Kiners Korner Chronicles, No. 4: The Little Roller Up Along First

Mookie Wilson's ten-pitch at-bat ends the most famous game in Mets history — Shea Stadium, October 25, 1986

Welcome to the Kiners Korner Chronicles.

This site is dedicated to Ralph Kiner and the legacy of the greatest sports postgame show ever, Kiner's Korner.

While researching our book, Down on the Korner, my co-author Howie Karpin and I tracked down as many surviving episodes of Kiner's Korner as we could find. Now, you can watch those treasured broadcasts right here on this site and relive the conversations, the characters, and the unforgettable moments that made Ralph's show so special.

But our search also taught us something heartbreaking: for every conversation we recovered, dozens more were lost — taped over, thrown out, or gone forever.

So we're doing the next best thing. Through the power of AI and deep research into the old games, we hope to recreate a little bit of that magic. The game recaps are real, built from the box score. The interviews that follow are our best imagining of the conversations that were lost — what Ralph would have asked, and what his guest might have answered.

The Game

FLUSHING, N.Y. — The Mets were one strike from the end of their season. What happened instead, in the tenth inning on Saturday night, October 25, 1986, became the most retold comeback in baseball history: New York 6, Boston 5, in ten innings, before 55,078 at Shea Stadium, in four hours and two minutes. The win tied the World Series at three games apiece.

Boston built its lead the way it had all Series — early and efficiently. Wade Boggs beat out an infield single in the first and scored on Dwight Evans's double. In the second, Spike Owen singled, Boggs singled him to third, and Marty Barrett singled him home. Roger Clemens, meanwhile, did not allow a hit through four innings. The Mets finally broke through in the fifth: Darryl Strawberry walked and stole second, Ray Knight singled him home, Mookie Wilson singled — Evans's error in right letting Knight take third — and Danny Heep, pinch-hitting for Rafael Santana, grounded into a double play that scored Knight anyway. Two-two.

The Red Sox reclaimed the lead in the seventh on an unearned run — Knight misplayed Jim Rice's grounder, and Evans's groundout, with a hit-and-run on that kept the double play from being turned, scored Barrett. Wilson ended that inning by throwing Rice out at home on Rich Gedman's single. Boston loaded the bases in the eighth and came away empty — Jesse Orosco needed exactly one pitch to retire Bill Buckner. The Mets tied it in the bottom half: Lee Mazzilli singled, Lenny Dykstra bunted his way on, Wally Backman sacrificed, Keith Hernandez was walked intentionally, and Gary Carter, hitting with a 3-0 green light, lifted a sacrifice fly to left. Three-three.

Then came the tenth, and it cut both ways. Dave Henderson led off against Rick Aguilera and homered on the second pitch. Boggs doubled and Barrett singled him home. Boston 5, Mets 3 — and when Backman and Hernandez flied out to open the bottom of the inning, the Shea scoreboard briefly congratulated the Red Sox as world champions. Carter singled to left. Kevin Mitchell, pinch-hitting in the pitcher's spot, singled to center. Knight, down 0-2 — one strike from elimination — singled to center too, scoring Carter and sending Mitchell to third. Calvin Schiraldi came out; Bob Stanley came in to face Wilson.

Wilson's at-bat lasted ten pitches. At 2-2, Stanley threw an inside pitch that broke in on him and skipped past Gedman to the backstop — Mitchell scored the tying run on the wild pitch, Knight took second. Wilson worked the count full, fouling pitches away, and on the tenth pitch he hit what Vin Scully called "a little roller up along first — behind the bag." Buckner, playing in the game in the tenth despite Dave Stapleton having replaced him for defense in Boston's three earlier wins, moved toward the line and let it go under his glove and through his legs. Knight scored. Ballgame. The official scorer charged Buckner with the error, and — a detail the retellings often miss — Wilson was credited with no RBI at all on the night: the tying run scored on a wild pitch, the winning run on the error, and the Mets' only RBIs belonged to Knight (two) and Carter (one). Aguilera, who had given up the two tenth-inning runs, was the winning pitcher. Schiraldi took the loss.

