What if? 9 legendary baseball moments that could have been altered by a 'Golden At-Bat'

The greatest moment of Mike Montgomerys career was right there, bat in hand, so close but so far from Game 7 of the 2016 World Series.

This was last season in the independent Atlantic League, the Long Island Ducks hosting the High Point Rockers, Montgomery on the mound, one batter away from a reunion with Michael Martinez.

Advertisement He was on deck and I got the guy out, so I didnt end up facing him, Montgomery said on Wednesday, by phone from his home in Arizona.

But that would have been a funny, cool moment.

Baseball gives us plenty of funny, cool moments but they cant be contrived.

That was part of the charm on that drizzly November night in Cleveland when Montgomery faced Martinez with everything at stake.

Montgomery, the Chicago Cubs fourth reliever, had no career saves.

Martinez, a defensive replacement, had a .197 career average.

Joe Maddon, the Cubs manager, knew that his Indians counterpart, Terry Francona, had emptied his bench.

If Montgomery landed his curveball, it would be checkmate and he did, getting Martinez on a dribbler to third to clinch the Cubs first championship since 1908.

But what if Francona could have used a Golden At-Bat a concept, commissioner Rob Manfred said, that is gaining buzz among major-league owners? That is, what if the manager had the option of inserting a different hitter, even if it wasnt his turn, in a once-per-game wrinkle that would upend strategy forever? Lets say they bring in Mike Napoli and I throw that same curveball, and he rips it for a homer or a double and they win and we lose, Montgomery said.

Is that more exciting for fans, which is probably what theyre going for? Is that better for the game? Obviously, from my perspective, it would be way worse.

Id much rather face Martinez in that situation than Napoli or Francisco Lindor .

No kidding.

But suppose Francona had deployed the Golden At-Bat against Aroldis Chapman with two outs in the eighth, giving Lindor, Napoli or Jose Ramirez a turn instead of Rajai Davis.

Its always unlikely for any hitter to take Chapman deep but Davis did! And that game-tying blast was glorious, partly because it was such a surprise.

Advertisement The Golden At-Bat would limit the chances of an unexpected star turn, as Davis provided and Martinez could not.

But just when it seemed that Montgomery would dismiss the idea entirely Its too much, you know, Savannah Bananas for me, he said he reconsidered.

If I look at the other side of it, OK, are we catering to the younger generation? Is that what the youth want? You cant just be like, Oh, baseball needs to be like it was in the 1940s or 60s or 80s.

I dont know if (kids) even want that, but I guess its their way to get the younger generation into baseball more and maybe they know something we dont.

I personally think its a little gimmicky.

But lets say its implemented and nobody can stop it or do anything about it.

It does create interesting scenarios where youre now getting the best hitting match-up versus the pitcher.

To be clear: MLB is a long way from implementing anything like this.

The particulars have not been formalized, and the idea has not been presented to the players.

But other rules have modernized the game, and as viewing habits rattle baseballs economic model , it might be worth considering.

Think about all the rule changes weve had: no breaking up double plays at second base, no running over the catcher if he doesnt have the ball, said Eduardo Perez, a 13-year major leaguer and MLB Network Radio analyst.

When were in the postseason and the 10th inning rule doesnt apply, its like, Are you kidding me? Weve accepted that.

All these things have evolved.

But our sport is getting older, and with the revenue (issues) of the local broadcasting people, they need to do something.

This is all to be able to get more eyeballs on the game.

Im good with it.

Im not not yet, anyway.

But it does make me wonder how the Golden At-Bat might have rewritten history.

Since its all still conceptual, lets say that a team must be trailing in the eighth inning or later to use it.

How would some of baseballs most cherished moments have changed? Advertisement The last out of that 2016 World Series was the first scenario that came to mind.

Here are nine more from the television era that would have looked very, very different with a Golden At-Bat: 1956 World Series, Game 5, two outs, top of the ninth inning Who hit: Dale Mitchell Result: Strikeout New batter: Gil Hodges Remember Dale Berra? He played 11 years in the majors, from 1977 to 1987, mostly with the Pittsburgh Pirates .

He might have been named Gil if the Golden At-Bat had existed in 1956.

Heres the situation: Don Larsen is one out away from perfection against the Brooklyn Dodgers in the fifth game of the 1956 World Series.

Walter Alston, the Dodgers manager, calls for veteran Dale Mitchell to bat for pitcher Sal Maglie.

In the stands at Yankee Stadium, Carmen Berra turns to her sister, Mary, with a promise.

Her husband, Yogi, is the New York Yankees catcher, and she is carrying their third child.

If Larsen finishes the perfect game, she vows, she will name the baby Dale.

