out, Ray Knight singled, and Howard Johnson hit a home run. 10-8 Mets. But in the bottom of the 13th, Tom Gorman -- the only reliever the Mets had left -- allowed a leadoff single to Rafael Ramirez. He struck out Dale Murphy and Gerald Perry, but then gave up a home run to Terry Harper. 10-10. More "free baseball."

Gene Garber walked Lenny Dykstra and Hernandez in the top of the 14th, but got out of it. Knight singled for the Mets in the top of the 15th, but got no farther than 1st base. With 2 out in the bottom of the 16th, Ken Oberkfell singled off Gorman, and Bruce Benedict drew a walk. But Gorman got out of it.

Rick Camp, the Braves' last remaining reliever, came into the game in the top of the 17th, and walked Gary Carter, but then struck out Darryl Strawberry and Gorman, and got Knight to ground into a force play. Ramirez singled with 2 outs in the bottom of the 17th, but Gorman got out of it.

Top of the 18th. HoJo led off with a single. Danny Heep bunted, and Camp rushed it, and threw it away. 1st and 3rd, nobody out. Dykstra hit a sacrifice fly, and it was 11-10 Mets. There was nothing that Braves manager Eddie Haas could do, as Camp was it: The only pitchers he had left were starters, the same as the Mets.

Bottom of the 18th. Perry and Harper grounded out. That brought up Camp, as Haas couldn't pinch-hit for him. He had nobody left to bat or pitch. This pudgy bearded guy, wearing Number 37 for his home-State team, came up to bat. He came into that game 10-for-168 for his career -- a lifetime batting average of .060. He was 0-for-his-last-13. He hadn't gotten a hit since September 1, 1984, 10 months earlier.

John Sterling, who became the main voice for the New York Yankees in 1989, but then doing games for the Braves, turned to his broadcast partner, Ernie Johnson -- who pitched for the Braves in Milwaukee and was the father of basketball announcer Ernie Johnson Jr. -- and said, "I'll tell you, Ernie: If hits a home run to tie this game, this game will be certified as absolutely the nuttiest in the history of baseball."

What do you think happened? Have you ever heard 8,000 people make as much noise as 50,000? You did if you were watching TBS -- or WOR-Channel 9 -- that middle-of-the-night. I was watching on WOR, but, because of Sterling's call, it's the TBS version that seems to have been preserved for posterity and shown on highlights.

Sterling:

And he hits it to deep left! Heep goes back! It is... GONE! Holy cow! Oh my goodness! I don't believe it! I don't believe it! Rick Camp! Rick Camp! I told you Ernie, if he hits it out... That certifies this game as the wildest, wackiest, most improbable game in history!

Mets 11, Braves 11. And to make matters worse, Gorman walked the next batter, Benedict. But he got Paul Runge to ground into a force play, and we went to the 19th inning. (This Paul Runge is not related to the umpire of the same name, whose father Ed and son Brian have also been MLB umpires.)

The Mets play a game this long every few years. In 1964, they went 23 innings in a loss to the San Francisco Giants -- in the 2nd game of a doubleheader. In 1965, they went 18 innings in Philadelphia against the Phillies, before the game was called due to a curfew, and it was replayed. In 1968, they went 24 innings in a loss to the Houston Astros. In 1974, they went 25 innings in a loss to the St. Louis Cardinals.

In 1986, they played what was then the longest game in NLCS history, going 16 innings in beating Houston to clinch the Pennant. They went 20 innings in a 2010 win in St. Louis, 20 in a 2013 loss to the Miami Marlins, 18 in a 2015 loss in St. Louis, and 18 in a 2019 loss in Milwaukee to the Brewers. The 2020 introduction of the "ghost runner" rule makes another such marathon unlikely.

At some point in all this, Ralph Kiner, the great Pittsburgh Pirates slugger who'd been broadcasting for the Mets since the franchise began in 1962 (and still did one game a week until he died in 2014), left the stadium, returned to his hotel, and turned on the TV. He saw the game, and during the next Met broadcast, said that he thought it was a recap. Nope, the game was still going on.

Finally, at about 3:30 in the morning, with only about 8,000 people left in the stands, the Mets decided enough was enough, that they'd had it with these mother-freaking Braves in this mother-freaking game. They pounded Camp, who could not be relieved. Carter led off with a single. John Christensen, who'd pinch-hit for Strawberry, bunted him over to 2nd.

