World Series legends

Forty years later, it still defies logic, even for the man who became synonymous with a calendar month.
Technology that's now available at our fingertips at any moment in any location -- with a reasonably reliable cellular plan, that is -- enables us to punch in some combination of these words: "Reggie Jackson 1977 World Series three home runs." 
Soon enough, we're watching video of something that had never been seen before Oct. 18 of that year -- and might very well never be seen again.
Not only did the man who claimed to be "the straw that stirred the [Yankees'] drink" blast home runs in three consecutive at-bats under the bright lights in the Bronx to effectively put Game 6, and that Fall Classic, on ice, but he did it on three consecutive pitches against three different pitchers.
By the time he had been whisked off the field into the champagne-soaked clubhouse at Yankee Stadium, the future Hall of Famer had earned a ring, his very own candy bar and an everlasting nickname: Mr. October.
First, Jackson put on a batting practice show, a formidable foreshadowing of what was to come once the game began. After walking in the second inning, Jackson strode to the plate in the bottom of the fourth for his second plate appearance against Dodgers starter Burt Hooton. The Yankees were trailing by a run but had Thurman Munson on first base.
"I remember [the team] being down, 3-2, because I didn't play a ball in the right-field corner that well, and it went for a triple but should have been a double," Jackson told the New York Post years later. "The next time up, Hooton tried to come inside with a fastball with the first pitch. As soon as I hit it, I knew it was gone." 
Legendary Los Angeles Times columnist Jim Murray described Jackson's first bomb, which landed in the lower deck in right field, as a "booming Jack Nicklaus-type tee shot, high and far, the kind that pitchers wake up screaming in the middle of the night over."
Jackson's next at-bat came in the fifth inning. The situation had changed thanks to his first homer, plus an insurance run via a Lou Piniella sacrifice fly, putting the Yankees in front, 5-3. They would not trail again. They were feeling it, and so was Jackson.
New pitcher Elias Sosa was on the rubber and delivered a first pitch strike to Jackson, who uncorked a screaming, laser-like liner that cleared the right-field wall and somehow didn't seriously injure someone in the bleachers. Statcast™ wasn't around 40 years ago, but this one practically defined "exit velocity." The late Murray wrote that homer No. 2 "would have crossed state lines and gone through the side of a battleship on its way to the seats."
Jackson was caught on television in the dugout after the Sosa homer. "Hi, Mom," he said, holding up two fingers. "Two."
The Yankees were now up, 7-3, the Dodgers were demoralized, the crowd knew there would be a trophy handed out in the Bronx that night, and the only question was how much history No. 44 would make. As it turns out, the answer was quite a bit more.
"I hit knuckleball pitchers very well, and I couldn't believe they had brought in Charlie Hough," Jackson would tell the Post years later, when asked to recount his final at-bat of the game, which came as the leadoff hitter in the bottom of the eighth. "He threw me a hit-me knuckleball, and I dropped a bomb in dead center." 
Video: 1977 WS Gm6: Fans applaud Reggie Jackson
Jackson's third homer was, fittingly, the most majestic of the Series. This one was crushed to center and in rarefied air, both literally and figuratively. Not often did fans see freshly-landed moonshots bouncing around on the unoccupied black batter's eye bleachers as this one did, at least 450 feet from home plate, and not often did they witness three homers by one player in a World Series game.
In fact, it had only happened twice before Jackson turned the trick, when another gregarious and somewhat talented Yankees slugger, Babe Ruth, did it in 1926 and '28 (it has since been replicated by Albert Pujols in 2011 and Pablo Sandoval in '12). 
Jackson's legacy is safe in the annals of signature Fall Classic heroics, but others come to mind as we embark on the annual opportunity to witness more game-changing feats.
Take Don Larsen, the Yankees pitcher who retired the first batter in Game 5 of the 1956 World Series against the Brooklyn Dodgers -- and promptly set down the next 26 to complete the first and, still only, perfect game in a Fall Classic. 
"It's just one of those days that I had very good control," Larsen told CBS Radio in 2016. "And I never had control like that before or after."
Larsen, previously known for going 3-21 for the 1954 Baltimore Orioles and arriving in New York as a trade throw-in, walked roughly five batters per game in the regular season, but never faltered in this contest and now stands alone in history. The only other no-hitter in postseason history came courtesy of Philadelphia's Roy Halladay in Game 1 of the 2010 National League Division Series against Cincinnati.
As with Larsen, control was the key word for St. Louis Cardinals right-hander Bob Gibson during his 1967 World Series tour de force, which also deserves recognition on this list. Gibson had already won World Series MVP honors three years prior, when he went 2-1 in three starts and put up a Series ERA of 3.00 while leading the Cardinals to victory over the Yankees.
He was even better against the Red Sox in 1967. Gibson got the Cardinals off to a great start, going the distance in a 2-1 Game 1 win in Fenway Park. In Game 4, back home at Busch Stadium, he fired a shutout. And he helped St. Louis take home the title by winning Game 7 on the road, giving up only two runs in nine innings. 
If you're scoring at home, that's three starts, three complete games and three victories. That's 27 innings, 14 hits, three runs, five walks and 26 strikeouts. That's one for the ages.
The same goes for Madison Bumgarner in the 2014 World Series against the Kansas City Royals. The Giants left-hander started Game 1 in Kansas City and pitched San Francisco to a 7-1 victory with seven innings of three-hit, one-run ball. In his next outing, back home for Game 5, Bumgarner went the distance on a four-hitter, striking out eight. And then, when his team needed him the most, Bumgarner went to the mound one more time.
This was in Game 7, and it wound up as one of the greatest relief appearances in Fall Classic history. Bumgarner took over in the fifth inning and went the rest of the way to seal the Series, shutting down the Royals at Kauffman Stadium with five scoreless, two-hit innings while striking out four. He finished the Series going 2-0 with one save and pitched to an ERA of 0.43 over 21 innings.
"What a warrior he is, and it's truly incredible what he did throughout the postseason," Giants Manager Bruce Bochy said. "I told him I just can't believe what he accomplished through all this."
The phrase "can't believe" also applies to one of the most famous swings in World Series history. In Game 1 of the 1988 Fall Classic, the Dodgers were supposed to be without NL MVP Kirk Gibson, who had two bad legs. But with the tying run on first base, two outs in the bottom of the ninth and Los Angeles down, the Dodgers needed a pinch-hitter, no matter how banged up he might be. Gibson hobbled to the plate.

There's no need to set up the drama; we all know what happened on the full-count slider by Dennis Eckersley. We remember Scully's call as it flew into the right-field pavilion of Chavez Ravine: "High fly ball into right field, she is gone!" We can recount Jack Buck's immediate reaction afterward: "I don't believe what I just saw." And Scully's after that: "In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened!"
There are so many memorable World Series feats that it's almost impossible to limit the top choice, but Reggie Jackson's 1977 trifecta somehow still stands above the rest. The great Red Smith wrote in The New York Times that "Shakespeare wouldn't attempt a curtain scene like that if he was plastered."
In other words, World Series moments are poetic and worthy of preserving for posterity. What's next?
This article appears in the World Series Program. To purchase a copy, visit mlbshop.com.