Manfred Mann – "Do Wah Diddy Diddy" (1964)

She looked good (looked good!)

She looked fine (looked fine!)

She looked good, she looked fine

A few days ago, an old friend sent me a video of Mickey Mantle’s final World Series home run, which he hit off Gibson in game 7 of the 1964 Fall Classic.  Click here to watch that video.

It was Mantle’s record 18th World Series roundtripper.  No currently active player has more than seven, so that record will likely stand for a very long time.

Mantle’s blast came in the top of the 6th inning, driving in Bobby Richardson and Roger Maris (both of whom had singled) and cutting the Cardinals’ seemingly comfortable 6-0 lead in half.  

If that game had taken place in 2024 instead of 1964, Gibson would have almost certainly been yanked in favor of a relief pitcher after surrendering Mantle’s home run.  But Cardinals manager Johnny Keane left him in the game even after he gave up a two-out walk later in that inning.

Gibson got out of the 6th with no further damage, and retired the first two Yankee batters the 7th before giving up a single to the pesky Richardson.  Would any current major-league manager have left him in the game to face slugger Roger Maris rather than calling in a lefty relief pitcher?  I doubt it.  But Keane stuck with Gibson – who retired Maris on a line drive to right.

The Cardinals added an insurance run in the bottom of that frame, and Gibson set the Yankees down in order in the 8th.  With a 7-3 lead going into the 9th, Keane told Gibson that he was leaving him in to close out the game.

“Don’t be cute and don’t go for the corners,” the Cardinal skipper told his ace. “Just get it over. They’re not going to hit four home runs off you.”

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But after the big right-hander struck out Tom Tresh to open the 9th, he gave up a long four-bagger to Clete Boyer.  Keane no doubt breathed a sigh of relief when his pitcher fanned pinch-hitter Johnny Blanchard for the second out.  But Phil Linz then deposited a Gibson offering into the left-field seats, cutting the Redbirds’ lead to just 7-5.  

If Bobby Richardson had gotten on base, would Keane have relieved Gibson rather than let him face Maris and perhaps Mantle with the game – and the Series – on the line?

We’ll never know because Gibson induced the New York second-sacker to pop up for the final out, giving St. Louis the championship.

After the game, Keane was asked why he left Gibson on the mound in the top of the 9th even after the Boyer and Linz home runs.  “I had a commitment to his heart,” the manager replied.

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Any baseball fan would agree that Gibson’s game seven performance was remarkable.  But you can’t appreciate just how remarkable it truly was without knowing that only three days earlier, the big righty had started – and finished – game five of the ’64 Series, which went ten innings.

Think about that.  Gibson pitches a ten-inning complete game, takes two days off – starting pitchers today usually get four days off between starts – and then pitches a nine-inning complete game.

I haven’t been able to find Gibson’s pitch counts for those games.  But the most widely-followed formula for estimating pitch counts tells you that Gibson likely threw around 153 pitches in game five and 146 pitches in game seven.  

Today starting pitchers rarely throw more than 100 pitches in a game.  In fact, no major-league pitcher has thrown more than 112 pitches this season.

And no major-league pitcher has started a game on three days’ rest this year – much less two days’ rest.

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Not surprisingly, Bob Gibson was named Most Valuable Player of the 1964 World Series, while Johnny Keane won the Sporting News Manager of the Year Award. 

But in 1965, the two men’s career trajectories diverged sharply.

I’ll tell you more about what happened to Gibson and Keane after their 1964 World Series triumph in the next 2 or 3 lines.

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Jeff Berry and Ellie Greenwich – who penned numerous pop classics (including “Be My Baby,” “Chapel of Love,” “Leader of the Pack,” and “River Deep, Mountain High”) – wrote today’s featured song for the Exciters, who released their recording of it under the title “Do-Wah-Diddy” in 1963.  Click here to listen to that recording.

Click here to watch a very young Bruce Willis singing the song to Cybill Shepherd in an episode of Moonlighting.

Click here to watch Mary-Kate Olsen – or perhaps Ashley Olsen – singing the song on Full House.

Click here to listen to Manfred Mann’s recording of “Do Was Diddy Diddy,” which hit number one on the Billboard “Hot 100” the week that the St. Louis Cardinals won game seven of the 1964 World Series.

Click here to buy that recording from Amazon.