Whoever was managing the Mets at that point -- it might have been 1st base coach Bill Robinson -- decided to let the next day's starter, Ron Darling, pitch the bottom of the 19th, and a few innings thereafter if necessary, since who knew if this game had another 9 innings in it, and sent Rusty Staub, playing one of his last games, up to pinch-hit for the exhausted Gorman.

Haas ordered Camp to walk Staub intentionally to set up a double play, but it didn't work: Knight doubled home Carter and sent Staub to 3rd.  (Daniel Joseph Staub was known as Rusty for his hair, and Montreal Expos fans called him "Le Grand Orange." He wasn't fast even before he turned into a flame-haired Fat Elvis -- or, as Sterling called him in this game, "Babe Ruth.") HoJo was intentionally walked, and that didn't work, either: Heep singled home Staub and Knight, and the throw from the outfield was mishandled, and HoJo scored, too. Dykstra flew out, getting Heep to 3rd, and Wally Backman singled Heep home, before Camp finally got Hernandez to ground out.

Mets 16, Braves 11. This was the mid-1980s Mets. Surely, these Mets could hold a 5-run lead. Surely, the Braves wouldn't score 6 runs and win it in the bottom of the 19th. Or, potentially worse, score 5 runs and send the game to a 20th inning!

They were determined to give it a good shot. Darling came out, and got the 1st out, a groundout by Paul Zuvella. But Claudell Washington hit a bouncer to 1st that Hernandez mishandled. (No, Kramer and Newman from Seinfeld were not in the stands to yell, "Nice game, pretty boy!") Claudell and his long neck got to 2nd.

No problem, Darling would get out of it, right? Sure enough, he got Ramirez to pop up. One more out. That left only the dangerous Murphy, the 1982 & '83 National League Most Valuable Player, and still one of the most dangerous hitters in the game. But what could he do? A home run would only make it 16-13.

But Darling walked him. And then he walked Perry. And now the bases were loaded for Harper, who had already homered. And Harper singled. Washington and Murphy scored. Perry was on 3rd. It was 16-13 Mets. Men on 1st and 3rd. A home run would tie the game. Again.

And who was up? Rick Camp. Surely, he wouldn't do it again...

He didn't: Darling struck him out on a high fastball. Finally, mercifully, at long last, ballgame over.

Camp was the losing pitcher, but he won something more important than a single baseball game. He won a place in baseball lore. After all these years, we're still talking about this mind-boggling game, and not about any other game in which he ever pitched.

Oh yeah: Although the game was over, the night wasn't. The game ended at 3:55 AM. At 4:00 on the dot, Ted Turner kept his promise: The fireworks went off. The 8,000 or so fans who hadn't left cheered.

People living near the stadium did not. They heard booms and saw flashes of light, and they called the police, thinking that Atlanta was under attack.

Incredibly, Camp got 2 more hits that season, for a batting average of .231. He closed his career 13-for-175, .074. On-base percentage, .109. Slugging percentage, .114. OPS, .224. OPS+, -39. RBIs, 7. Home runs, 1.

After leaving baseball, Camp became a lobbyist. He got into legal trouble in 2005, indicted by a federal grand jury for conspiring to steal over $2 million from a mental health agency. He was convicted, and served 3 years in prison. But everyone who met him seemed to say he was a wonderful guy. Is it possible that, like Denny McLain, a pitcher who went to prison on a similar charge, he simply got in with the wrong people?

Camp died in 2013. He was 59 years old. He gave baseball fans a memory they might cherish, or they might not, but it is one that they will never, ever forget.

Billy Hunter, 1928-2025

The St. Louis Browns were a failed franchise. They played in the American League for 52 seasons, from 1902 to 1953. They finished in 2nd place, 5 games out of 1st place, behind the Philadelphia Athletics, in 1902. They finished 2nd, 1 game behind the Yankees, in 1922. They won the Pennant in 1944, with most of the game's top stars off serving in World War II. They finished 3rd the next season, 6 games behind the Detroit Tigers.

And that was it. Other than those 4 seasons, they finished an average of 34 games out of 1st place.

