The Shot Heard Round the World

To celebrate the return of baseball season, today's Photo of the Week is of Ralph Branca, the man who became famous for what would be called The Shot Heard Round the World. Ralph Branca pitched for the Brooklyn Dodgers from 1944-1953 and then again in 1956. He also pitched for the Tigers (1953-1954) and the Yankees (1954). A three-time All-Star, he won 80 games for the Dodgers with a career high of 21 wins in 1947. In 1948 he was ninth in the league in wins. In 1951 he was tenth in National League in ERA. He had a incredible career.

But that's not what people remember him for.

They remember what happened on October 3, 1951 at the Polo Grounds in Manhattan. It was the third game of a three-game playoff for the National League pennant. It was the ninth inning and the New York Giants were losing to the Brooklyn Dodgers 4-2, with two runners on base when Bobby Thomson stepped up to the plate. Willie Mays was on deck, and Chuck Dressen the Dodgers manager, made what some consider a controversial call. Instead of walking Thomson, and pitching to Mays, he had Branca pitch to Thomson.

The first pitch was a strike, right on the inside corner.

The second, fastball, high and inside.

The third, a breaking ball, down and away.

Thomson connected, drove the ball down the left field line and it landed in the lower deck stands for a three run home run. And the Giants won the pennant. 

But the phrase, the Shot Heard Round the World is a line from a poem called Concord Hymn by Ralph Waldo Emerson. The day after the game, the New York Daily News ran the headline 'The Shot Heard Round the Baseball World.' The phrase stuck and the rest was history. But I think this picture of him smiling with a kitty is better than the one everyone else remembers - the one of him weeping facedown on the bleechers.

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