If you ask the typical baseball fan nowadays what their favourite season is, many will answer 2011 without thinking. That year saw one of the most thrilling final days in MLB history, with Tampa Bay and Boston duking it out for one wild card spot while St Louis scrambled past Atlanta for the other one. The Cardinals carried their hard-earned spot all the way to the World Series, where they came back from a 3-2 deficit to top the Rangers in dramatic fashion.

But stepping into the past reveals a treasury of forgotten seasons capable of vying with 2011 for that ultimate crown. 1991 saw two worst-to-first runs that culminated in the Blue Jays beating the Braves in a ten-inning, one-run Game 7. 1941 had the last season over .400 and the unbeatable 56-game hitting streak of Joe Dimaggio. Even in the far-distant past, 1908 stands out as a year in which the Cubs bested the Giants and Pirates in a three-way pennant tussle that came down to a replayed tie that might not have been a tie at all.

But even when these hidden gems are examined, one season is often forgotten, despite having everything you could ask for. Two divisions went down to the final game, the other two to the final week; the World Series, nicknamed the Suds Series, went to seven games and finished dramatically; two ancient rivals eliminated each other in the last weekend; Rickey Henderson stole his 130 bases; and on and on and on. It was a supercharged season, filled to the brim with spectacle and tension, heroism and tragedy, from its first day to its last.

This is the story of 1982.

The season before 1982 had been a strike-shortened mess. Faced with a mid-season shutdown, MLB took the extremely rational step of splitting the season in twain, then pitting the victors of the two halves against one another. This had the unintended effect of knocking the best team in the NL East, the Cardinals, and in the NL West, the Reds, out of the postseason entirely, as several other teams got hot in one half and cold in the other.

The ridiculous format, though, didn’t help the moribund Atlanta Braves one bit. Atlanta hadn’t finished in the top half of its division since 1974, and they hadn’t won the West since the first year the West was a thing, in 1969. The 50-56 Braves managed to split their games perfectly, never going on anything like a streak and dropping under .500 in both halves of the season.

After yet another lifeless season, the Braves fired their manager of four years, Bobby Cox. (Cox would later return to manage the Braves through the longest division pennant streak in baseball history.) They then hired Joe Torre, whose winning percentage as the Mets’ manager was nearly fifty percentage points lower than Cox’s had been in Atlanta.

The rebuild was genuinely on for Atlanta, after years of trying helplessly to join the top teams. The Braves had given up on their dreams of contending—or so it seemed until they won their first thirteen in a row, still tied for the longest winning streak to open a season. Imbued with new life and led by heroic centerfielder Dale Murphy, the Braves were then faced with a following five-game losing streak, leading to a low ebb at 27-20 by May’s end. Atlanta was in a 1-6 rut and were just 1.5 games in front of the chasing Padres, with the Dodgers not far behind. (The Giants had gotten off to a terrible start, at just 21-29, but they were headed for a hot streak of their own.)

At this point, the Braves suddenly started winning again, going 24-13 from June 1 to the All-Star Break, clinging to a narrow lead to the break and through it. A 9-4 run out of the gate broke the tension somewhat, as Atlanta’s lead stretched from two games to nine, and the division started to look secure. The Braves roared into a long stretch of games against their chief division rivals, the Padres, Dodgers, and Giants, with a hefty lead, but the competition had the perfect opportunity to catch up.

As July faded into August, the Braves’ lead got more ramshackle with every passing day. From that 61-37 peak, Atlanta went an atrocious 1-15 against mostly divisional competition, with an eleven-game losing streak capping a terrible run that dragged them from nine games ahead to 2.5 behind. The division looked a far sight a few days later, as the Dodgers took a four-game lead on August 18. The Braves, four games back, were closely followed by the struggling Padres and the storming Giants, 21-12 since the All-Star Break. The West was going down to the wire.

It was also, at that moment, the biggest divisional lead in baseball.

