Miracle on Grass

by David Fanucchi

remember immediately thinking to myself, ‘Okay, I’m swinging away now. How have you elevated the ball against a sidearm pitcher before in your career? Let’s get out in front of an off-speed pitch and see what happens.’” As Lasorda and Smith spent a few minutes arguing with the first-base umpire over the critical pickoff call of Dawkins, Mientkiewicz took the moment to collect himself and his thoughts. “I was thinking that I was still ahead on the count, and that I had gotten that big hit in the seventh, and right then, something just came over me, and the game slowed down. I’ve never had a two-week window in my life, the way those two weeks in Sydney were for me. No matter what I had, no matter what I saw in my mind or thought might happen, the game was slower than it had ever been in my entire life, my entire career. And I remember standing there in that at-bat thinking, ‘I can