Mitchell is a .312 career hitter.

But hes 35 years old and had batted just .204 that season.

He would never get another hit in the majors.

Alston has five future Hall of Famers in his lineup Roy Campanella, Hodges, Pee Wee Reese, Jackie Robinson and Duke Snider.

With a Golden At-Bat to use, perhaps Alston would have chosen the left-handed Snider, in hopes of a game-tying homer to the short porch in right.

But its more likely that Hodges would have gotten the call.

Hodges had the only hit off Larsen in Game 2, when Larsen walked four and didnt make it through the second inning.

Hed come close to a hit in Game 5, with a deep drive to the gap that Mickey Mantle chased down in left-center .

He was also having an excellent World Series: 7-for-14 with a homer and eight runs batted in before Game 5.

As it happened, Hodges had no more hits in the series.

Mitchell struck out on a checked swing.

The Yankees won the championship in seven games.

And two months later, Carmen Berra gave birth to her third son: Dale.

1972 World Series, Game 7, two outs, bottom of the 9th inning Who hit: Pete Rose Result: Flyout to left New batter: Johnny Bench The As were one out away from their first championship in Oakland.

All they needed was for Rollie Fingers, their Hall of Fame closer, to retire a pinch hitter named Darrel Chaney.

And Fingers hit him with a pitch.

With the As up by one run, the ultimate hit machine came to bat as the potential winning run.

But Pete Rose didnt hit many homers, and thats what would have won the World Series.

Manager Dick Williams met Fingers on the mound with one instruction for Rose, who was batting left-handed: keep the ball away.

Advertisement I threw him a fastball tailing away, and it was up a little bit, Fingers told me a few years ago, for my book on World Series history .

I know he likes the ball up, but I knew he wasnt gonna hit it out to left field.

The Reds did have guys who made a living launching baseballs over the fence: Johnny Bench and Tony Perez.

Both had hit 40 in a season and were on their way to Cooperstown and Bench had already rescued the Reds with a game-tying homer in the ninth inning of the NLCS finale.

With the championship at stake, manager Sparky Anderson just might have reached for a slugger over the Hit King.

I think, in 1972, he probably would have put Johnny in or even my dad, just because of the clutch nature of what he did back in the day, said Eduardo Perez.

I think he would have gone for the throat, especially with Sparky being so innovative and not being shy to pull the trigger.

Rose would be MVP of the Reds next World Series, the 1975 classic against Boston .

But this time, he bit on the perfect pitch from Fingers.

He hit it towards the end of the bat, just a nice little old lazy fly ball to Joe Rudi in left, Fingers said.

It made my day.

1985 World Series, Game 6, one out, bottom of the 9th inning Who hit: Dane Iorg Result: Two-run, game-winning single New batter: George Brett George Brett is by far the greatest player in the history of the Kansas City Royals : Hall of Famer, three-time batting champion, MVP, statue at the ballpark , the whole thing.

Hes also the last guy with four hits in Game 7 of a World Series.

Funny thing about baseball, though: Brett wouldnt have played a Game 7 if not for a rally that took place without him.

Thats how baseball goes without the Golden At-Bat, anyway.

The Royals faced elimination in Game 6 of the 1985 World Series, trailing the St.

Louis Cardinals , 1-0, in the bottom of the ninth.

Todd Worrell, the St.

Louis closer, had faced six batters in Game 5 and fanned them all.

With the dangerous Brett due up eighth in the inning, this game should have been over.

Advertisement But Worrell didnt strike out anyone this time.

And all of a sudden, the ballpark was booby-trapped.

A blown call at first.

A pop foul that dropped untouched on the lip of the dugout.

A passed ball.

And Dane Iorg, of all people, lifting the Royals from losing to winning on the games final swing.

If the Royals had to choose between Iorg, who batted .223 that season, and Brett, the majors OPS leader, it would have been no choice at all.

Brett might have driven in those runs instead, and maybe that would have been a better script.

This game actually happened on the same date that Marty McFly went back in time in Back To The Future really, its true but no Royals fan would rev up the ol DeLorean to change it.

Iorg looped a clean single to right for the tying and winning runs, and the Royals romped to the title in Game 7.

1986 World Series, Game 6, two outs, bottom of the 10th inning Who hit: Mookie Wilson Result: Game-tying wild pitch, game-winning ground ball to first (E3) New batter: Keith Hernandez Who made the last out in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series? The Boston Red Sox had four chances to get it, against Gary Carter, Kevin Mitchell, Ray Knight and Mookie Wilson.

Each time, they failed.

So the answer to that question, then, is Keith Hernandez, who flied out to center off Calvin Schiraldi for the second out of the fateful 10th inning at Shea Stadium.

