The most maligned World Series in recent memory caught lightning in a bottle Sunday night when Cleveland and Florida battled into extra innings in a Game 7 classic before the Marlins won it 3-2 in the 11th. Edgar Renteria’s single off Charles Nagy scored Craig Counsell with the Series-winning run.
Bobby Bonilla opened the 11th with a single to center and chugged around to third one out later when Tony Fernandez failed to come up with Counsell’s grounder. After an intentional walk to Jim Eisenreich loaded the bases, Devon White forced Bonilla at the plate on a grounder to second. Renteria took a strike, then lined Nagy’s second pitch into center field for the hit that gave the Marlins a World Series title in just their fifth year of existence.
Florida fought back from a one-run deficit to tie the game 2-2 in the last of the ninth inning on Counsell’s one-out sacrifice fly, and all of a sudden, no one outside of Cleveland was complaining about how long the game would go on.
Cleveland was two outs away from winning it all for the first time since 1948 when closer Jose Mesa blew a one-run lead in inimitable Cleveland fashion. After Moises Alou led off with a single and Bonilla struck out, Charles Johnson punched a single to right on a 1-2 pitch to put runners on the corners with one out. Johnson had been hitting .160 with two strikes on him.
Counsell then smoked a liner to right for a sacrifice to score Alou and tie the game, sending Marlins fans into delirium and sending the game into extra innings.
Jaret Wright, the Indians’ 21-year-old rookie, who began the season in Double-A, allowed one run on two hits in 6 1/3 innings, but was denied his second Series win when Mesa blew the save. Wright was a little sharper than veteran Florida left-hander Al Leiter, and his only mistake was giving up a solo home run to Bonilla leading off the seventh inning, cutting the Indians’ lead to 2-1.
The Marlins had Wright in trouble right off the bat in the first inning when Renteria doubled with one out and Gary Sheffield walked. Darren Daulton hit a sharp grounder to second that looked like a sure double play until Sheffield’s hard slide into second forced shortstop Omar Vizquel to eat the ball. But umpire Joe West ruled that Sheffield’s slide constituted interference–he slid into Vizquel instead of the second-base bag–and instead of runners at first and third and two outs, the Marlins’ inning ended.
The Indians scored two runs off Leiter in the third inning to grab a lead they would hold into the ninth. After a leadoff walk to Jim Thome and a Marquis Grissom single, Wright bunted the runners over. Fernandez, starting at second for the flu-weakened Bip Roberts, followed with a 2-run single.
After giving up Renteria’s one-out double in the first, Wright didn’t allow another hit until Bonilla’s homer in the seventh inning. The only real Marlins threat during the first six innings came with two outs in the sixth when right-fielder Manny Ramirez misplayed a Daulton fly ball into a three-base error, making an awkward sliding attempt to catch it and letting it get past him as the slow-footed Daulton chugged around the bases. But Alou popped up to center on Wright’s first delivery.
After Wright walked Counsell two batters after Bonilla’s homer, Cleveland manager Mike Hargrove opted to go with his experienced bullpen. It worked fine until Mesa entered in the ninth.
Florida closer Robb Nen gave up a one-out single to Fernandez in the top of the 10th, but struck out Ramirez and David Justice to end the inning. The Indians also had a runner aboard in the 11th, but Thome bounced into a double play to end the inning.
