Introduction: Game 5 in Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh has always been a proud sports town, and will always be a big sports town. It lives and breathes to watch their hometown boys play, and is part of the fabric of it's culture, and while it's certainly crazy for the Steelers and the Pirates, it's longest love affair is with it's baseball club, the Pittsburgh Pirates. Founded in 1887 as the Pittsburgh Alleghenies, the club would go on to win five World Series in 1909, 1925, 1960, 1971, and 1979. It was the team that brought us Bill Mazerozski's famous walk off Game 7 Home Run in 1960, it was the team that endured tragedy when Roberto Clemente's plane crashed, and the team that brought us the 'We Are Family' team of 1979 featuring Willie Stargell-and on Sunday, October 10th, another star studded team of players was knocking on the door of winning it's 10th National League Pennant en route to the World Series.
Narrator: Just how good were the 1992 Pittsburgh Pirates?
Peter Gammons: "The Pirates of the early '90s were arguably the best team in baseball, and certainly the most balanced. Their outfield was outstanding-Barry Bonds was heading to the Hall of Fame; he was an electrifying athelete he had power, speed, and a heck of a glove. Andy Van Slyke played the role of the consummate veteran in centerfield......
Gene Collier: .....and then there was the pitching. Doug Drabek was an absolute warhorse who you had to literally drag off the mound, and in 1992 he was at his best, sporting a 2.77 ERA that year. Stan Belinda was an save machine on the back end.....
Joe Starkey: .....then there was Tim Wakefield, a kid knuckleballer who was absolutely unhittable down the stretch for the Pirates; a lot of guys looked really bad swinging against him.....
Gene Collier:.....and up the middle you had Chico Lind and Jay Bell, who were two of the best in the business at the time......
Peter Gammons: .....and they were managed by Jim Leyland, who was maybe the most no-nonsense, respected maneger in the league....and his teams took on that image. Like Pittsburghers, they worked hard, they ran out every ball, and they took on all comers. Pittsburghers loved that.....
The Pirates were in the NLCS for the third time in three years, having come close against the Reds and the Pirates in 1990 and 1991.
Gene Collier: The beginning of the series hadn't gone well; we were blown away by John Smoltz in Game 1.....
Steve Blass:.....and then Danny Jackson got shelled from Atlanta to Pittsburgh and back in Game 2.....things looked really bad.
Tim Wakefield: .....and here I was as a rookie pitching the biggest game of the series in Game 3 going up against a Cy Young winner and future Hall of Famer. No pressure, right?
Peter Gammons:.....and he delivered a masterful performance under fire in front of a crowd of 56,000+. Five hits over nine innings, outdueling one of the best in the game.....and you could see the sense of relief.
(Cut to locker room footage with post game speech by Jim Leyland ("we played hard. I'm especially proud of Tim for stepping up" and Bucs celebrating)
Gene Collier: There was the feeling that momentum was beginning to shift back to the Bucs...and although they didn't win Game 4, they seemed to finally have gotten a grasp on Atlanta's hand of aces; without a costly error by Jeff King, I think they win there.
That set the stage for Game 5; Atlanta's Steve Avery was on the mound. Avery had tormented the Pirates in 1991, spinning two unhittable performances.
Joe Starkey: ...Steve Avery had been kryptonite to Pirate bats all year long. The Bucs were wholly owned by him last year and this year-it was either figure him out or this was the end.
Steve Blass:....and they came out and shelled him back to Atlanta.
(Footage: "There's a looping line drive and a fair ball. Redus will have at least a double."(crowd roars))
(Footage:"Payoff Pitch! Bounced up the middle; base hit! Redus will come around to score!" (crowd roars))
(Footage: "3-2 Count....over the head of Justice (crowd roars).....Bell into score. The Bucs are up 2-0!"(crowd roars) The monkey is off the back of Barry Bonds! A smile is just a frown turned upside down.)
(Footage: "Deep drive left-center field, back to the wall Otis Nixon.....he can't get it! Bonds into score! King has a double! 3-0 Pittsburgh! (crowd roaring))
(Footage: "That's well hit to the left field corner! Gant on the run can't get it. McClendon has a double, King on to score, and Pittsburgh has a 4-0 lead. They are hitting rockets off of Steve Avery here in the first inning! (crowd roaring))
(Footage:.....and they knock Steve Avery out after just one third of an inning.)
Peter Gammons:....and I can remember watching that and thinking that momentum had turned. Barry Bonds, who had been 0 for the series got going again, and you could see that they thought they had the Braves figured out.
Joe Starkey: Bob Walk came out and threw a complete game, shutting the Atlanta offense down over nine innings, and you could just see them oozing with confidence.
(Footage: "Redus waves off Walk, that ends it!)
(Footage: Barry Bonds: "When I got out here, the fans were behind me, it was a great feeling...It hit that double, rounded second base, and the jinx was over...and noe we've got Tm Wakefield waiting for us down in Atlanta for Game 6, and he's been awesome.")
Gene Collier: They clearly felt good heading down to Atlanta, and you can see that by the footage of them getting on the plane....
(Footage: Pirates boarding a Boeing 737 jet. Lloyd McClendon waves and yells "Be back soon with some hardware!")
These images are the last the world will ever see of the 1992 Pittsburgh Pirates.....
[CNN Special Report Banner] 12:26
"We have breaking news, a Boeing 737 has crashed in the Atlanta suburbs......"
(Footage from a helicopter shows several small fires and a blackened treescape, with the charred tail section of a 737 and little else visible.)