'Gibby, meet Freddie!' Two hobbled Dodgers, two iconic walk-off home runs
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The parallels between Freddie Freeman’s walk-off grand slam in Game 1 of the 2024 World Series and Kirk Gibson’s walk-off two-run homer in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series are uncanny.
For starters, both Dodgers stars were not playing at 100% when they hit their pivotal walk-off home runs in the first game of their respective World Series at Dodger Stadium. In Freeman’s case, it’s a right ankle sprain that’s hobbled him for weeks and forced him out of the starting lineup multiple times during the NLCS. And for Gibson, he had a severely injured left hamstring and right knee that kept him out of the ‘88 Fall Classic outside of that lone pinch-hit home run.
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The comparisons don’t stop there. Both of them were hit into a very similar part of the right-field stands, both came with two outs in the inning, and in both cases the rally got started with a walk. There have been only three World Series walk-off home runs for a team that was trailing: Freeman’s, Gibson’s and Joe Carter’s for the Blue Jays in 1993.
As Freeman’s ball left the yard at Chavez Ravine on Friday, FOX Sports MLB and Dodgers’ lead play-by-play broadcaster Joe Davis paid homage to another legendary announcer and the longtime Dodgers voice he succeeded in 2017.
“She is gone,” Davis said, a call back to Vin Scully’s same exclamation for Gibson’s home run in ‘88. “Gibby, meet Freddie!”
You might remember the rest of Scully's iconic call: "In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened."
Well, the impossible just happened again, 36 years later. How can you not be romantic about baseball?
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