The Playoff Teams & October Battles Of The 1988 MLB Season

Dan Flaherty MLB History, Sports History Articles

The 1988 MLB season wasn’t filled with drama when it came to pennant races, but that didn’t stop the year from having an epic ending that was seemingly written in Hollywood and literally ended there.

Three teams—the Oakland A’s, the New York Mets and the Los Angeles Dodgers got a hold of their division leads and pulled away by comfortable margins. The most exciting race, in the AL East, was the excitement of shared mediocrity, and even at that, the eventual win of the Boston Red Sox didn’t have a dramatic finish. It was the individual achievments and iconic moments that truly defined this 1988 MLB campaign.

Oakland produced the first 40/40 man in MLB history, as Jose Canseco hit forty home runs and stole forty bases, even if the accomplishment has since become disgraced by his PED use. Boston had a memorable mid-summer hot streak after a managerial change. Los Angeles got one of the great pitching performances of all time, when Orel Hershiser threw 58 scoreless innings. And the Mets won 100 games for the second time in three years.

But when it comes to making history, nothing topped what happened in the first game of the World Series. Kirk Gibson, the LA rightfielder, was the NL MVP, but hobbled badly by injury and unable to start against Oakland. With his team trailing 4-3 in the bottom of the ninth, and the great A’s closer Dennis Eckersley needing just one more out, Gibson was summoned to pinch-hit.

Gibson hobbled up to the plate, and with a man aboard, got a hold of backdoor slider and hit a line drive into the rightfield stands. It was a stunning moment, straight out of The Natural and in Hollywood’s own backyard. It set the stage for a stunning upset as Los Angeles dispatched the 104-win A’s.

The links below contain all the key moments for the teams that defined the 1988 MLB season, from their big regular season wins, to the times when it seemed like things might get away, to the game-by-game narratives of each postseason series. The heart of the 1988 season is all here.