From a Gimpy Entrance to a Classic Moment

Who’s that coming to bat, Walter Brennan?

No, it really was Kirk Gibson, and he wasn’t walking to home plate, he was lurching.

Eleven years ago tonight, Gibson whacked a home run that produced an ovation almost sufficient to trigger an earthquake.

The Dodgers were trailing Oakland, 4-3, and were one out away from losing Game 1 of the World Series.

No one expected Gibson to play in this one and few thought he’d be ready to perform in the Series at all. He had a sprained ligament in his right knee and lingering soreness from a strained left hamstring. He limped on both legs.

Mike Davis, having drawn a two-out walk, was at first base when Gibson, pinch-hitting for Alejandro Pena, gingerly set up to face Dennis Eckersley, who had saved all four A’s victories in the American League championship series and 45 others during the regular season.

With 55,983 watching, Gibson worked Eckersley for a full count. Then Gibson got a very ordinary slider, waist-high over the heart of the plate. With a snap of his wrists, Gibson hit it over the right-field wall.

Gibson, who wasn’t even on the Dodger bench when summoned by Manager Tom Lasorda, had gotten a rousing ovation when he limped to home plate. Now, as he rounded the bases, the ovation was ear-splitting, and it continued long after Gibson disappeared into the swarming Dodger dugout.

Eckersley was disconsolate. “It was a terrible pitch, I’ve got to live with it,” he said.

*

Also on this date: In 1989, the Kings’ Wayne Gretzky passed Gordie Howe to become hockey’s all-time leading scorer with 1,852 points. . . . In 1910, a drifter and Army deserter, Walter Dipley, shot and killed world middleweight boxing champion Stanley Ketchel in a farmhouse near Springfield, Mo. Years later, writer John Lardner wrote of Ketchel’s death: “Stanley Ketchel was 24 years old when he was fatally shot in the back by the common-law husband of the lady who was cooking his breakfast.” . . . In 1968, U.S. discus thrower Al Oerter won an unprecedented fourth consecutive gold medal at the Mexico City Olympics.