After a franchise high point—a run of four contending seasons that included an NLCS trip in 1981—ended in 1982, the Expos drifted off the radar. Over a four-year rebuilding process, they parted ways with great players. When Andre Dawson continued the exodus by leaving via free agency prior to 1987—and then promptly won the MVP […]
Baseball fans in the Bronx experienced a lot of frustration in a short historical period that started in 1983. The Yankees were never bad—indeed, the typical high expectations that come with Pinstripes were in place every spring. But through most of the 1980s, the Yanks were just good enough to tease and then come up […]
Baseball in Oakland had been in a dry spell since the AL West title run in the strike-shortened season of 1981. The A’s promptly dipped under .500 the following year and stayed there. Midway through the 1986 season, the organization tapped Tony LaRussa, who had managed the 1983 Chicago White Sox into the ALCS, to […]
The Royals were just two years removed from the ultimate high—their 1985 World Series title that capped off a decade of consistent winning. But they couldn’t be blamed if it seemed like longer. 1986 had turned into a long nightmare. The team slipped under .500. Manager Dick Howser was diagnosed with a brain tumor and […]
After a strong six-year run of contention ended in 1983, the city of Milwaukee saw losing baseball for the next three years. The 1987 Milwaukee Brewers returned to contention under first-year manager Tim Trebelhorn and gave the fan base a roller-coaster ride of excitement, fraught with several notable streaks on both a team-wide and individual […]
The Boston Red Sox endured their fair share of heartbreaking finishes through an 86-year championship drought. One thing they often did was make credible bounceback efforts. The one-game playoff loss to the Yankees of 1978 was followed up by 91 wins in 1979. The 2003 devastation at the hands of the Yanks was followed by […]
An upstart champion, a dramatic pennant race and the derailment of a potential dynasty were all a part of an exciting 1987 baseball season that included the following highlights… *How the Minnesota Twins used a potent lineup and a top-heavy pitching staff, led by Frank Viola and Bert Blyleven, to navigate their way to a […]
The Minnesota Twins and St. Louis Cardinals were teams built for their homefield. The Twins had power, well-suited to the hitter-friendly atmosphere at the Metrodome. The Cardinals, playing in what was then an artificial turf-covered Busch Stadium with deep dimensions, were constructed on speed. It’s appropriate that when these contrasting teams met in the 1987 […]
In the 21st century, the St. Louis Cardinals and San Francisco Giants are arguably baseball’s two pre-eminent franchises. They’ve combined for seven National League pennants and four World Series titles. On three occasions (2002, 2012 & 2014) they’ve gone head-to-head in the postseason. That wasn’t the case when they met in the 1987 NLCS and […]
The Minnesota Twins were an 85-win team, one of the worst to ever reach the League Championship Series round in 1987. The Detroit Tigers had the best record in baseball and were fresh off winning an epic divisional race against the second-best team, the Toronto Blue Jays. It’s natural that the Minnesota-Detroit matchup in the […]
The 1987 St. Louis Cardinals were a team with some amends to make. They were coming off a horrid run of a year plus ten innings. It went back to the 1985 World Series when, on the verge of a championship in Game 6, a bad umpire’s call triggered a ninth-inning collapse and they melted […]
The 1987 New York Mets came into the season feeling like a dynasty might be at hand. They had won an epic World Series title in 1986, the culmination of a three-year building program under manager Davey Johnson that included strong seasons in 1984 and 1985. They were both young and established and were widely […]