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"You don't always make an out. Sometimes the pitcher gets you out."

With the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox tied for first in the American League East at the end of the 1978 season, the stage was set for a one-game playoff between the two rivals on October 2, 1978.

It is of course a painful memory for Sox fans. "When I hit the ball," Bucky Dent recalled, "I knew that I had hit it high enough to hit the wall. But there were shadows on the net behind the wall and I didn't see the ball land there. I didn't know I had hit a homer until I saw the umpire at first signaling home run with his hand. I couldn't believe it."

Neither could the Red Sox. Don Zimmer, then Boston's skipper, changed the Yankee shortstop's name to "Bucky F___ing Dent." Creative Red Sox fans have thought up other derogatory phrases since.

Dent's home run was the headline grabber in that one-game playoff game between the historic rivals at Fenway Park before 32,925. The Yankees were down to the Sox in the AL East by 14 games on July 19. After Billy Martin was fired as manager, Bob Lemon led the team to a 52-21 record. Losing 14 of 17 in September, the Sox made a late-season run winning their last eight games, catching the Yankees on the last day of the season.

New York's 24 game winner Ron Guidry gave up two runs to Boston through six - a home run to Carl Yastrzemski and a Jim Rice RBI single. Mike Torrez, a former Yankee, was the Boston pitcher.

Dent's home run, like the Fisk home run in 1975, overshadowed what remained of the game. Not many remember that the Red Sox still had a chance in the bottom of the ninth. But Goose Gossage got Carl Yastrzemski to pop out with 2 on and 2 out, after his teammates propelled the Sox within one run in the 8th. Not many remember that the victory in that game was earned by Ron Guidry, moving his record to 25-3.

"I had a dream as a kid," the player who was born Russell Earl O'Dey said. "I dreamed some day I would hit a home run to win something."

Red Sox nation again faced bitter disappointment. Their hero was once again the goat, and shortly after, rumors came out that suggested that Dent used a corked bat to hit the fabled home run. While the bat was never located and the accusation never proven, several individuals claimed that Dent told them he used a loaded bat. Dent has of course denied this.

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