The Mets , down by two runs with two outs and the bases empty, had seemingly wasted a dominant season.

Hernandez retreated to the clubhouse for a beer and a smoke, deciding to watch the ending on TV in manager Davey Johnsons office.

Then Carter singled.

And Mitchell singled.

And Knight singled.

And Bob Stanley rumbled into the game to face Wilson.

Hernandez never moved; his vantage point was suddenly lucky.

If Johnson could have used a Golden At-Bat in this moment, would Wilson have faced Stanley? No chance.

Advertisement As fellow 1986 Met and longtime broadcaster Ron Darling said the other day, succinctly: Keith would have hit in every big at-bat.

Its fun to imagine Hernandez taking one last drag, one last swig and sprinting for the on-deck circle with the World Series on the line.

But its even more fun to know what really did happen.

Wilson took an at-bat for the ages: a foul ball, two balls, three more fouls, the game-tying wild pitch for ball three, two more fouls...

and then the wicked little roller that skipped under Bill Buckners glove and into legend.

August 26, 1987, Cleveland Indians at Milwaukee Brewers, no outs, bottom of the 9th inning Who hit: Glenn Braggs Result: Ground out New batter: Paul Molitor This wasnt about Glenn Braggs, really.

It was about the odd predicament of preserving a hitting streak with a Golden At-Bat in play.

Since Joe DiMaggios hallowed 56-game record in 1941, only two players have hit safely in as many as 39 consecutive games.

One was Pete Rose, who had a 44-game streak in 1978.

The other was Paul Molitor, whose 39-game streak in 1987 ended when he was on deck.

In the first eight innings on Aug.

26, Molitor went hitless in four at-bats against Cleveland rookie (and future major-league manager) John Farrell.

The game was scoreless in the bottom of the ninth, which meant that at any moment, a Brewer not named Molitor could win the game with one swing while denying Molitor another chance.

Farrell retired Braggs and two others in order in the ninth.

Doug Jones came in for the 10th and faced Rick Manning with two on and one out.

With Molitor due up next, Manning singled in the winning run and the home crowd booed.

The fans started cheering when he threw me the first pitch for a strike, Manning said later.

How about that: the home fans wanted me to strike out.

It was the right result a Brewers win but the wrong hero.

A Golden At-Bat might have engineered a better one.

1992 NLCS, Game 7, two outs, bottom of the ninth inning Who hit: Francisco Cabrera Result: Two-run, pennant-winning single New batter: Terry Pendleton And now the Braves season hangs in the balance as Francisco Cabrera comes to the plate to bat for the pitcher, Sean McDonough told his CBS audience, with the Pittsburgh Pirates one out away from the World Series at rollicking Fulton County Stadium in Atlanta.

He appeared in only 12 games for the Braves this year and batted only 10 times, with three hits.

Hes 0-for-1 in this series.

Advertisement After a ball from Stan Belinda, analyst Tim McCarver suggested that Cabrera should take if the count got to 2-0: He has not been up that much, and I think the chances then are better with a walk than a hit when you have to come off the bench and face a guy like Belinda.

A most unlikely man in the spotlight for Atlanta, McDonough agreed, and the count indeed ran to 2-0.

But that most unlikely man wasnt up there to take.

Cabrera hacked at the next pitch, whistling it foul down the left field line.

He swung again on 2-1, connecting for the two-run single that sent Sid Bream hobbling around third and into the World Series and the city of Atlanta into delirium.

Fit Francisco Cabrera for a Santa Claus outfit and call it Miracle on Capitol Avenue, I.J.

Rosenberg wrote in the next days Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Nothing else seems to fit.

If manager Bobby Cox had his pick of hitters, hed have probably called for Terry Pendleton, the 1991 NL MVP who led the league in hits in 1992.

Pendleton specialized in clutch October doubles hed come up big in the 1985 and 1991 World Series and had led off the ninth with a double off Doug Drabek.

Maybe Pendleton would have delivered again.

But the story is somehow sweeter with a leading man like Cabrera, whose career was over a year later.

Pendleton had nearly 2,000 career hits.

Cabrera had just 92 an appropriate total for the guy with the signature swing of that season.

1992 World Series, Game 6, two outs, bottom of the 11th inning Who hit: Otis Nixon Result: Bunt ground out to pitcher New batter: Deion Sanders The night of his first World Series championship, Cito Gaston was eager to force Cox, his counterpart, into one specific move.

Gaston, the Toronto Blue Jays manager, wanted to put Deion Sanders on the Atlanta Braves bench.

Advertisement Deion Sanders was absolutely killing us and I couldnt wait to get him out of that ballgame, Gaston told me for the book.

He was on fire.