The Braves yet again mustered their forces and cut off a four-game losing streak by winning six in a row, including two walk-off victories before raucous home crowds. The first, a 2-1 triumph in 10 innings that saw the Mets briefly take a 1-0 lead before Atlanta erased it, was arguably the turnaround moment of the season, as little-known Terry Harper, a career -0.6 WAR player, sent a run home on a two-out throwing error by the Mets’ third baseman. The Mets loaded the bases, then watched as Pat Zachry walked Dale Murphy and sent the winning run home.

Just a few days later, the Braves won in another walk-off, their winning streak hitting five games as Chris Chambliss knocked a double to right field to bring the Braves level with the Dodgers for the division lead, just five days after sitting four games back as Los Angeles lost four games out of five.

The remained of the season was hard-knuckled fighting. After pulling into that tie, Atlanta won eight of their next ten, but the Dodgers had woken up and went 5-4 themselves to keep the Braves honest. Atlanta then helped them out with that, dropping four straight to briefly cede the division lead before walking off the Dodgers in the thriller of the season, a back-and-forth 12-11 game that went ten innings and ended in a Dale Murphy single that sent the Braves back in front of the race.

The drama was intense. The Houston Astros, who would finish 77-85, somehow swept the Braves, knocking them out of the NL West lead and into a 2.5-game deficit. After taking two-of-three from the Reds, the Astros showed up again and ran it back, this time dropping the Braves three games back with 10 to play.

For the last time, fire came into the Braves’ soul. They eliminated the Padres by winning two of three, then took two games from the Giants to scramble into first place as the Dodgers lost two to the Reds. The season would end with a Dodgers-Braves showdown, followed by Braves-Padres and Giants-Dodgers. With those games left to play, the September 28 standings were: Braves in the lead, Dodgers one game back, Giants two games back. Everything was coming together for a photo finish.

The Braves took the first game of their series with LA, winning 4-3 in a classic that went to twelve innings. The Braves took a 4-2 lead in the top of the twelfth and were headed for victory when the Dodgers started to come back. Ken Landreaux and Dusty Baker hit singles to put men on the corners, and Pedro Guerrero came to the plate with the world on his shoulders.

Guerrero was then a fledgling hero, with only one of his five All-Star appearances under his belt, but with a .304 batting average, he was headed for his one and only Silver Slugger award. Over the season, he would knock 64 extra-base hits to just seven double plays. And with no outs and two men on, the Braves desperately needed a double play to win.

They got it. Guerrero slammed a hit—right to shortstop Rafael Ramirez, who relayed the ball in swift succession to Glenn Hubbard, then to Chris Chambliss for two outs (Baker and Guerrero) to the sole run taken home by Landreaux. The bases were cleared and the fire was put out, and Gene Garber closed his fourth inning and the game with a humble flyout from Steve Garvey. The Braves had won and took a two-game division lead for the first time since September 4.

Atlanta would lose the following night to set up a critical cross-country finish. As the Braves, one game clear of the Dodgers and the Giants, looked to hold off fourth-place San Diego, LA and San Francisco would take each other on in the classic rivalry duel.

Both Atlanta and Los Angeles won the first two games of their series, maintaining the Braves’ one-game advantage, and San Francisco was eliminated by their longtime foe. On the last day of the season, October 3, the Braves held serve, with the chance to win the pennant against the Padres. But San Diego sent five runs home in the fifth inning on three singles, a walk, a triple, and a sac fly, and though the Braves loaded the bases in the top of the seventh with one out, Padres pitcher Dave Dravecky came in and sent them down to seal the victory.

That sent the pennant chase across California to San Francisco, where the Giants and Dodgers were to wrap up their series. Now just half a game ahead, the Braves retired to the clubhouse and watched nervously.

The Dodgers’ Ron Cey opened the scoring in the top of the second with a two-run home run to left field, scoring Rick Monday and giving LA a 70% win probability there and then. But the Giants elucidated sighs of relief in the bottom half of the inning with a small-ball pair of runs to tie things up, earned by a single, a double, two walks, and a run-scoring double play.

