Slamming history
Milton Bradley’s title-winning swing
The enormously talented, if sometimes mercurial, Milton Bradley launches one of the greatest home runs in baseball history 27 years ago today – lining a two-out, two-strike grand slam to right-center off Joe Lisio in the bottom of the ninth to lift Harrisburg over Norwich 12-11 in the fifth and deciding game of the Class AA Eastern League finals.
The slam caps a five-run rally that starts with Bradley already in the clubhouse, believing there is no chance he has another at-bat in a championship game seemingly heading Norwich’s way.
Bradley easily does the math. He realizes there are six batters ahead of him in a game the Navigators lead 11-7 with only three outs separating them from a title that Harrisburg previously wins in 1996, owns again in 1997 and then yet again in 1998.
At the behest of Senators hitting coach Steve Phillips, Bradley begrudgingly returns to the dugout, where he unknowingly awaits authoring a moment like none other in baseball history.
That moment comes after Jason Camilli’s two-out infield single with the bases loaded scores one run and cuts Norwich’s lead to 11-8.
That brings up Bradley for his moment.
After working the count to 3-2 against the right-handed Lisio, the switch-hitting Bradley lines a fastball over the fence in right-center for a grand slam that caps a straight-out-of-Hollywood finish on a rainy, misty and altogether surreal Monday night on City Island.
The slam gives Harrisburg its fourth straight Eastern League title, an unprecedented run that remains a record in the century-plus history of the Class AA league.
“I hit the ball,” Bradley says after the game, “and then it seemed real quiet.
“Kind of like The Twilight Zone.”
Alas, on the 10th anniversary of authoring the greatest single moment on Harrisburg’s City Island since the place first opens for baseball in 1890, Bradley is suspended by the Chicago Cubs for the rest of 2009 season after publicly criticizing the team.
Bradley ends up playing 12 seasons in the major leagues, batting .271 during the regular season and .310 in the playoffs with four homers in 11 postseason games.
He also starts as the designated hitter for the American League in the 2008 All-Star Game, the final one played at the original Yankee Stadium.
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