Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, October 24, 1993 TAG: 9310240191
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: TORONTO LENGTH: Long
Carter connected with one out and made the Blue Jays the first team to repeat as World Series champion since the 1978 New York Yankees. His line drive over the left-field wall came after Williams walked leadoff batter Rickey Henderson and gave up a one-out single to Paul Molitor, the Series' Most Valuable Player.
"It was a slider down and in. It was the same pitch I swung and missed," Carter said. "I choked up and I stayed down on it and tried to make contact.
"I told my wife when I came to the park today that something special would happen today. When they didn't score, I said to myself I would drive in the winning run."
Carter and Bill Mazeroski are the only players to finish the World Series with homers. Mazeroski's solo shot in 1960 broke a 9-9 tie in Game 7 and lifted Pittsburgh over the Yankees. Never before had the Series ended on a home run that rallied the losing team to victory.
Lenny Dykstra's fourth home run of the Series and sixth in the postseason sparked a five-run rally - four off starter Dave Stewart - that helped put Philadelphia ahead 6-5 in the seventh inning. Phillies reliever Larry Andersen escaped a bases-loaded, two-out jam in the eighth, but Williams again blew it.
Williams, the losing pitcher in a 15-14 defeat in Game 4 that put the Phillies in a 3-1 hole, walked Henderson on four pitches. He retired Devon White on a fly ball, then lost control of the game.
"He's the guy who got us this far," said Jim Fregosi, the Phillies' manager. "I'm not going to change now."
Duane Ward pitched one inning to pick up the victory. It was the third consecutive year the American League won the World Series and gave it a 53-37 overall edge.
The 1993 Blue Jays were the fourth team that played its home games in a domed stadium to reach the Series, and all four have won. The others were Toronto in '92 and Minnesota in '91 and '87.
"This is the topping on the cake," said Cito Gaston, the Blue Jays' manager. "I'm happy for Joe and I'm so happy for Molitor. He played his heart out all year."
The Blue Jays won with a team that lost 12 of its players in the off-season. Dave Winfield and David Cone were among five starters for Toronto when it won Game 6 in Atlanta last season who no longer are with the club. Toronto general manager Pat Gillick has said he expects to turn over about one-fourth of the team this off-season, with Henderson and injured pitcher Jack Morris the most likely to go.
Molitor and Stewart were Gillick's prime free-agent signees during the winter, and both paid big dividends. Stewart was MVP of the AL Championship Series with two victories; and Molitor, who left Milwaukee after 15 years to go to Toronto in search of his first championship, went 12-for-24 in the Series. He hit a solo homer and a run-scoring triple and a single in the finale and scored three times.
"When I chose to come to Toronto, it was a difficult choice," Molitor said. "Once it was made, I had the vision of Toronto becoming the first team in 15 years to win back-to-back titles."
Carter has driven in 100 runs in seven of the past eight years. He got another RBI with a sacrifice fly in the first inning but had been hitless in seven at-bats before his second home run of the Series. Carter jumped for joy around the bases while his teammates streamed from the dugout and left-field bullpen to greet him at the plate.
Fireworks were set off inside SkyDome, and 10 minutes after the game ended several Toronto players came back on the field, squirting champagne into the crowd.
The Phillies, who came back from a 2-1 deficit to beat Atlanta in the NLCS, had two hits off Stewart when they entered the seventh trailing 5-1. After several innings of swinging early in the count, however, they began to display the patience at the plate that has served them well all season.
Kevin Stocker battled for a 10-pitch walk leading off, and Mickey Morandini singled. That brought up Dykstra, and he lined a drive into the right-field seats for his sixth home run of this postseason and 10th of his career, most among active players.
That made it 5-4 and finished Stewart, but not the Phillies. Mariano Duncan greeted Danny Cox with a single and stole second, and scored the tying run on Dave Hollins' single. A walk to Darren Daulton and a chop single by Jim Eisenreich loaded the bases.
Pete Incaviglia, who had not played since Game 3, batted for Milt Thompson and hit the first pitch from Al Leiter to center for a sacrifice fly and a 6-5 lead.
The Blue Jays started the game as if they would wrap up the Series easily.
White walked with one out in the bottom of the first and Molitor tripled to the base of the right-center field wall. Carter followed with a high drive to left that stayed in the park for a sacrifice fly.
With two out and none on, the quick-strike Blue Jays were not finished. John Olerud lined a double to left-center and Roberto Alomar hit an RBI single up the middle, raising his arm in triumph as he left the batter's box.
Philadelphia broke through in the fourth when Daulton doubled with two out for the team's first hit and scored on a single by Eisenreich. Last week, it was Eisenreich's three-run homer that sent Stewart to defeat.
Toronto took a 4-1 lead in its fourth on a leadoff double by Alomar, a groundout and Ed Sprague's sacrifice fly - the Blue Jays' seventh in the Series.
The Phillies got a big chance in the fifth, and Stewart and the Blue Jays gave it to them. Trailing 4-1, Morandini reached on an error by Alomar at second base with one out and Duncan reached on a two-out error by third baseman Sprague, who had been benched in Philadelphia to make room for Molitor.
John Kruk got ahead in the count and walked on a 3-2 pitch, bringing up Hollins with the bases loaded. But Hollins swung at the first pitch and hit a routine grounder to Olerud at first.
Molitor made it 5-1 by homering with one out in the fifth. His line drive over the left-field wall made the chants of "MVP! MVP!" even louder, though, true to his form, he circled the bases without celebration or fanfare.
Before the Series started, Molitor said the Blue Jays had just as much fun winning as the rough-and-tumble Phillies, only that they were a more business-like bunch.
"I bet we have more cellular phones than they do," he said.
He was right, the Blue Jays do. Now they also have more world championships.
\ see microfilm for box score
by CNB