Growing up the son of a maniacal Chicago sports lunatic (his words), I of course became one myself. My family was Chicago White Sox fans, whose run without a World Series title was only exceeded by the Crosstown Rival Cubs. In 2005, the South Side Sox had an amazing season, finishing 99-63 and clinching home field advantage in the American League Playoffs. My dad surprised my sister and I with tickets to the first two games, in Chicago. He said that this was the first World Series in his lifetime, and who knew if there’d ever be another.
Born in Chicago, moving to New York at age 1, my father ingrained in me his passion and love for our White Sox. I had never been to a White Sox game in Chicago until the 2005 World Series. After a great win in Game 1 against the NL Champion Astros, Game 2 was a matchup between the White Sox’s Mark Buehrle and the Astros’ Andy Pettitte.
Going into the bottom of the 7th inning, the Astros were leading 4-2. With the bases loaded and 2 batters out, first baseman and cleanup hitter Paul Konerko stepped up to bat. Konerko’s wife, Jennifer, gave birth to his first son, Nicholas only a few days before. Konerko stepped up and on the very first pitch, hit a Grand Slam, putting his team up 6-4.
After the formerly unhittable “El Grande” closer Bobby Jenks gave up 2 runs in the top of the 9th, Astro’s star closer Brad Lidge came in to pitch the bottom of the ninth. After getting the number nine hitter Juan Uribe out, leadoff man Scott Podsednik came to bat. Scotty Pods, as he was called, had not hit a single Home Run in the regular season, but had already hit one in the playoffs, in the ALDS against the Red Sox. On a 2-1 pitch , Podsednik made contact and launched the ball into the right center field stands, hitting only the 14th walk-off home run in World Series history.
As a 12-year old boy at the time who never really understood the futility of Chicago baseball, I could never understand the pure joy that the White Sox winning a World Series Game, much less the entire World Series, felt like. This was a city that went from 1959-1983 without a playoff team, and hadn’t had a World Series Champion since 1917. I was just a kid. My father, a lifelong White Sox fan, described the Sox winning as “Euphoric, a shock, I was waiting for the roof to fall in.”
They had their victory parade, they had their ring ceremonies, but I will never forget the entire stadium shaking when the ball left Podsednik’s bat and landed in the Right Center Field bleachers. A memory for a lifetime.
-Bennett Karoll is a Chicago White Sox fan (duh)
