Every child who's ever played an inning in little league has the fantasy: bases loaded, two out, three-two count, down 4-1 on the bottom of the ninth, the pennant on the line. In our mind's eye, we are Babe Ruth (or Willie Mays, or Hank Aaron, or Mike Schmidt, or Cecil Fielder), we swing from the heels and - crack! - the ball soars upward, rising toward a sea of out-stretched arms, and as it clears the fence our teammates, the crowd, the city go berserk, for the Yankees (or the Giants, or the Braves, or the Phillies, or the Tigers) have won the pennant.In all of sports, no scenario is more dramatic than the pressure cooker of a major league pennant race. Day after day, game after game, inning after inning, players battle for first place with one eye on the scoreboard and another on the schedule. Some teams wilt or crumble under the relentless tension, like the Indians of 1940, and some discover hidden reserves of character, like the 1967 Red Sox. And on rare and great occasions a player realizes that childhood fantasy, the pennant-winning home run, as Bobby Thomson did at the Polo Grounds in 1951. A pennant race defines what is best about baseball: the chance for a pure, glorious, redemptive moment.In Pennant Races, Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times sports columnist Dave Anderson vividly recreates the excitement of the most thrilling down-to-the-wire finishes in baseball history. Here are John McGraw's tough-as-nails 1908 New York Giants furiously duking it out with the Cubs of Tinker-to-Ever-to-Chance, only to fall victim to "Merkle's Boner." The three-way 1920 race featured not only the tragically fatal beaning of Cleveland Indian star Ray Chapman, but the outbreak of the Black Sox scandal just as a surging Chicago was only one half-game out of first. From Dizzy Dean and the 1934 Gas House Gang Cardinals to "Leo the Lip's" 1941 Dodgers to the famous "Phillie Phlop" in 1964, Pennant Races tells the stories of the greatest names and teams from the turn of the century to the 1993 duel between Atlanta and San Francisco.Loaded with big-league lore, long-forgotten historical detail, and plenty of argument starters (Anderson's comments on 1951 Brooklyn manager Charlie Dressen should get 'em going in Flatbush), Pennant Races is a necessary addition to the library of any true baseball fan. Read Less