And when I brought in a left-hander, Bobby took him out of the game, and that was great for us.

Cox had a strong bench option, subbing Ron Gant for Sanders when Gaston called for David Wells in the seventh inning.

But that was fine with Gaston; Sanders had a double, a single and a stolen base already, and was hitting .533 for the Series.

If Cox could have brought Sanders back from the bench, he likely would have done so with two outs in the ninth, when Otis Nixon faced Tom Henke, trailing by a run with runners on first and second.

Nixon, however, actually saved the Braves from elimination, smacking a two-strike, game-tying hit to left.

In the end, though, he couldnt do it twice.

Down to the last out again in the 11th, after Toronto had regained the lead, Nixon batted again with pinch runner John Smoltz (!) on third as the tying run.

He tried to bunt for a hit, but pitcher Mike Timlin scooped it up, tossed to first and the Jays had their title.

Would Sanders have made the final out if hed returned to the game in the ninth? Would Cox have still let Nixon face Henke and saved Sanders for the 11th? And if you think Coach Prime is famous now, what if hed had his own Carlton Fisk moment, too? All we know is that Nixon triumphed the first time, but his second chance ended in defeat.

And speaking of presidents, a 1992 candidate opined about the bunt on the campaign trail the next day.

Why do you think they told Nixon to bunt? Gov.

Bill Clinton of Arkansas mused to the press corps.

I believe if I were going down in the World Series, Id want to go down swinging.

September 2, 2001, Mike Mussinas near-perfect game, two outs, bottom of the 9th Who hit: Carl Everett Result: Single New batter: Manny Ramirez Pitching before a national audience on Sunday Night Baseball, Mike Mussina retired the first 26 Red Sox hitters at Fenway Park.

Needing one out for the Yankees third perfect game in four years and facing David Cone, the last to do it Mussina seemed to get a break with the pinch hitter summoned by manager Joe Kerrigan.

Advertisement It was Carl Everett a very good hitter, but one who had struggled all season off Mussina.

In 10 early-season meetings with Mussina, Everett was 1-for-9 with a walk and seven strikeouts.

Down in the count again, 1-2, Everett punched a clean single to left, clapped his hands, tossed aside his helmet and departed for a pinch hitter.

My work here is done, he seemed to say, as Mussina Mr.

Almost winced on the mound.

Kerrigan made the right decision, as it turned out.

But he also had one of the sports top sluggers, Manny Ramirez, in the game.

Ramirez had struck out looking twice and popped out, and didnt hit Mussina especially well at that stage of his career.

But this was Manny Ramirez in his prime.

He bashed 41 home runs in 2001.

Boston was down just one run.

Any manager would have gladly given Ramirez one more shot and Mussina surely wishes that Kerrigan had.

2011 World Series, Game 6, bottom of the ninth, two outs Who hit: David Freese Result: Game-tying triple New batter: Albert Pujols If you think the Golden At-Bat idea is absurd, youll love this visual.

The St.

Louis Cardinals, down to their last out at home against the Texas Rangers , call for Albert Pujols to take the final at-bat.

And instead of ascending the dugout steps and glaring menacingly from the on-deck circle, Pujols strolls in from...

second base.

Pujols was just about the most dangerous hitter on Earth in October 2011.

He had belted three homers in Game 3 of the World Series.

On this night, down two runs with one out in the ninth, he had doubled off Neftali Feliz.

He stayed at second after a Lance Berkman walk and an Allen Craig strikeout.

So how would this have worked, exactly? Would a Golden Pinch Hitter be replaced by a Golden Pinch Runner? Well leave that to MLB.

Anyway, the presence of Pujols would have set up a fascinating counter-move: Would the Rangers have intentionally walked him, moving the winning run into scoring position for Yadier Molina? They did walk Pujols in the 10th, with two outs and a base open, only for Berkman to tie it with a single off Scott Feldman.

Advertisement Maybe Feliz would have faced Pujols a second time, struck him out and won that elusive championship ring for Adrian Beltre, Michael Young and the gang.

Maybe Pujols would have clanged one off the Gateway Arch for a walk-off homer, and grateful fans would have flooded the front office with dollar bills like the end of Its A Wonderful Life to keep him in free agency.

All we know is that David Freese, the local kid who was 0-for-3 in the game, had to take his at-bat and he sliced a two-strike, game-tying triple over Nelson Cruzs head that still haunts the good folks of Arlington.

Two innings later, Freese drilled a game-ending homer and wound up as the World Series MVP.

It was his turn to bat, in both pivotal moments, and nobody took it away.

(Top photo of Mookie Wilson in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series: Ronald C.

Modra / Sports Illustrated via Getty Images).

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