Ralph's Guest

The Mets' left fielder — one single, a run-saving throw from left field in the seventh, a bunt single's worth of chaos in the ninth, and the ten-pitch at-bat that New York will talk about forever.

The Interview (imagined)

What follows is a dramatic recreation. The game was real. The conversation is our imagining of the Kiner's Korner segment that likely aired that night — the tapes of those early shows were erased long ago.

Ralph: Mookie, I have broadcast a lot of baseball games, and I am not sure I have ever seen one end like that. Bottom of the tenth, two out, nobody within a strike — Boston was one strike away, more than once. Take me into that at-bat against Bob Stanley.

Mookie: Ralph, I just kept telling myself, don't be the last out. Just keep the line moving. Stanley kept coming inside on me, and I kept fouling them off. Ten pitches. I wasn't trying to hit a home run. I was trying to not go home.

Ralph: At two and two, he threw the one that broke in on you and got past Gedman, all the way to the backstop. Kevin Mitchell scores the tying run, Ray Knight goes to second. What did you think in that moment?

Mookie: I thought, we're tied, and now Ray's in scoring position, and the pressure just flipped. It wasn't on me anymore — it was on them. Stanley still had to get me out, and I could see the whole thing turning.

Ralph: Then the count goes full, and on the tenth pitch you hit the little roller up along first. Behind the bag. It goes under Buckner's glove, through his legs, and Knight comes around to score. Mookie — the box score gives you no run batted in on the play. The run scored on the error. Does that matter to you at all?

Mookie: Ralph, they can write whatever they want in the box score. Ray crossed the plate and we won the game. That's the only line I care about. If I don't put that ball in play, though — if I strike out — there is no error. You have to make them field it.

Ralph: People forget you were in this game long before the tenth. In the fifth, your single and Dwight Evans's error put Knight on third, and he scored the tying run on Heep's double-play ball. And in the seventh — Rich Gedman singles, and you throw Jim Rice out at home from left field to end the inning. Boston leads three to two at that moment. If Rice scores, it's four to two, and maybe there's no comeback at all.

Mookie: That's the part I think about. Everybody remembers the roller. But this team stayed in the game all night — little plays. Ray made an error in the seventh too, and then he's the one who gets the hit in the tenth and scores the winning run. That's baseball. You don't get to pick which mistake is your last one.

Ralph: Let's walk the whole tenth one more time. Henderson homers off Aguilera. Boggs doubles, Barrett singles him home. Five to three. Backman flies out, Keith flies out deep to center — and the scoreboard up there actually flashed congratulations to Boston. Two outs, nobody on. What was the dugout like?

Mookie: Quiet for about ten seconds. Then Gary singles. And Kevin Mitchell — Ralph, the man wasn't even in the on-deck circle in his spikes, he'd been in the clubhouse — comes up and singles. Then Ray falls behind oh and two and singles. One strike away, three times over, and three straight singles. After Kevin's hit you could feel Shea shaking. I mean it. The stands were shaking.

Ralph: One more thing. In the ninth inning, you bunted in front of the plate, Gedman's throw pulled Owen off second, and suddenly the winning run was in scoring position with nobody out — and the Mets couldn't get him home. Johnson struck out, Mazzilli and Dykstra flied out. Most teams fold after that. This one didn't.

Mookie: This team never folded all year, Ralph. One hundred and eight wins, and we needed every one of them to get here. We weren't about to start folding in the tenth inning of the World Series.

Ralph: Tomorrow night, Game Seven. Same ballpark. What do you tell Mets fans?

Mookie: I tell them to get some rest — because we're not done, and something tells me tomorrow's going to be another long night.

Ralph: Mookie Wilson. One single, one throw, ten pitches, and one little roller up along first. Thank you.

Mookie: Thank you, Ralph. Happy to be here — instead of talking about how it ended the other way.

The interview is a recreation of the lost Kiner's Korner conversation. Photo: actual production still — Mookie Wilson with Ralph Kiner on the Kiner's Korner set. Box score: Retrosheet via The Baseball Cube / Baseball-Reference. The audio companion to this article — the Flag of Victory Polka, the disclaimer, and the full imagined interview — is available with this post.