You’re the home team. You’ve got two-outs on your opponents in the Top of the 9th, clinging to a one-run lead. There are runners on 2B and 3B, and you’ve got a lefty on lefty matchup with one of your best relievers on the bump.
He gets a fly ball, albeit a deep one. It drifts into the no-man’s-land in between left and center, but does so slowly enough for there to be plenty of time for the outfield to figure it out. Hell, you even have two centerfielders in the area, as one slid over to left to allow
the superior defender to man center.
Everything points towards your club wrapping up a win, even one of a come-from-behind fashion. Your struggling middle infielder – who picked up a trio of hits last night and immediately got rocketed up the batting order today – slugged a crucial grand slam in the 6th to flip the scoreboard in your favor! A win would mean another series victory, a second straight day of winning in come-from-behind fashion with an epic dinger, and would take down your most bitter of divisional rivals.
Then, this happens:
Shading his eyes from the sun with sunglasses on the top of his hat upside down, Dane Myers bricked it. Flubbed it. Toed it a bit. The runs scored, the floodgates opened, and by the end of the half inning the Reds found themselves down 10-5 a blink after having the game won.
To their credit – or, rather, to the credit of the Baseball Gods for making it sting even more – the Reds charged right back in the Bottom of the 9th. Erratic pitching, good eyes at the plate, a laser of a single by Sal Stewart, and the Reds found themselves down just 10-9 with the bases loaded and Matt McLain – whose grand slam earlier in the game I spoke of – at the plate again.
He lined out. The Reds lost this one, because of course they did. They lost the series, they failed to bury the St. Louis Cardinals, and we get to relive this one in the deepest, darkest corners of our memories for the rest of time.
Don’t believe me on that last part? I’m still haunted by Laynce Nix.
