A Classic in Red

Bowie Kuhn, the Commissioner of Baseball, must have been a happy man last week. For the first time in four years, the World Series was not a stage for Kuhn's No. 1 nemesis, A's Owner Charlie Finley, and Oakland's annual post-season melodrama of clubhouse brawls and management-player disputes. Instead, baseball's show of shows was a tight, tense struggle between the Boston Red Sox and Cincinnati Reds. It even featured an old-fashioned flap over an umpire's call and an indeterminably aged Cuban pitcher with a penchant for cigars and dramatic performances.

Considering that one Series site was Boston's venerable Fenway Park, the kind of irregular and intimate bandbox where baseball got its start, the return to basics was appropriate. Advance scouts for both clubs, who had been observing the opposition teams since July, reported few weaknesses. The Reds were stacked with powerful hitters, high-octane speed, superb defense and one of the best bullpens in the game. The Red Sox entered the Series with equally potent hitting, nearly flawless defense and a pitcher named Luis Tiant. The Cuban righthander, who claims to be 34 but is widely believed to be older, had won 76 games for Boston since it reclaimed him in 1971 from the minor leagues, where he had been abandoned as a washed-up fireballer. Cincinnati Scout Ray Shore warned his fellow Reds before the Series began: "There isn't anybody in our league or any other league who pitches like Tiant."

The Reds discovered that in the first game. On a raw autumn day at Fenway, Tiant put on a one-man show. Though he was called for one balk on his pick-off move to first base, the wily pitcher more than made up for it by tossing a five-hit shutout. Twisting and turning on the mound like a particularly well-fed cobra, the portly Tiant mesmerized the Reds with his dizzying motion, then drove them to desperation with an improbable assortment of pitches and speeds, including a rainbow curve that seemed to take 30 seconds to reach the plate. As if his pitching were not enough, he also produced a hit--and some madcap base running that climaxed when, on the first pass, he missed home plate in trying to score a run. "I know I miss it," he said later with a grin. "But I don't want to hurry back. I want to come back easy, you know? I hope nobody sees me."

Cold Rain. The next day the Reds' batters did some more ineffectual swinging, this time at slow balls delivered by Bill Lee, a free-spirited lefty known as "the Spaceman." But just when it appeared that Lee and Boston were headed for a second victory, a cold rain stopped play for 27 minutes. By the time action resumed, Lee had lost his touch, and the Reds struck for two runs in the top of the ninth to win 3-2. They gratefully accepted the split. "We're lucky to get out of here with our lives," said Cincinnati Manager Sparky Anderson.

In Game 3 at Cincinnati's Riverfront Stadium, it was Home Plate Umpire Larry Barnett who was lucky to get out alive. His crisis came with none out and a man on first in the bottom of the tenth inning; the score was tied 5-5. That was the moment when Reds Pinch Hitter Ed Armbrister bunted, hesitated as he started toward first, and then collided with Red Sox Catcher Carlton Fisk just as Fisk was trying to field the ball. Fisk pushed Armbrister aside, then threw the ball over second base into centerfield. Was his error caused by interference? If so, Armbrister was out and the runner would return to first. If not, the Reds had two men on base and nobody out.

Umpire Barnett ruled no interference. The play, he insisted, was an innocent collision. A few UP1 moments later, Joe Morgan singled in the winning run. The Red Sox were furious. Fumed Fisk: "It's a gawddamn shame to lose a gawddamn game because of that gawddamn call. I'm an infielder fielding the ball and he stands right in my way. If that's not interference, I'll ..." Indeed, the rulebook seems to support Boston's beef; section 7.09 (1) says unequivocally that a batter or runner should be called out automatically if "he fails to avoid a fielder who is attempting to field a batted ball."

With the argument still steaming, Tiant returned to the mound the next evening for his second appearance. Though his control was not as sharp as in the first game, and he had to work out of numerous Cincinnati threats, Tiant managed to earn his second victory cigar with a 5-4 win, which brought the Series even again.

Game 5 was the story of a young fastball pitcher and an aging power hitter. The pitcher, Cincinnati Southpaw Don Gullett, 24, fired the ball with such velocity that he retired 16 consecutive Red Sox batters in one stretch. Meanwhile Reds First Baseman Tony Perez, 33, who had gone hitless in the Series, cracked two home runs over the leftfield wall. The final margin: Reds 6, Red Sox 2.

Saturday was an anticlimax for both teams. The Reds were going into Game 6 in Boston poised just one win from victory. The Red Sox, looking for their first series title in 57 years, were determined to force a seventh game. Instead of playing ball, though, the players had to watch rain splatter Fenway Park, and the game was postponed until Sunday.

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