Game Six Read Free

his pocket.
    Okay, chump, dig in all you like, that plate belongs to me. You like that? You see that one? How about this? Okay, sit down. Bye-bye. Next victim.
    Luis had from almost his first game known he belonged on a pitching mound. Curiously calm and in command, he just didn’t experience the position’s crushing pressures as a stress, but seemed to welcome them as a form of pleasure. Genetics? Yes, no doubt; he was his father’s son, and already had the presence, the cojones, of a matador, but Tiant Senior remained a lanky rapier of a man, whereas there was more than a little of the bull in Luis: solid legs, thick core, barrel chest, and burly shoulders.
    And a few days later Bobby Avila came to call at their house to tell them of the offer from the general manager of the Mexico City Tigers:
    One hundred and fifty dollars a month to start, but the American clubs keep their eyes on the Mexican League now; someone’s going to bring him over into their system if all goes well, I’ll make sure of that.
    Luis watched his father anxiously—$150!—but didn’t speak a word. He had always been a dutiful son, secure in his parents’ love, always respectful of their wishes. He saw only sorrow in his father’s big, expressive features as he heard the news; he could never hide his feelings. He didn’t want his boy to go.
    But he nodded yes.

ONE
    Now we’re back in the lion’s den.
If they beat us here, they deserve it.
    C ARL Y ASTRZEMSKI
    If a man put a gun to my head and said
I’m going to pull the trigger if you lose this game,
I’d want Luis Tiant to pitch that game.
    R ED S OX MANAGER D ARRELL J OHNSON
    T HE SUN ROSE ON BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, AT 7:03 IN THE morning on Tuesday, October 21,1975. This, in itself, was news. Local meteorologists, who had been under siege for the last four days, hastily issued dispatches of an optimistic forecast: partly sunny, high near seventy degrees, 10–15 mph winds from the west to southwest. Clearing throughout the day and cooler, with temperatures dropping into the high fifties by 8:30 P.M., the moment on the mind of every resident in the region, native or itinerant, as they stirred that morning.
    Game time.
     
    BASEBALL’S FIFTH COMMISSIONER , Bowie Kuhn, woke shortly after six in his presidential suite at the Ritz-Carlton, went straight to the window, and saw the early rays of light filtering across the Boston Common. He had held his job for nearly seven years now, presiding over one of the rockiest periods in the game’s history, beset by labor unrest and falling attendance. But to date this tense, competitive World Series had shown signs of reviving interest in thegame, until the New England weather intervened. The sturdy lawyer’s Oxfords that Kuhn had worn the day before to walk the soggy field, before postponing the game at yet another elaborately staged press conference, still sat drying by the fireplace. When the rains first hit, Kuhn had moved Game Six of the World Series, originally scheduled for Saturday afternoon, to Sunday afternoon, and then pushed it back again, as the storm lingering over Boston persisted, to Monday night. Now, at last, after a third day’s delay, sunshine on Tuesday morning.
    The forty-eight-year-old Kuhn rang for coffee, sat down at his desk, and paged through his phone book. Even before he notified Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey, in his own suite down the hall at the Ritz, his first call would be to network executive Chet Simmons. The commissioner worked for baseball’s twenty-four wealthy owners, but during World Series Week NBC paid the bills.
    Chet, I am cautiously optimistic that we are back in business.
     
    AT THE STATLER HILTON, half a mile closer to Fenway Park, Cincinnati Reds manager Sparky Anderson woke at first light—no alarm clock necessary for Sparky—and crept to the window. One look outside and the butterflies in his guts cranked their engines; his stomach was so jumpy he could have juggled three eggs on it. His nimble,