HOBBLED HEROICS
‘She is gone! In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened!’
The play stands on its own goose bumps, one of the most dramatic hits in baseball history, a walk-off home run in the World Series by a guy who could barely walk. In Los Angeles, Kirk Gibson’s home run has taken on a mythical air, the iconic moment from the last time the home team appeared in the World Series — 28 years ago.
With three little words, Scully loads a city atop his magic carpet and transports everyone to happier times.
“She is,” Scully said, his voice rising, the brief pause ever so dramatic, “gone!”
Those three little words instantly evoke a highlight reel in the mind: Gibson jerking his elbow backward as he hobbles around the bases, Manager Tommy Lasorda thrusting his arms skyward as he waddles onto the field in celebration. Scully silences his microphone to let the crowd noise tell the story. Then, after 1 minute 10 seconds, he returns to the air and utters the words that so perfectly defined a championship season.
“In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened!” Scully said.
Gibson laughed at the question of whether he has a copy of Scully’s call.
“You don’t need copies of Vin’s call,” Gibson said. “They play it on TV a couple times a day.”
Gibson and his wounded knees were in the training room in the ninth inning, with the Dodgers trailing the Oakland Athletics by a run, against Hall of Fame closer Dennis Eckersley.
Scully, on the national television broadcast, told the audience Gibson was not in the dugout and would not be available. Gibson heard that, defiantly shuffled over the batting tee, and growled to a batboy: Tell Lasorda I can hit.
With two out, Mike Davis walked. Gibson emerged from the dugout, igniting a frenzy among the crowd. He worked the count full, and then hit the home run — the most memorable moment of his career, immortalized by baseball’s greatest voice.
“He just has an exceptional ability to paint a vivid picture,” Gibson said. “It’s iconic. He’s one of a kind. He has separated himself. One could hardly argue that he wasn’t the best of all time. I don’t know how you could argue that.”
In the final years of his career, Scully rarely visited the clubhouses, but he liked to make an exception when Gibson was manager of the Arizona Diamondbacks.
“I dropped everything,” Gibson said. “Whoever was in my office, they got a treat.”
In between his playing and managing days, Gibson worked as an analyst on broadcasts of his hometown Detroit Tigers, at times working with the legendary Ernie Harwell.
“One of the things that was on my bucket list was to work with Vin,” Gibson said. “That didn’t happen.
“We’re going to miss him. That’s for damn sure. But his memories and his calls will forever be entrenched in our minds.”