If you ask most baseball fans to name the greatest World Series of all time, you’d be hard-pressed to find anybody who wouldn’t at least mention the Fall Classic in 1975 featuring the Cincinnati Reds and Boston Red Sox.
Of course, one of the most memorable World Series moments came into everyone’s living room that fall when Carlton Fisk famously gestured for his fly ball in the bottom of the 12th inning of Game 6 to stay fair. It did, and the Red Sox forced a Game 7 for all the marbles; a game the Reds won 4-3 enabling the Big Red Machine to bring a a World Championship back to the city of Cincinnati.
And while everyone remembers Fisk’s home run, Johnny Bench had a different memory come to the forefront on Tuesday. After hearing of the passing of Red Sox’s great Luis Tiant, Bench posted his stat line from the 1975 World Series when the right-hander was on the mound for Boston.
Johnny Bench’s simple tribute to Reds World Series foe Luis Tiant says it all
Bench went 2-for-16 (.125) in three games against Tiant during the series with four fly-ball outs, three strikeouts, a pair of ground ball outs, and a foul pop. Tiant started Games 1, 4, and 6; all of which were Boston victories.
Tiant spent 19 seasons in the big leagues with most of his days spent in Boston as well as Cleveland. For his career, Tiant was 229-172 with a career 3.30 ERA and 2,416 strikeouts. Tiant went to the All-Star Game three times and won the ERA title in both 1968 and 1972.
Bench’s simple tribute speaks volumes about how good Tiant truly was. Tiant is a member of the Red Sox Hall of Fame, but does not have a plaque in Cooperstown. The right-hander was eligible to be inducted from 1988-2002, but it’ll now be up to the Veteran’s Committee if Tiant is ever to be immortalized in the Baseball Hall of Fame.
