By Phil Ellenbecker
In the Kansas City Royals' magical season of 1985, the night of June 28 stands out as truly magical. It was a Friday night, 32,651 were on hand at Royals Stadium. Kansas City entered the night 4 1/2 games behind California in the American League West, in fourth place.
The Royals ended the night 3 1/2 games out, tied for third, after outlasting the Angels 5-4 in 14 innings.
The game didn't serve as a springboard for the second-half surge that carried the Royals to a division title on the way to a Cinderella-like world championship run. That would come later.
But I do believe this was a signature win for the Royals, emblematic of what the season would bring. It had all the ingredients. A sturdy performance on the mound by Bret Saberhagen. George Brett stellar at bat and in the field. Clutch hitting by Hal McRae. Shutdown relief by Joe Beckwith, followed by unimposing closer Dan Quisenberry wiggling his way out as he'd somehow done for the past six seasons. Lesser lights emerging as heroes, such as Beckwith and Greg Pryor.
The game proceeded in tit-for-tat fashion until Pryor, he of the .219 batting average that year, finally ended it with a single in the bottom of the 14th off Doug Corbett that scored John Wathan with two out.
It was Pryor's only hit that year in 12 at-bats with two outs and a runner in scoring position.
That made a winner of Quisenberry, who'd come on in the 12th inning. He gave the Royals a chance to win, after giving up a go-ahead run in the 13th, by coaxing inning-ending double play balls with runners on third in both the 13th and 14th.
The Angels took a 4-3 lead in the 13th on Bobby Grich's RBI single, then loaded the bases on a single by Gary Pettis. But second baseman Frank White came home on Dick Schofield's grounder to get Daryl Sconiers, and JIm Sundberg completed the twin killing by throwing to Steve Balboni at first.
The Royals extended the game in their half of the 13th on a double by Sundberg and triple by Lonnie Smith.
California threatened again in the 14th when Bob Boone singled, advanced to second on Juan Beniquez's sacrifice bunt and moved to third on Rod Carew's infield single. Quisenberry again got the ground ball he needed as Pryor, who'd just entered the game that inning, gobbled it up at shortstop and combined with White and Balboni for the double play.
(Beniquez's sacrifice was California's fifth in the game. Manager Gene Mauch loved the bunt. According to an article at http://baseballpastandpresent.com, Mauch's teams led the league in sacrifices in 14 of his 22 full seasons as a manager.)
Balboni, who'd gone hitless in his five previous at-bats, drew his second walk of the night with one out in K.C.'s half of the 14th, and Wathan pinch ran for him. After Sundberg, who went 4 for 7 for the night, grounded out, Pryor came through with his game winner.
McRae got the game into extra innings by slugging a two-run homer in the eighth off Donnie Moore, who'd just come on in relief, after a double by Brett. That tied the game 3-3. Darryl Motley and Frank White followed with singles, but after Balboni made out, Motley's bid to put the Royals ahead on a Sundberg single was snuffed out by center fielder Pettis, ending the inning.
One inning earlier Brett rubbed out an Angels' threat when he made a tumbling catch of a foul down the third-base line by Carew with Craig Gerber at third.
Brett's hit in the eighth made him 3 for 3 for the game, which is where he finished as he also drew four walks to reach base all seven times he was up.
Like the Angels, the Royals had their chances in extra innings, loading the bases in both the 11th and 12th. White grounded out and Balboni struck out, ending the 11th. McRae hit into a fielder's choice for the last out in the 12th.
Sconiers began a 3-for-4 night with a homer leading off the second inning, giving the Angels the early lead. Motley, also 3-for-4, answered with own leadoff homer in the fourth.
The Angels went ahead 2-1 in the fifth on Carew's single that drove in Gerber. They added a run in the sixth when Balboni committed an error on a ground out by Grich, allowing Ruppert Jones to score from first.
Saberhagen, 7-4 with a 3.28 ERA coming in en route to a 20-6, 2.87 Cy Young season, threw seven innings and allowed two runs, both earned, and seven hits, striking out three and walking two. Beckwith followed with four shutout frames of one-hit ball with four strikeouts while walking three. Quisenberry then finished up with three innings, working around five hits.
Quisenberry, on the way to leading the league in saves for the fifth time in six seasons, logged three or more innings in nine of his 84 appearances, as the era of the one-inning closer hadn't quite dawned.
Beckwith, meanwhile, despite a nondescript 1-5, 4.07 ledger on the year, proved a handy stopgap at times in 1985, as on this night. He also had two other 4 1/3-inning scoreless stints that year.
So there you have it, lots to write about on this night, a seasonlong battle between the Royals and Angels sort of summed up in one game. With the right team winning. K.C. proved it could beat who it had to and when it had to by going 9-4 against California on the season.
It was between July 13 and Aug. 2, when the Royals went 13-3, including a streak of seven straight, that the Royals began to really make their move. That spurt took them from 7 1/2 games behind the Angels to two back. It was back and forth from there. The Angels led on 31 dates, the Royals 19 and the two teams were tied eight times before the Royals pulled ahead for good in the final week of the season.
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