Game 7 of the 2001 World Series between the Arizona Diamondbacks and New York Yankees was listed as the best game of the 2000s, according to The Athletic’s Tim Britton.
Britton noted that Game 7 had plenty of star power in the game, especially when it came to who took the mound for both teams.
I’m not sure how you beat this. You start with the pitching matchup. Roger Clemens won the AL Cy Young Award that season, one of seven he’d win in his career. Curt Schilling finished second in the NL Cy Young voting that year and was arguably the best big-game pitcher of his generation.
Oh, and the pitchers who finished the night on the mound? That would be Randy Johnson, who bested Schilling for one of his five career Cy Young awards and had thrown more than 100 pitches the night before, and Mariano Rivera, the first and only unanimous Hall of Famer.
Game 7 saw a back and forth affair that had the Yankees leading 2-1 going into the bottom of the ninth inning with Rivera going for the save and New York’s fourth straight World Series title.
After a Mark Grace single and a Rivera throwing error on a Damian Miller bunt attempt to start the inning, shortstop Tony Womack faced Rivera with one out and two runners on and hit a double into right field to tie the game at 2-2.
Top five plays of the postseason in terms of cWPA during the 21st century:
1) Tony Womack double to RF off of Mariano Rivera in Game 7 of the 2001 World Seriespic.twitter.com/EhlJlC6Z4E
— Max Goldstein (@MaxSportsStudio) October 9, 2019
Two batters later, Luis Gonzalez etched his name in Arizona sports history with a walk-off bloop single over a pulled-in infield to win the series.
November 4, 2001: Diamondbacks’ Luis Gonzales singles home the winning run off Mariano Rivera in the Bottom of the 9th of Game 7 and Arizona wins the World Series over the Yankees. pic.twitter.com/x6mJiiFvt5
— This Day In Sports Clips (@TDISportsClips) November 4, 2020
With the win, the Diamondbacks became the fastest expansion franchise in MLB history to win a World Series. The win also marked the first championship for the Diamondbacks as well as the first and only title to date for Arizona in the big 4 (NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL).
Game 5 between Diamondbacks, Yankees also appears on list
Game 5 of the 2001 World Series between the Diamondbacks and Yankees was listed as the 15th best game in the 2000s.
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After the Yankees won Game 4 courtesy of a walk-off home run by Hall of Fame shortstop Derek Jeter in extra innings, Game 5 at Yankee Stadium turned into another classic.
With the Diamondbacks leading 3-1 headed into the 9th inning, closer Byung-Hyun Kim entered the bottom of the ninth inning to close out the game, one night removed from Kim giving up a two-run, two-out game tying home run to Yankees first baseman Tino Martinez.
With two outs and one runner on, Yankees third baseman Scott Brosius would hit a two-run, two-out home run to tie the game at 3-3.
On this day in 2001, Scott Brosius hit a 2-run home run in the 9th inning to tie Game 5 of World Seriespic.twitter.com/w5pU758rxn
— Yankees Videos (@snyyankees) November 1, 2021
Second baseman Alfonso Soriano would later hit a walk-off single in the 12th inning to win the game and give the Yankees a 3-2 series lead after New York had trailed the series 2-0.
Britton added that New York’s win in Game 5 was another indication of how dominant the Yankees were during this time.
Nearly a quarter-century later, it’s hard to overstate how difficult it felt to beat this version of the Yankees, especially in the Bronx. New York had won three straight World Series and four of the previous five. The roster was deep, buoyed by established October heroes and the much-ballyhooed “mystique and aura” of the old Yankee Stadium — which never felt more resonant than in this Game 5.
And so when Scott Brosius lofted another game-tying, two-out, two-run homer in the ninth inning off Kim, Joe Buck’s call — “It borders on the surreal” — felt entirely appropriate. Soriano won it with a single three innings later. The Yankees felt unkillable.
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