With the exception of a brief flurry of hitting in the bottom of the third, both teams then rested for a bit, like two boxers retiring to their corners and circling to recoup their energy. From the fourth through sixth innings, neither side made a hit.

The teams came back to life in the seventh inning. In the top half, Rick Monday, Ron Cey, and Jose Morales hit singles to load the bases with one out—whereupon Giants pitcher Greg Minton, called in suddenly to deal with the damage after fireman Gary Lavelle lasted all of one at-bat, forced a strikeout and a groundout to hold Los Angeles.

It was in the bottom of the seventh that the critical moments of the game occurred. Though Fernando Valenzuela had been pitching beautifully for the Dodgers, having set down ten men in a row, Tommy Lasorda had brought in Jorge Orta in the top of the seventh, requiring Tom Niedenfuer to take Valenzuela’s place on the mound—Niedenfuer, whose 2.71 ERA that year simply sparkled. But Niedenfuer ceded a single to Bob Brenly and a double to Champ Summers, and with two men in scoring position in a tie game, Lasorda threw Terry Forster in after Niedenfuer struck out reliever Greg Minton.

With Giants on second and third and the season on the line, Forster coolly struck out Jim Wohlford, and the rally seemed over. Then Joe Morgan strode to the plate.

Morgan had already compiled a Hall of Fame career, with one of the best careers of the 1960s and 70s. But after reaching eight straight All-Star games with the Reds, the aging Morgan had taken his talents to San Francisco to ill effect. Morgan had already begun to struggle in his last years in Cincinnati, hitting just .236 in 1978, and before 1982 had seemed almost washed-up, without a batting average over .250 since 1977. The magical season had been a renaissance campaign for the second baseman, though, as he’d hit .289 and would later earn a Silver Slugger award to go with a handful of MVP votes for the first time since he’d won the crown in 1976.

Now Morgan was at bat with the voices of millions of Giants fans and millions more Braves fans cheering him on. But Morgan had only walked once and made outs the next two times. He’d hit just 13 home runs that year, a paltry 2.4% of his plate appearances. Could he be counted on to save the game?

The whole NL West race, the ridiculous three-cornered struggle for the pennant, was coming down to this one chance, two men on, two men out, a superhero at the plate trying to cap a redeeming year with one last glorious moment.

He got it.

Morgan sent Forster’s fastball to deep right field for his fourteenth home run, a three-run dinger that practically knocked the Dodgers out of the playoffs. As the crowd roared, Tommy Lasorda bowed his head in LA’s dugout. The season was over. The Braves had won, though they hadn’t won at all.

The Dodgers made a slight effort in the top of the eighth, sending Ken Landreaux home and bringing the tying run to the plate before Greg Minton held them off. Two groundouts and a strikeout in the ninth, and the Giants had knocked their historic rival out of the playoffs on the very last day of the year.

The Braves were eliminated by the Cardinals without much drama in the NLCS that year. Atlanta nearly won the second game of St Louis’s three-game sweep, going up 3-2 before ceding a tying run in the bottom of the eighth and a walk-off single in the bottom of the ninth.

But the Series-bound Cardinals’ easy victory didn’t matter much. The Braves had lifted themselves from the cellar and won the West for just the second time in franchise history. What was more, it had happened in one of the most thrilling division finishes ever.

And the Braves, once a franchise on the move, were finally settling down in Atlanta. Their swift departure from Milwaukee, where they stayed just 13 seasons, was evidence that the management would be happy to kick them out of Atlanta and send them to yet another home if the city didn’t take to their brand of baseball.

But Atlanta was beginning to care. The Braves’ seventeenth season in the South was a fruitful one, as they topped the league average in attendance, surpassing 1,000,000 fans for the first time since 1971 and setting an Atlanta baseball season attendance record that they would break the following season. The Braves were there to stay, and though the 1980s would be rough for the team, Atlanta had fallen in love with baseball for good.

Part 2: California 🢂