A Series of Ultimate Fantasies

By Tom Callahan

People, not numbers, play baseball, the Dodgers proved again. What folly to explain the game's latest outlandish finding in figures like the Oakland batting average and the Los Angeles ERA, when everyone who watched the World Series knows that Kirk Gibson and Orel Hershiser cannot be explained any more than Mickey Hatcher can be believed.

To start things off, on consecutive nights in Los Angeles, something close to the ultimate hitter's and pitcher's daydreams were played out in such implausible detail that it strained decency. The A's led in the ninth inning of the first game, 4-3. Had there been one out instead of two, two on instead of one, that would have been enough. But the win-or-lose situation was perfectly framed, as that stubbly spirit Gibson emerged from the infirmary to take his only hack on crippled legs that said home run or nothing. On a 3-and- 2 pitch, naturally, the Dodgers won, 5-4.

While less suspenseful, the next game was even harder to swallow. In itself, Hershiser's 6-0 shutout was unsurprising. After topping off his Cy Young season with 59 scoreless innings -- one more than Don Drysdale's eternal streak -- he had blanked the blankety-blank Mets in the playoffs. But against Oakland, the hits that Hershiser allowed weren't as astonishing as those he accumulated: three of them. No Series pitcher had given as good as he got since the Yankees' Don Larsen went 0-for-2 in 1956. Orel yielded three singles but took two doubles and a single back. Stretching the ridiculous was a pregame portrait of his Rockwellian mom and dad, the Little League Parents of the Year, tossing out first balls.

At home, Oakland won the third game, 2-1, on a ninth-inning homer by Mark McGwire off Jay Howell. But a day later, Howell coerced McGwire into popping up with the bases loaded to save a 4-3 victory. The A's started to get the picture. To assist in melodrama, a clutter of wounded Dodgers joined Gibson and Dr. Frank Jobe in the training room. The patients of Jobe included Mike Marshall, Mike Scioscia and starting pitcher John Tudor, whose elbow gave out, maybe forever, after only four batters.

Mickey Hatcher homers, as likely as Walt Weiss errors, multiplied. In fact, the Series images are largely of Hatcher doing everything, throwing his ample body on bases as though they were hand grenades. "You don't have to have all the talent in the world," he said, "if the team plays together."

Manager Tommy Lasorda's prescience began with his use of Hatcher. Besides making a concert of the hit and run, Lasorda also let the A's alumnus Mike Davis ("a buck-ninety hitter," as Dennis Eckersley moaned) swing away in the fifth game on a 3-and-0 count -- for a homer, of course. Wisest of all, he persisted with Hershiser in the treacherous moment of that last 5-2 victory, when the choirboy was so spooked he actually sang hymns. "Today I'm living out the dream," Hershiser had said, "of a kid who was funny looking, wore glasses, had arms down to his knees and ended up playing in the majors."

The Dodgers' inspired tactic was to exalt the Mets and A's and emphasize their own ordinariness. "You guys don't get much respect," someone told emergency catcher Rick Dempsey. "We don't deserve much respect," he replied. Oakland manager Tony La Russa was able to stand about one day of that. "They're the National League champions, aren't they?" he snapped. "I've been hearing about National League superiority my whole life."

Though the American League has won its share of '80s titles -- well, four of the nine -- the old paranoia is always prickling to break out. "They never miss a chance to put you down," griped Don Baylor, a junior-circuit man of 17 years' standing. "It's always been that way, and anyone who's ever played in a World Series or All-Star Game feels the same." Even with modern cross- pollination, National Leaguers have kept a reputation for playing harder, though it was an American Leaguer from Detroit, Gibson, who stirred the Dodgers. As Hershiser said, he made it "cool" to sweat. Perhaps what's better in the old league isn't the players or the way they play, but the game they play. Watching Hershiser at the bat and on the bases was an argument for nine-man baseball. "I don't like the dh," he said. "I hate the rule. It's terrible." Is there a higher authority on the game at the moment?

In his champagne-soaked B.V.D.'s, the MVP made the winners' tour of the losers' quarters, bucking up, in particular, the Cuban strongman Jose Canseco, who crashed one home run and made 18 outs. "Pretty soon we'll be able to think of all the good things," Canseco said. "Pretty soon you'll see some & smiles." When someone sought to know the toughest part of the whole thing, Canseco replied, "Doing the Spanish interviews." As he said it, he winked at Hershiser.