Last four games in Baltimore 1982: Brewers/Orioles series
We knew what was at stake. Simply the Birds had to sweep the last four games of the 1982 season. Of course that sounded impossible because the first-place Brewers were the guests at Memorial Stadium.
That was a Brewers team with sluggers Cecil Cooper, Paul Molitor and Ben Oglivie. Oh, yeah and player named Robin Yount. And add a homer hero named Gorman Thomas. All the Brewers needed was one win to clinch the pennant.
Back on Sept 24, we had taken two of three from the Brewers in Milwaukee. The one loss? A 15-6 hammering. Yount knocked in 6 runs that day.
The do or die series in Baltimore began with a twin bill on Oct. 1. A split and the season would be over for the Birds. 18-game winner Pete Vukovich was on the mound for Milwaukee. Ken Singleton opened the fourth with homer and the Orioles were up 4-1. Jim Dwyer and Rich Dauer both had 3 hits in the 8-3 win in the first game.
Storm Davis started game two. Eddie Murray set the tone with a first-inning two-run blast. The Birds breezed in game two, 7-1. Murray had 3 hits.
Still on the brink of elimination, the Birds took the field on Saturday one game back of Milwaukee. By this time, I had caught Orioles fever and was in the crowd. It was a blowout. No one was going to stop Earl Weaver’s final team.
Despite a 3-0 lead in the first, this game tied in the fourth. We scored the next seven runs. Brother Lo (John Lowenstein) had 3 hits. So did Rick Dempsey. Reliever Sammy Stewart shut the door and the O’s breezed 11-3. We were tied for first with one game to be played.
It was rent-a-pitcher, Don Sutton and Jim Palmer for the Birds. And we got blown out. Yount hit a pair of homers. We lost 10-2.
So I had tickets to the first two games in Milwaukee this week. Both games were terrific. That Monday game saw not just one but two Jonathan Schoop homers.
That crazy ninth inning. Two outs and down by two runs off of former Birds reliever K-Rod. And Schoop homers. Still down a run. Pinch-hitter Delmon Young singles up the middle. David Lough is asked to pinch-run. And then Nick Markakis hits one in the gap. Most runners stop at third. Not Lough. He was positively flying. He scored without a throw and we are tied. Yahoo.
In the home half of the ninth, a few Little League plays checked in. First substitute catcher, Nick Hundley fires a ball over the first baseman’s head. The game is not lost as Schoop rescues the error. And then the Brewers answer back in the stupid department. A pinch-runner is on third. And then JJ Hardy catches a routine liner. The runner gets doubled off very stupidly.
Hundley atones for his error and singles in the go-ahead run. Zach Britton gets out of trouble for the save in the 7-6 win.
I had better seats on Tuesday. This game had everything. Naturally another Nellie Cruz homer. The big hit was a pinch-hit three-run homer from Steve Pearce. We had erased a Brewers 5-0 lead. It was our turn to blow it at the end. But it was so close. Manny Machado nearly ended the game with a tough play at third. And get this we lose in 10 when pitcher Yovani Gallardo pinch-hits a bomb to center to beat us 7-6.
The final game didn’t have the same dramatics. Cruz cracked two more homers (19). But a four-run eighth by the Brewers spells an 8-3 loss.
