The 1989 World Series was played between the Oakland Athletics and the San Francisco Giants, and is perhaps best remembered for the earthquake which caused a 10-day interruption in play. The Series ran from October 15 through October 28, with the A's sweeping the Giants.
Umpires: Rich Garcia (AL), Paul Runge (NL), Al Clark (AL), Dutch Rennert (NL), Vic Voltaggio (AL), Eric Gregg (NL)
Series MVP: Dave Stewart
Game 1
The first game of the 1989 World Series was played on October 14 at Oakland Coliseum, the home field of the Oakland Athletics.
| Team
| 1
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| R
| H
| E
|
| San Francisco
| 0 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 5 | 1
|
| Oakland
| 0 | 3 | 1
| 1 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | X
| 5 | 11 | 1
|
PITCHERS: SFG - Garrelts, Hammaker (5), Brantley (6), LaCoss (8)
OAK - Stewart
WP - Stewart
LP - Garrelts
SAVE - none
HOME RUNS: SFG - none
OAK - Parker, Weiss
ATTENDANCE: 49,385
Game 2
Game 2 took place on October 15 at Oakland Coliseum.
| Team
| 1
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| R
| H
| E
|
| San Francisco
| 0 | 0 | 1
| 0 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | 0
| 1 | 4 | 0
|
| Oakland
| 1 | 0 | 0
| 4 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | X
| 5 | 7 | 0
|
PITCHERS: SFG - Reuschel, Downs (5), Lefferts (7), Bedrosian (8)
OAK - Moore, Honeycutt (8), Eckersley (9)
WP - Moore
LP - Reuschel
SAVE - none
HOME RUNS: SFG - none
OAK - Steinbach
ATTENDANCE: 49,388
Game 3
For the third game of the Series, the teams traveled to the San Francisco Giants' Candlestick Park. The game was delayed until October 27, or about ten days, due to the Loma Prieta earthquake. For more information, see the article on ABC sportscaster Al Michaels
| Team
| 1
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| R
| H
| E
|
| Oakland
| 2 | 0 | 0
| 2 | 4 | 1
| 0 | 4 | 0
| 13 | 14 | 0
|
| San Francisco
| 0 | 1 | 0
| 2 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | 4
| 7 | 10 | 3
|
PITCHERS: OAK - Stewart, Honeycutt (8), Nelson (9), Burns (9)
SFG - Garrelts, Downs (4), Brantley (5), Hammaker (8), Lefferts (8)
WP - Stewart
LP - Garrelts
SAVE - none
HOME RUNS: OAK - D. Henderson (2), Phillips, Canseco, Lansford
SFG - Williams, Bathe
ATTENDANCE: 62,038
Game 4
The final game of the 1989 World Series took place on October 28 at Candlestick Park.
| Team
| 1
| 2
| 3
| 4
| 5
| 6
| 7
| 8
| 9
| R
| H
| E
|
| Oakland
| 1 | 3 | 0
| 0 | 3 | 1
| 0 | 1 | 0
| 9 | 12 | 0
|
| San Francisco
| 0 | 0 | 0
| 0 | 0 | 2
| 4 | 0 | 0
| 6 | 9 | 0
|
PITCHERS: OAK - Moore, Nelson (7), Honeycutt (7), Burns (7), Eckersley (9)
SFG - Robinson, LaCoss (2), Brantley (6), Downs (6), Lefferts (8), Bedrosian (8)
WP - Moore
LP - Robinson
SAVE - Eckersley
HOME RUNS: OAK - R. Henderson
SFG - Mitchell, Litton
ATTENDANCE: 62,032
Trivia
- During Game 4, the San Francisco Giants, as a team, hit for the cycle (had at least one single, one double, one triple and one home run) yet still lost the game 9-6.
- Giants catcher Bill Bathe became the 5th National League player in World Series history to hit a home run in their very first at-bat.
- This was the first World Series that Fay Vincent presided over as commissioner. Vincent had only been in office for over a month after the sudden death of Bart Giamatti. The black armbands that the Athletics & Giants wore was in memory of the fallen commissioner. The official World Series balls even had Giamatti's signature on them.
- Dave Parker of the Athletics made sure that he had a hold of his jewlery during the earthquake. While with his jewlery, Parker raced out of Candlestick Park and into the parking lot.
- Several years later, Athletics first-baseman Mark McGwire would publically state that he felt that in light of the earthquake, the rest of the World Series should've been canceled.
- Out of respect for the tragic circumstances surrounding the 1989 World Series, the Athletics weren't allowed to celebrate their World Series victory with champagne.
- According to Fay Vincent, he had already made the decision to postpone Game 3 without telling anybody first. As a result, the umpires filed a form of protest of Vincent's decision.
- When Athletics were advised to go back to Oakland after Game 3 was postponed, they had to travel through San Jose. While it would normally take around 30 minutes in order to travel from Oakland to San Francisco, it took the A's around 2 hours in order to get back to Oakland.
- On the 100 Years of the World Series DVD, Tim McCarver, who was working as a broadcaster for ABC, incorrectly says that ABC started their coverage of the Earthquake Game at Five O'Clock Eastern Time (as opposed to Five O'Clock San Francisco Time). Besides that, McCarver claims that moments before Al Michaels cut off McCarver to inform the viewers of the earthquake, that he could already sense the ominious rumbling.
- According to Tim McCarver, when the earthquake hit, he and his broadcasting partners Al Michaels & Jim Palmer immediately grabbed a hold of what they preceived to be the armrests. In reality, the announcers were clutching on each others' thighs and they were left with bruises the next day. Years later, Al Michaels would boldly admit his strong belief that had the earthquake lasted much longer than 15 seconds, he would've gotten killed.
- Shortly after the earthquake, Jose Canseco and his wife Esther, were spoted filling up their car at a self-service gas station. The catch was that Jose was still in his full Oakland Athletics visiting uniform while at the gas station.
- Joe Torre, who was at the time was working as a special guest analyist for ESPN, was given the task of playing roving reporter (interviewing players such as Rickey Henderson and Dave Parker) immediately following the earthquake. Torre was with Chris Berman in the upper deck section when the earthquake hit. Torre had to convince Berman about three times to walk down the steps for safety.
- According to umpire Vic Voltaggio, he distinctively remembers seeing a white wall waving either during or immediately after the earthquake.
- At the Westin St. Francis hotel (which had all of its power knocked out because of the earthquake), ESPN's Bob Ley saw then San Diego Padres manager Jack McKeon smoking a big cigar and sporting $1 glowing deely boppers. Just one day later, the St. Francis would be the site of Commissioner Fay Vincent's press conference (where candles and television cameras provided the only forms of light in the room) in which Vincent made the decision on when the World Series would resume.
- The 10 day delay in-between Games 2 and 3 was the longest delay in World Series history.
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