1949 World Series

The 1949 World Series featured the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers, with the Yankees winning in five games for their second defeat of the Dodgers in three years, and the twelfth championship in team history. This victory would start a record run of five consecutive World Series championships by the Yankees.
History was made in the ninth inning of Game 5, when the Ebbets Field lights were turned on, making it the first World Series game finished under artificial lights. The first scheduled Series night game would not be held until 1971.
Both teams finished the regular season with the exact same records and winning their respective leagues by exactly one game.

After nine unsuccessful seasons with both Boston and Brooklyn (in which he never finished higher than fifth), manager Casey Stengel finally had success in the minors while coaching Oakland to the Pacific Coast League pennant in 1948. Shortly after, he was called up to replace Bucky Harris as the Yankees skipper in what would become the start of a long-standing... and winning relationship. New York, who had fallen from first to third under Harris, responded to Stengel's appointment by winning their sixteenth American League pennant and doing so in dramatic fashion. Stengel's team trailed Boston by one game as manager Joe McCarthy's Red Sox arrived at Yankee Stadium for a season-closing two-game set, but the Yankees swept them in classic "Curse of the Bambino" fashion. Across-town the Brooklyn Dodgers were "cutting it close" as well while managing to beat the St. Louis Cardinals (by one game) in the National League pennant race.

Don Newcombe, who had a 17-8 record as a Dodgers rookie in 1949, drew the start and did all he could to spoil Stengel's debut. Through eight innings of Game 1, Newcombe struck out eleven Yankees, walked no one, surrendered only four hits and had not permitted a run. Pitching rival Allie Reynolds wasn't far behind with nine strikeouts, four walks, two hits and no runs. Reynolds managed to retire the order in the ninth on a grounder, popup and fly ball, but Newcombe was not as lucky as the Yankees' Tommy Henrich put one in the right field stands for the win. The Dodgers answered the close Yankees' triumph the next day with a Game 2 nailbiter of their own. Preacher Roe outpitched Vic Raschi for the 1-0 win and Gil Hodges singling home Jackie Robinson, who had doubled, in the second inning.

The tensions continued in the third game as both teams remained locked in a 1-1 stalemate through the eighth. Former National League slugger Johnny Mize, (purchased in August from the New York Giants), knocked a bases-loaded single off Dodger starter R...