1978 World Series

As the World Series celebrated its 75th Anniversary, two teams that shared many chapters in its story met for a classic rematch of East vs. West. The defending champion New York Yankees had struggled for several years on the way to recapturing their twenty-first crown while the Los Angeles Dodgers were still stinging from the previous year's defeat. Both teams boasted strong pitching staffs, top-notch sluggers and several All-Stars in their line-ups. Many experts had predicted a close, seven game Series that would be decided in the closing minutes, but things did not appear that way in Game 1. LA's Davey Lopes drove in five runs on two home runs and Dusty Baker added his own against twenty game winner Ed Figueroa and the entire New York bullpen. Tommy John got the first Series victory of his career after tossing shutout ball for six innings in the 11-5 opener. The only encouraging performance from the Yanks was the familiar play of "Mr. October" Reggie Jackson, who picked up right where he had left off in '77 with a home run and two singles.

Little changed the following day as the Dodger Stadium crowd was treated to it's second win in a row thanks to Ron Cey, who knocked in all of Los Angele's runs with a single in the fourth and a three run homer in the sixth. Rookie pitcher Bob Welch saved the 4-3 game in the ninth after Jackson took the plate with two men on base. As the count went to 3-2, Reggie, who had fouled off three two-strike pitches, swung mightily at Welch's fastball and missed. Now up two games-to-none, the National Leaguers were thinking sweep as the contest shifted to Yankee Stadium.

Game 3 promised to be a pitchers duel as both team's brought out their "big guns". Don Sutton (a fifteen game winner) started for the Dodgers against Ron Guidy (25-3, 1.74 ERA, nine shutouts) and both aces struggled despite their spectacular stats. Guidry allowed seven walks and eight hits while Sutton surrendered five runs and nine hits in 6 1/3 innings. Roy Whi...

The 1978 World Series matched the defending champion New York Yankees against the Los Angeles Dodgers in a rematch of the 1977 Series, with the Yankees winning in six games to repeat as champions.
1978 was the first of ten consecutive years that saw ten different teams win the World Series, a string unprecedented in Major League Baseball history. The Los Angeles Dodgers would break the string with a World Series win in 1988 (as they won in the 1981 World Series).
This Series had two memorable confrontations between Dodger rookie pitcher Bob Welch and the Yankees' Reggie Jackson. In Game 2, Welch struck Jackson out in the top of the ninth with two outs and the tying and go-ahead runs on base to end the game. Jackson would get his revenge in Game 6 by smashing a two-run homer off Welch in the seventh to increase the Yankees' lead from 5–2 to 7–2 and put a final "exclamation point" on the Yankees' victory.