Marathon

The Giants and the Superbas in a crazy one.

Marathon

I can never seem to choose the right games to record. I had a chance to film myself playing this one, but decided not to. Neither New York nor Brooklyn have played well in the early going, and I thought this game would likely be boring.

Boy, how wrong I was.

This one started off well for Brooklyn. Harry Lumley led off the top of the 4th inning with a double. After two outs, good old Harry Pattee (a blog legend) came up:

Pattee’s single scored the run, and he showed his speed by stealing the next base. The Giants did get out of the inning, but the damage was done.

New York came back in the top of the 6th. Fred Tenney came up to bat with Cy Seymour on at second base and two men out:

Tenney’s single scored Seymour, tying the game at 1. He didn’t quite display the basestealing prowess that Pattee did, though, and his caught stealing was the third out of the inning.

And that set the stage for the madness that was to come.

Brooklyn Takes the Lead

The Superbas broke the ice in the bottom of the 7th.

Catcher Lew Ritter stood at second base with two out. Up came Tommy Sheehan:

Lumley followed this with a single, and Brooklyn led, 3-1.

But it didn’t last long.

Mike Donlin led off the top of the 8th for the Giants with a single. And that brought up Larry Doyle.

I knew it was a somewhat risky choice, but I decided to try to hit and run anyway. And it worked:

That made the score 3-2 Brooklyn. Cy Seymour grounded out, sending Doyle to third. And that brought up Art Devlin, with a runner on third and one out:

Tie ballgame.

9th Inning

New York added 2 more in the top of the 9th. I thought for sure that the Giants would run away with this. I was so sure, actually, that I didn’t grab screenshots.

It wasn’t particularly complicated. A successful Joe McGinnity bunt with runners on first and second set things up for Donlin, who came to the plate with two outs and two runners in scoring position. I decided to pitch to Donlin instead of walking him, and the score was suddenly 5-3 Giants.

But that wasn’t all.

Tim Jordan led off the bottom of the 9th with a simple groundout to short. The Superbas had two outs left.

Tommy Sheehan singled, however, and stole second base on the next pitch. And that brought up Lumley:

That second column triple made it a 5-4 game, and now things were a lot different.

Up came left fielder John Hummel:

That single tied the game at 5.

Brooklyn wasn’t able to add any more, and that led us to extra innings.

14th Inning

This is where it becomes a little difficult.

Neither team was able to get a runner past first base in the 10th, 11th, 12th, or 13th innings.

It was exciting and tense, but, as you can probably imagine, it was also a bit anticlimactic. There’s really no good way to explain the tension when there is so little offense, and there aren’t many offensive highlights to report.

The 14th, however, was different.

Donlin singled and stole second for the Giants, and dyole followed up with a walk. After Seymour flew out, Devlin walked, and the bases were loaded. Tenney flew out to left field, which was a bit of a letdown for the Giants. With two outs, up came Al Bridwell:

I thought that the Giants might completely run away with this one at this point. However, Spike Shannon ground out back to reliever George Bell, and we went to the bottom of the 14th.

But, once again, that wasn’t all.

Sheehan walked with one out in the bottom of the 14th. And that brought up Lumley yet again:

This dramatic home run off Giants reliever Luther Taylor tied the score at 7, and made me wonder if this one was ever going to end.

The Finish Line

Brooklyn had a chance in the bottom of the 15th, with runners on first and second and only one out. Pinch hitter Whitey Alpermann ground out, advancing the runners to second and third.

However, Jordan struck out, and on we went to the 16th.

With one out, Seymour singled for the Giants. And up came Devlin, once again:

I never thought I’d see 2 home runs in a single 1908 game. The score was now 9-7 Giants, and this was one to always remember.

Brooklyn didn’t mount much of a comeback in the bottom of the 16th. Hummel, the 9th inning hero, came up with one last chance:

And that was that.

16 runs and 31 hits doesn’t sound much like 1908. Brooklyn allowed 7 bases on balls, which was their undoing. The two teams combined for 17 strikeouts, which was also a bit odd.

Oh — and Lumley hit for the cycle. Told you I wish I’d recorded this one.

There were 8 stolen bases and 3 men caught stealing. I’m not sure you’d get that many in a week of 2022 baseball.

This was certainly one to remember.