True Hero of Series Saw Title Slip Away on Bases

It was the eighth inning of Game 7 of the World Series. The score was 0-0 when Atlanta’s Lonnie Smith led off with a single to right field. The batter was Terry Pendleton.

Pendleton smashed a drive to deep left center, where it caromed off the wall for an extra-base hit.

It should have won the 1991 Series for the Atlanta Braves. The fleet Lonnie Smith, who once stole 68 bases in a season, could have scored easily from first--except that he inexplicably lost sight of the ball. He hesitated, stopped running, started back to second after he had rounded it, and then, seeing the ball was nowhere in sight and he was being decoyed, took off for third, where he had to stop. He died on third. So did Atlanta’s World Series championship chances.

It would have been fitting if Terry Pendleton had won the World Series for the Braves because he put them in it in the first place. His hit, which might have been a triple if Smith had gotten out of his own way, would have wound up with the Braves winning, 1-0, because the game went into extra innings, and it was not until the bottom of the 10th that anyone--Minnesota--was to score.

Pendleton’s contributions to the season were such--.319 batting average, 94 runs, 86 runs batted in, 22 home runs--that he became the National League’s MVP. Except for Pendleton, the Atlanta Whatchamacallums were pretty much the same team that finished last three years in a row and four times out of the last five.

Atlanta should at least have sent a Series share to the St. Louis Cardinals for their input.

Free agency is having an increasing influence on the grand old game, but it’s still an artful crapshoot where most general managers opt for the big-reputation players, with dubious results.

Most “experts” thought the Braves were crazy to be throwing big bucks--multimillions for multiyears--at third baseman Pendleton.

He was coming off a season during which his St. Louis team didn’t even play him, turning the position over to Todd Zeile.

“They told me really to go scratch myself,” Pendleton recalled as he sat in a locker room the other night. “I couldn’t understand it. I had had some good years. I’d been in three World Series. I must have been doing something right. We all know it’s a business, but when they let go of Willie McGee, Vince Coleman, who’s next--Ozzie Smith? It’s all money. I knew I was gone when I won arbitration in 1990. You keep that in mind. But when I came over here to Atlanta, they made me feel wanted. They told me what they were going to do for me, not what they wanted me to do for them.”

Even so, it was a gamble in the minds of most baseball men. Pendleton, after all, had batted only .230 and was benched the entire month of September. His six home runs were not impressive--although Busch Stadium is, to be sure, a park where 11 homers a season makes you club champion.

In Atlanta, where the fences are friendlier and the altitude (1,100 feet) is downright loving, Pendleton’s batting stroke revived. In addition to his 22 home runs, he had 34 doubles and eight triples. During the Braves’ pennant drive, as they overtook the Dodgers in the closing days, he hit safely in 25 of 28 games.

He solidified the infield with 349 assists in 481 total chances. His errors (24) were about par for third base, where the ball comes rocketing at 130-m.p.h. in less than a second. As a switch-hitter, he avoids platooning.

It was a cardiac World Series. Five games were decided by one run. Five games were decided in the final inning. Four games were decided by the final pitch. Three went extra innings, including the final one the Twins won, 1-0.

It would have been fitting for Pendleton’s extra-base hit to have won it. He had a Series that not only matched his season, but exceeded it. He batted .367. He hit two home runs, one of which was the margin of victory in Game 4. He drove in three runs, scored six. He had three doubles.

His 11 hits were more than anyone had in the Series--and his 11th hit should have won the Series. If Lonnie Smith hadn’t stopped, like a guy who suddenly remembers he left his wallet on the car seat, he would have scored the winning run, and Terry Pendleton would have been responsible not only for the greatest season, but the greatest day Atlanta has had since Sherman left.