1982 American League Championship Series

The 1982 American League Championship Series was a best-of-five playoff semifinal postseason series in Major League Baseball’s 1982 postseason between the Milwaukee Brewers and the California Angels for the American League (AL) pennant and the right to play in the 1982 World Series. The 14th ALCS in league history, it began on October 5 and concluded on October 10. The Brewers overcame a two-games-to-none series deficit to defeat the Angels in five games, advancing to the World Series for the first time in franchise history.

This was the first ALCS not to feature either the Oakland Athletics, Baltimore Orioles, or New York Yankees. This ALCS was marked by a dramatic comeback by the Brewers, who lost the first two games of the series and were trailing late in the final game, and the series was the first League Championship Series where the home team won every game.

The series was noteworthy as being the first to feature a matchup between two "expansion" teams (i.e., franchises not included among the 16 operating in the major leagues for most of the first half of the 20th century), for featuring two teams that had never before won a pennant, and for being the first time a team came from a 2–0 deficit to win the series.

This was the only time the Brewers won a league pennant until 2026.

Background

The American League East race would come down to a winner-take-all game against the Milwaukee Brewers and Baltimore Orioles. A game where both teams were tied for 1st on the last game of the regular season had happened only once before in baseball history — the 1949 American League race between the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees. The 1982 Game 162 were to be pitched by future Hall of Famers, Don Sutton and the Orioles’ Jim Palmer. Adding more drama was that it was Baltimore's legendary manager Earl Weaver's last game, who already announced this would be his last season (Weaver would later come out of retirement to manage the Orioles from 1985 to 1986). The race was also significant because the Brewers and Orioles had high expectations coming into the season, but both teams got off to dreadful starts and were given up on midway through the season. To get to this point, Baltimore, who were eight games back of Milwaukee and Boston in mid-August, won the first three games of the four-game series. Baltimore fans even brought brooms to Memorial Stadium, anticipating the final scene of one the greatest comebacks in MLB history.

In the first inning, Robin Yount, the AL MVP for the season in 1982, took a solo home run the other way against Jim Palmer. Yount homered to center in the third, and in the eighth inning he tripled and scored. The Brewers clung to a 5–1 lead with Sutton pitching well.

Sutton then walked two batters and gave up a hit in the bottom of the eighth, to cut the lead to 5–2. Joe Nolan came up to pinch hit with two outs and runners on the corners. Nolan laced a low line drive into the left field corner. It looked certain to score two more runs. Instead, left fielder Ben Oglivie went sliding feet first and made the catch, as his legs rolled up the wall that was on the right on top of the foul line. The rally was turned back around, and the Brewers scored five times in the top of the ninth, giving the Brewers a 10–2 win and a hard-fought AL East title.

Awaiting the Brewers in the ALCS was the California Angels, who were built on Gene Autry's plan to acquire veterans with winning pedigrees. They had traded for Bob Boone, a catcher from the 1980 champion Philadelphia Phillies; Tim Foli, a shortstop on the World Series winning 1979 Pirates; Doug DeCinces, a longtime Orioles' third baseman who won a pennant in 1979; All-Star left fielder Fred Lynn came over in a trade in 1981, who nearly won a World Series in 1975 with the Red Sox; and most importantly, big ticket free-agent signee Reggie Jackson, a 5x World Champion and 2x World Series MVP winner. Coincidentally, all the recent acquisitions but Jackson grew up in Southern California.

These new additions joined an everyday lineup. Rod Carew was now 36-years-old at first base, and hit .319 in 1982; Brian Downing hit 28 home runs, playing left field and batting leadoff. Bobby Grich, the second baseman, hit a .261/.371/.449; and Don Baylor, the DH, hit 24 home runs and drove in 98 runs. Grich and Baylor were also former Orioles, who Autry had signed through free agency in 1977.

While not as close as the AL East race, the AL West would come down to the 2nd to last day of the season, with the Angels holding off the Kansas City Royals.

Summary

Game summaries

Composite box

1982 ALCS (3–2): Milwaukee Brewers over California Angels

Aftermath

1982 would not be the closest the Angels came to winning a pennant in the 1980s. In 1986, the Angels were up 3–1 in the AL Championship Series, leading 5–2 in ninth inning, reaching within one strike of their first-ever AL pennant. Dave Henderson of the opposing Red Sox caught hold of a Donnie Moore forkball and launched a home run into the left field seats to give the Red Sox a momentary, 6–5 lead on the top of the ninth inning in a game the Red Sox would go on to win the game 7–6 in eleven innings; the Angels went down lifelessly in the following two games as the Red Sox completed the 3–1 series comeback. It would not be until 2002 when the Angels won their first pennant, on their way to their first World Series in franchise history.

This was the Milwaukee Brewers first and only American League pennant, as they moved to the National League in 1998. The Brewers would not win a pennant in the National League until 2026.

References

External links

• 1982 ALCS at Baseball-reference