On
September 22, 1968, Bob Gibson tossed his 27th complete game of the
year, but ended up on the losing end of a 3-2 Dodgers victory over the
Cardinals in Los Angeles. The loss by the Cards put Gibson’s record at 21-9,
while his ERA rose from 1.13 to 1.16. Gibby had one more start in front of him,
and in that start, he would reach what many of us consider a magic number:
1.12.
The
Dodgers called on future Hall of Famer Don Sutton to face Gibson. 23-year-old Sutton
was in control that day. He surrendered a hit to Dal Maxvill in the third, then
held the Cardinals hitless until the eighth. Meanwhile, Gibson kept the Dodgers
off the board until the sixth when Paul Popovich knocked in Tom Haller to make
it 1-0. Willie Crawford made it 2-0 Dodgers with a solo shot in the seventh and
Gibson found himself in a hole.
Gibson
and company were not in the hole long. Sutton’s run of dominance over the
Redbird lineup wore off in the top of the eighth. Although, he did retire the
first two men he faced in the frame. Dal Maxvill and Gibson began the rally
with a pair of singles. Lou Brock followed suit with a single to right that
brought Maxvill into score and moved Gibson over to third. Sutton then balked,
Gibson scored, Lou moved to second and the game was knotted up 2-2.
The tied
ballgame did not last long. Gibson began the bottom of the eighth by issuing a
walk to Bill Sudakis. Wes Parker moved Sudakis over to second with a sac bunt
before disaster struck… Popovich came to the plate having already knocked in
the run in the sixth. He was just a .218 hitter, who likely had one job, which
was to move Sudakis over to third. Popovich hit a flyball to Joe Hague in right
that looked like it would do exactly that. However, Hague threw a wild one into
third trying to get Sudakis out and once the runner saw the ball get away, he
made the dash to home. The score was 3-2. Gibson struck the last man he faced
in the inning out and headed to the dugout back in a hole.
Sutton
gave up a single to Orlando Cepeda in the top of the ninth, which ended his
day. Jim Brewer came on in relief and set the next three men down in a row.
After looking at this entire season, it would be easy to say that this loss was
perhaps the most heartbreaking loss that Gibson had to endure that season. With
that said, the Cardinals had clenched the pennant, he and his teammates would
be going onto represent the National League in the World Series, and Gibson
would go out one more time during the regular season and drop that number down
to 1.12.
Check out the box score here: https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/LAN/LAN196809220.shtml
Sources included: The
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The St. Joseph Gazette, The Schenectady Gazette, and
Baseballreference.com
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