They had their moments. And there were 15 members of the Baseball Hall of Fame who played for them, including Rogers Hornsby, Dizzy Dean and Satchel Paige. But only 3 of those played at least 4 full seasons for them: Bobby Wallace, George Sisler and Rick Ferrell -- and, if they ever had to start dropping guys from the Hall, Ferrell and possibly Wallace would be among them.

Now, the book can be closed on the Browns, because their last living former player has died.

Gordon William Hunter was born on June 4, 1928 in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, the town famous for introducing the tradition of Groundhog Day, about 80 miles northeast of Pittsburgh. He grew up in Indiana, Pennsylvania, and played shortstop and quarterback at Penn State.

In 1952, playing for the Fort Worth Cats, he was named the Most Valuable Player of the Texas League. But the Cats were a farm team of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and the Dodgers' shortstop was Pee Wee Reese. Here's a list of shortstops who got stuck behind Pee Wee who later became major league managers: Bobby Bragan, Gene Mauch, Dick Williams, Don Zimmer, Billy Hunter.

So the Dodgers traded him to the St. Louis Browns. He made his major league debut for them on April 14, 1953, and became their one and only representative to the All-Star Game. On September 27 of that year, was again their starting shortstop in the last game they ever played, a 2-1 11-inning loss to the Chicago White Sox. When they re-debuted on April 13, 1954 as the Baltimore Orioles, in a 3-0 loss to the Detroit Tigers, he was, again, their starting shortstop. In both cities, he wore uniform Number 6.

On November 17, 1954, he became part of the biggest trade, by number of players, in baseball history: 17. Among the other players the Yankees got were pitchers Don Larsen and Bob Turley. Among the players the Orioles got was Gene Woodling, who had played left field on the Yankees' 5 straight World Champions of 1949 to 1953.

Wearing Number 20, Hunter wasn't considered good enough to replace even an aging Phil Rizzuto. After Rizzuto was released in 1956, it was Tony Kubek who succeeded the Scooter, not Hunter. He was a member of the Yankees' World Series-winning team, but was not on the Series roster.

That should have been a sign that he was going to be part of "the Kansas City Shuttle," a pattern in which the Yankees and the Kansas City Athletics sent players back and forth. Oddly enough, in that February 19, 1957 trade, the Yankees traded, among others, the man who became the last living St. Louis Brown, Billy Hunter, for, among others, the man who became the last living Philadelphia Athletic, Bobby Shantz. The following year, Hunter made his last major league appearance, with the Cleveland Indians. In 630 major league games, he batted .219.

He spent the 1959 season with the San Diego Padres of the Pacific Coast League, then was hired as a scout by the Indians, then was welcomed back into the Oriole organization. He managed the West Virginia-based Bluefield Orioles to the Appalachian League Pennant in 1962 and 1963. He was then made the major-league Orioles' 3rd base coach, and remained so until 1977, including on 8 1st-place teams, winning 6 Pennants and the 1966 and 1970 World Series. Hunter, wearing Number 55 and waving runners home, became a familiar sight to baseball TV viewers.

In Game 4 of the 1969 World Series, manager Earl Weaver was thrown out of the game, and Hunter served as acting manager. He was offered the manager's job for the California Angels for the 1972 season, but turned it down. On June 27, 1977, he finally said yes to a managing job, with the Texas Rangers. He got them to 2nd place in the American League Western Division, and also finished 2nd in the voting for AL Manager of the Year -- behind his recent boss, Weaver, who nearly won the AL East.

Ranger 1st baseman Mike Hargrove, who later became a Pennant-winning manager with the Cleveland Indians, called Hunter "a perfect blend of knowing how to handle people, plus knowing the game." He guided the Rangers to another 2nd-place finish in 1978. In spite of that, he lost the locker room, feuding with some players, and later admitted that he was sorry he took the job.

His record over was 146–108, for a .575 winning percentage, but he never wore a major league uniform in an official capacity again. He returned to the Baltimore area, and served as head coach at Towson State University from 1979 to 1988, and as the school's athletic director from 1984 to 1995. The school and the Orioles each elected him to their Hall of Fame.

Billy Hunter died on July 3, 2025, at the age of 97, in Lutherville, Baltimore County, Maryland. He was the last living former St. Louis Brown, and the last living original Baltimore Oriole. He was also the earliest living former Yankee. That title is now held by Bobby Richardson. The oldest living former Yankee was already Bobby Shantz, who is also the last surviving player for the Philadelphia Athletics.