by Matt Barr

Meme-ified

I've done a couple of these, but don't make a habit of it. But this is a neat idea and about at my level of creativity and concentration after the last couple days: Name your top ten sports memories that you saw in person or on the television as they happened.

I'm assuming these are "top" memories as in most indelible, not "favorite," necessarily.

1. Bills rally from 35-3 down in the third quarter to beat Houston 41-38 in overtime of the 1993 AFC Wild Card game.

2. Brad May's overtime game winner against Boston in 1993. May had kissed his stick before the faceoff that led to the goal. It was the Sabres' first playoff series win in ten years.

This game was on ESPN and I was watching it in Chicago. There was a service back then, before streaming media on the Internet, when you could dial a number and for XX cents a minute listen to local radio broadcasts of sporting events. When the game went into overtime I dialed up Rick Jeanerret's play by play and got to hear his famous "May Day! May Day! May Day!" call.

3. Wide right, 1991.

4. No goal, 1999.

5. Nolan Ryan's seventh no hitter, 1991.

6. Bills 51, Raiders 3, AFC Championship game, 1991.

7. Gilbert Perreault's jersey retirement ceremony, 1990.

8. Game 2 of the 1988 World Series. I had not seen Gibson's game-winning home run live. I did tune in to see what Bob Costas famously called the worst lineup ever to take the field in a World Series game win 6-0 behind Orel Hershiser, who had as many hits as he allowed on the mound over nine dominant innings.

9. Trailing 53-17 in Super Bowl XXVII, Don Beebe knocks the ball out of Leon Lett's hands as Lett is about to score on a fumble return. It didn't compute, someone putting that much effort into what two billion other people thought was a meaningless play. I've come to believe I've never seen anything more admirable in a sporting venue.

10. Bartman, 2003. This would be indelible anyway but what gave it texture was that my wife and I were watching the game in bed when Steve Bartman got in the way of Alou catching the foul ball. "Here it comes," I said, or words to that effect, meaning that I knew in my bones that five outs from the World Series, something was going to happen to prevent the Cubs from getting there. My wife thought I was being defeatist and overwrought. One walk, wild pitch, and error on an inning-ending double play ball later, I looked like I knew what I was talking about for the one time that happens per month.

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