The Day Bobby Hit The Home Run

"I got nothing left, nothing," Newcombe announced as he walked into the Dodger dugout. Jackie Robinson and Roy Campanella, who was not playing that day because he had pulled a thigh muscle, took Newcombe aside.

"My arm's tight," Newcombe said.

"Obscenity," Robinson replied. "You go out there and pitch until your obscene arm falls off."

"Roomie," Campanella said, "you ain't gonna quit on us now. You gonna hum that pea for us, roomie."

While the two built a fire under Newcombe, other Dodgers were making the inning miserable for both Maglie and Thomson. Reese and Snider opened with singles to right, and when Maglie threw a curve in the dirt and past Wes Westrum, Reese scored and Snider sped to third. Then Maglie walked Robinson, and the Dodgers, ahead 2-1, once again had runners at first and third.

Pafko pulled a bounding ball up the third-base line and Thomson, breaking nicely, reached backhand for it. The play required a delicate touch; the ball glanced off the heel of Thomson's glove and skidded away from him. Snider scored, making it 3-1 Brooklyn, and Pafko was credited with a single. Then Billy Cox followed with a fierce one-hopper, again to Thomson's sector.

One thought—"Get in front of it"—crossed Thomson's mind. He did, lunging recklessly. There were other times at third when Thomson had thought of hard smashes coming up and hitting him in the face. This time he didn't. He thought only of blocking the ball with his glove, his arm, his chest. But the ball bounced high and carried over his shoulder into left field. The Dodgers had their third run of the inning and a 4-1 lead.

Newcombe blazed through the eighth, his arm no longer tight, and Larry Jansen retired the Dodgers in the ninth. "Come on," Durocher shouted as the last of the ninth began. "We can still get 'em. Come on."

Newcombe threw two quick strikes to Alvin Dark. "Got to get my bat on the ball," Dark thought. "Just get my bat on it."

Newcombe threw again, and Dark rapped a bounder into the hole in the right side of the infield. Both Hodges and Robinson broke for the ball and Newcombe ran to cover first base. Hodges, straining, touched the ball with the tip of his mitt and deflected it away from Robinson. Perhaps if he had not touched it Robinson could have made the play. As it was, Dark reached first on a single.