By John Mesh
We lost Baseball Hall of Fame member Ryne Sandberg last Monday to metastatic prostate cancer at the age of 65.
Now, Sandberg, who played for the Philadelphia Phillies and Chicago Cubs (best known as a Cub), is an immortal. Sandberg’s No. 23 was retired and there is a Sandberg statue at Wrigley Field.
“The Sandberg Game” put Sandberg on the road to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. He was inducted in 2005.
“The Sandberg Game” was the NBC Game of the Week on Saturday, June 23, 1984, at Wrigley Field. It was a classic regional rivalry game: Chicago Cubs vs. St. Louis Cardinals. The franchises have been playing each other since 1885.
It was a day game, as were all Cubs’ home games dating back to when Wrigley Field opened in 1914. Lights and night games came to Wrigley Field in 1988 (although the first attempts at installing lights was in 1941).
Bob Costas and Tony Kubek in the TV booth. The legendary Harry Caray announced the game for the Cubs on radio. Jack Buck and Mike Shannon on TV and radio for the Cardinals.
I watched the game at my parents’ house here in Hutchinson.
The game easily could have been the “Willie McGee Game” because the St. Louis Cardinals’ center fielder hit for the cycle (three-run triple, two-run homer, RBI double, single, six runs batted in).
St. Louis built a 7-1 lead and McGee was already named NBC’s Player of the Game.
Chicago cut the lead to 9-8 and the Cardinals brought in future Hall of Fame closer Bruce Sutter, who started his career with the Cubs in the bottom of the ninth inning.
Sandberg belted a home run into the left-field bleachers to tie the game at 9-9 and sent the game to extra innings.
The Cardinals scored two runs in the top of the 10th inning to take an 11-9 lead. McGee had an RBI single and former Kansas City Royal Steve Braun drove in a run with a groundout.
Sutter stayed in the game in the bottom of the 10th inning. It was not unusual 41 years ago for closers like Sutter and Kansas City’s Dan Quisenberry to work two or three innings.
Sutter retired the first two batters to start the bottom of the 10th inning. Then he walked Chicago’s Bob Dernier. Sandberg sent another Sutter pitch into the left-field bleachers to tie the game at 11-11.
Harry Caray’s call:
“There’s a drive, way back! Might be outta here! It is! It is! He did it again! He did it again! The game is tied! The game is tied! Holy Cow! Listen to this crowd, everybody’s gone bananas!”
Bob Costas’s call of the first home run:
“Into left center field, and deep. This is a tie ball game!”
Costas and Kubek’s call of the second home run:
Costas: 1-1 pitch. [Sandberg swings]
Kubek: OHHH BOY!
Costas: [Over Kubek] And he hits it to deep left center! Look out! Do you believe it, it’s gone! We will go to the 11th, tied at 11.
The Cardinals did not score in the top of the 11th inning. The Cubs loaded the bases in the bottom of the 11th and Dave Owen singled to score Leon Durham to win the game on a walk-off.
NBC then named Sandberg and McGee Co-Players of the Game.
The “Sandberg Game” sparked the Cubs to the National League Eastern Division title and a playoff run in 1984. He was the NL MVP in 1984.
Sandberg finished his 15-year playing career with a .285 batting average, 2,386 hits, 282 homers (277 as a second baseman) and 1,061 runs batted in.
Sandberg was a 10-time NL All-Star, nine-time Gold Glove Award winner, seven-time Silver Slugger winner and led the NL in home runs in 1990 with 40. In addition to the MLB Hall of Fame, he is a Chicago Cubs’ Hall of Fame member.
He managed the Philadelphia Phillies, his first team, from 2013-2015 and posted a 119-159 record.
Sandberg’s battle with cancer ended at his home in Illinois Monday — the day after the 2025 Baseball Hall of Fame inducted its latest class. The 2025 class featured the late Dave Parker, the late Dick Allen, Billy Wagner, CC Sabathia and Ichiro Suzuki.