St Louis Cardinals tickets

EVERYONE EXPECTED THE 1968 WORLD Series to feature one of the greatest pitching matchups of all time: Denny McLain against Bob Gibson. With a large strike zone, a tall pitcher's mound, and ever-bigger ballparks, pitchers' dominance reached a fifty-year peak in 1968. American League batters hit .230 collectively, and only one, Carl Yastrzemski, managed to top .300. In this "Year of the Pitcher," Gibson and McLain were baseball's two best pitchers, and each led his team to the pennant. McLain, a free-spirited right-hander who moonlighted as an organ player and amateur pilot, won 31 games for the Detroit Tigers with his outstanding fastball and unhittable curve. Gibson, the militant fire-bailer, was even better posting a 1.12 ERA that was the lowest in baseball since 1914 and the fourth-lowest of all time. Although both men performed admirably in the World Series, in the end the spotlight was stolen by a pot-bellied left-hander who looked more at home on a sofa than on a pitcher's mound.

The most important strate¬gic move of the Series St. Louis Cardinals History came before the first pitch was even thrown. The three Tiger shortstops-Ray Oyler, Tom Matchick, and Dick Tracewski-had hit a com  bined .165 during the regu¬lar season, so manager Mayo Smith enacted probably the boldest World Series experiment since Connie Mack started Howard Ehmke in 1929. Smith moved Mitchell "Mickey" Stanley, his regular center fielder, to shortstop, although Stanley had never played the position before. That allowed him to play Al Kaline, a heavy hitter who would otherwise have sat on the bench, in right field. The move was a stupendous success, as Stanley handled 31 of 33 chances safely, and Kaline batted .379 in the Series and led all players with two homers and eight RBI.

Gibson lived up to his billing in Game 1, breaking Sandy Koufax's five-year-old Series record by striking out seventeen Tigers as St. Louis won easily, 4-0. The second game belonged to pudgy Detroit southpaw Mickey Lolich, an amateur sailor, scuba diver, archer, target shooter, and National Guard soldier who usually drove one of his five motorcycles to Tiger Stadium. Lolich pitched a complete game 8-1 victory and also hit the first home run of his professional career to tie the Series at one game apiece. Lou Brock's legs won Game 3. The St. Louis Cardinals MLB speedster had three hits and stole three bases. Orlando Cepeda contributed a three-run homer as St. Louis won, 7-3. The Cards also captured the next game as Gibson out dueled McLain, striking out ten batters in nine innings.