Thread by @cjs3872

Today marks the 40th anniversary of one of the wildest slugfests in @MLB history, as the @Phillies and @Cubs combined 11 HR and 50 hits, as the Phillies beat the Cubs 23-22 in 10 innings on May 17, 1979. Obviously, the wind was blowing out at Wrigley Field that day.

In that epic contest, Dave Kingman hit 3 HR that went about 1400 feet combined, Mike Schmidt hit 2 HR, the first and last, which turned out to be the game winner, Bill Buckner had a game-high 7 RBI, 4 coming on a grand slam, & Larry Bowa had a game-high 5 hits (in EIGHT at-bats).

Phillies closer Tug McGraw entered that game in the FIFTH inning with his team up 21-9, and got a grand total of TWO outs, not even escaping the fifth inning. And the pitchers that batted in the first inning, one of which was RELIEF pitcher Donnie Moore, had a homer & a triple.

One other fascinating note about that wild slugfest was that it was played with replacement umpires, as the regular umpires were on strike.

Another amazing statistic about that game 40 years ago is that, for the first five innings, the @Phillies AVERAGED batting around in each inning. There were a total of Phillie 45 at-bats in the first five innings, an average of nine per inning, or batting around in each inning.