In Detroit, 1968 season forever special
DETROIT -- Autumn, 1968. Too many things happening at once. It scrambled your brain.
The Summer Olympics were in October because they were held in Mexico City, and America reeled when a couple of our black sprinters raised gloved fists on the victory podium. The Vietnam War was in full futile fury and President Lyndon Johnson had already told us he wasn't going to run again, so Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, and George Wallace slugged it out in the fall. Tommy and Dick Smothers made fun of everything on CBS Sunday nights and the Beatles provided the season's soundtrack with new releases "Hey Jude" and "Revolution."
And while all that was going on, the Detroit Tigers came back from a 3-1 deficit to beat the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series. Mickey Lolich was MVP and the Tigers bested Bob Gibson in Game 7 . Thirty-eight years later, folks in Detroit still talk about Jim Northrup's two-run, two-out triple in the 4-1 victory at Busch Stadium in Game 7.
The Tigers and Cardinals were back in the Fall Classic again last night. Former Tigers Al Kaline and Willie Horton tossed ceremonial first pitches while a couple of those old Cardinals, Tim McCarver and Mike Shannon, watched upstairs from the broadcast booths at
When the pregame festivities concluded, the ex-ballpayers sat with 42,479 fans and watched the weary Cardinals spank the well-rested Tigers, 7-2.
Trendy Tiger fans -- the ones who discovered baseball in the last two weeks -- were somewhat stunned. The Tigers made things look a little too easy in the first two rounds of these baseball playoffs, but they were no match for Cardinal rookie righty Anthony Reyes (two runs on four hits over eight-plus innings and you could serve breakfast on the flat bill of the kid's cap) in Game 1.
The Tigers have been back to the World Series only once since '68 (beating the Padres in five easy games in 1984), but it is the Fall Classic of 1968 that Detroit old-timers remember most fondly. Winning in '84 was a sports moment. The Tigers' march through the summer/fall of '68 was a transcendent event that forever will be part of city history.
The story of the '68 Tigers took root in the summer of 1967. Across America, it was the summer of love with war protests, flower power, and all weird forms of psychedelic sights and sounds. In Boston, we remember it as the Impossible Dream summer of the Cardiac Kids, the year the 100-to-1 Red Sox forever changed the fortunes of Boston's baseball franchise, winning the greatest pennant race on the final day of the season.
The summer of '67 was different for Detroit. Not much love. Lots of carnage. Riots ripped the city apart, resulting in 43 deaths and almost 1,200 injuries.
While downtown burned, the Tigers managed to stay in the American League chase until the final inning of the season. The Red Sox clinched the pennant while gathered in their clubhouse, listening to the radio broadcast of Ernie Harwell describing Dick McAuliffe's game-ending double-play grounder against the Angels in Detroit. The Tigers didn't have ace Denny McLain at the end of that season and it was later learned that McLain was unavailable because he had gambling debts and had his toe broken by leg breakers.
It was the Tigers who brought Detroit back to life in 1968. Like the Yankees of '78, they did it in the middle of a newspaper strike and folks relied on television and radio more than ever.
The '68 Tigers had a cartoonish manager named Mayo Smith. The inimitable McLain healed sufficiently to become baseball's first 30-game winner since Dizzy Dean in 1934 (there won't be another). The Detroit dugout had a rogues gallery of Lolich, Horton, Norm Cash, Earl Wilson, Ray Oyler, Bill Freehan, Gates Brown, Mickey Stanley, McAuliffe, and Don Wert, along with Hall of Famer Kaline, who missed much of the season with an injury. Everybody knew Mayo had to get Kaline back on the field for the World Series and he created a spot by moving Stanley from center to shortstop. (Imagine Grady Little moving Johnny Damon to short for the 2003 ALCS.)
The Cardinals won three of the first four games of the Series. Gibson, who had dominated World Series against the Yankees (1964) and Red Sox ('67), fanned 17 in Game 1 in what is believed to be the most overpowering Series performance in history (no small claim given Don Larsen's perfect game).
Lolich, Horton, and Cash all hit homers when the Tigers squared the Series the next day , but then Detroit came home to Tiger Stadium and lost twice to fall behind, 3-1. When the Cardinals buried McLain and the Tigers, 10-1 , in the fourth game, it appeared that the Tigers were done.
Everything changed when the immortal Jose Feliciano was summoned to sing the national anthem before the final game in Detroit. The appearance had been arranged by the estimable Harwell and Feliciano offended most of the western world with his creative rendition of "The Star-Spangled Banner." He also infuriated Lolich, who was unnerved by the length and tone of the performance and coughed up three runs in the top of the first.
Lolich found his rhythm after the first, going the distance to beat the Cardinals, 5-3 . The key play was Horton throwing out Lou Brock at home in the fifth inning.
They went back to Busch and McLain got his only win in a 13-1 laugher in Game 6. Lolich hooked up with Gibson in Game 7 and beat the master.
Motown saloons still feature a classic photo of Lolich jumping into the arms of Freehan after retiring McCarver for the final out.
It was the last World Series without any preliminary rounds. No wild cards. No 83-win teams. The Tigers and Cardinals of '68 got there by beating nine other teams over 162 games. And every World Series game was played in the afternoon.
"Baseball in Detroit was sort of down for a while around here," Harwell said before participating in last night's first-ball ceremony (which included "America the Beautiful" by night-mover Bob Seger, who is neither a little too tall nor in need of a few pounds).
"The World Series in '68 was pretty important and made a little bit of a difference in Detroit. But this one's pretty important, too."
Important, and ever-difficult. Some of the "new" Tiger fans probably thought the '06 Bengals could beat the Cardinals just by showing up at the ballpark.
Not a chance. The Cardinals beat the Tigers in Game 1 last night. Just like in '68.
Dan Shaughnessy is a Globe columnist. His e-mail address is dshaughnessy@globe.com. 
