The Odyssey Of The White Sox And The Brewers
Harold Baines, circa 1984, who called the game to a halt with a walk-off blast in the bottom of the 25th inning. Getty Images via SportsIllustrated.com
The Odyssey Of The White Sox And The Brewers, or:
The Longest Baseball Game In The History Of Ever-So-Far
This week alone, thousands of tenacious fans endured uncomfortable plastic seats through a slew of loooong games. The Rays and the Red Sox sixteen-inning egg feast set the pace at the beginning of the week, with a game that began on Sunday evening and concluded over five hours later, complements to a single ribbie from Dustin Pedroia early Monday morning.
On Tuesday night, the Blue Jays and Mariners had beaucoup de bonus rounds in a match of their making that stretched to fourteen frames. The score was five-a-piece until Toronto’s Johnny McDonald stepped into the box with Rajai Davis on first. Meanwhile Davis stole two bases, and rained over Seattle to score on JMac’s sac fly.
Maybe these fans have a bit of a chip on their shoulder, a touch of hubris, perhaps. Maybe they sat through a game that was even longer than these two, and think they have thus earned good favor from the gods. But these games, which stayed in the teens as far as innings are concerned, were only a fleeting moment compared to the longest game in baseball history (ever, so far). A game that went into fourteen or even sixteen innings, like those of this week, is merely a verse when held to the epic that started on May 8th, 1984: The Odyssey of the White Sox and Milwaukee Brewers.
On Tuesday, May 8th, in 1984, the White Sox and Brewers met for battle at Comiskey Park in Chicago, Illinois. To clarify, the game started on May 8th, 1984, but play was stopped after the seventeenth inning, and then resumed the following night. The game started off as a pitcher’s duel between the Sox’ Don Sutton and the Brew Crew’s Bob Fallon. In the bottom of the sixth, Chicago’s T. Paciorek tacked the first run on the board with an RBI-single. Milwaukee did not hesitate to answer back, as R. Yount knocked in R. Ready for a run at the top of the seventh. The game was tied 1-1.
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