It was September 18, 1989. The Cubs were leading the Mets 7-4, and Mitch Williams, who had come in to pitch mainly because he needed the work, was allowed to bat with two men on base and two out.

He hit a three-run homer to the opposite field. Yeah, it doesn’t SOUND funny, but it was hilarious. It was his first major league hit.

The Cubs nearly wound up needing all those runs, too. Leading 10-4 in the ninth, WIlliams gave up a double, a walk and a pair of RBI singles. Then, leading 10-6, he hit Howard Johnson.

The next scheduled batter was Darryl Strawberry. There was a long delay because no one was in the on-deck circle. Where was Darryl? They sent someone to the clubhouse to find him. He had started to get undressed to shower because he thought the game was over. Hurriedly dressing, he came to the plate with the bases loaded, representing the tying run.

Williams struck him out swinging to end the game. Funniest game I ever saw.

I’m sure most 30 somethings or older remember this great call:
 “There’s a high…Pop fly, Sanchez under it. He’s never dropped one of these in his life” by the great Harry Caray. Then To the surprise of anyone watching Rey Sanchez ( a very sure handed fielder) dropped the pop up. I still laugh just thinking of Steve Stone’s “He just did Harry”.

Talk about priceless

It was some weird play, and I was unfortunately succumbed to listening Hawk Harrelson’s play-by-play. It was a type of double steal, he thought the man on 2nd was supposed to be out (I’m pretty sure it was Cedeno), but no one was called out. This led to Harrelson screaming to the high heavens “THIS IS WRONG. THIS IS JUST WRONG. THIS MAKES NO SENSE. THESE OFFICIALS ARE STUPID. I CANT BELIEVE THIS.”

If anyone has a video to that sequence, lest knows what I’m talking about, I’d appreciate it alot. It used to be on youtube, but it was deleted.

It was when Larry Biittner dove for a ball and his hat came off and the ball rolled into his hat and the hat flipped so he could not find the ball. I remember being at the game in the bleachers and yelling at Biittner while he was looking for the ball. He finally did find the ball and if I remember correctly, he actually thru the batter out at 3rd base.

Kasey

Dascenzo was in left (I think it was Dougie) and he tripped over the pitchers mound trying to get a foul ball that landed in the stands. He was laughing so hard he had trouble getting up. A group of people in the area yelled "HES FALLEN AND HE CAN’T GET UP!

..and Mark DeRosa’s reaction to it. Priceless.

It wasn’t funny at the time, but I think I’ll find it amusing in about fifty years – Latroy Hawkins throwing to first and having the ball bounce off the batter’s head and roll away to allow the game winning run to score.
I believe it was 2004 late in the season against the Phillies – again, I didn’t think so at the time, but the Cubs found such comical ways to lose games that month that it could be a movie script.

The funniest play I ever saw in a pro game had Cubs context.

I was at a Schaumburg Flyers game and Brant Brown was playing first. Late in the game, with a runner on third, the batter hit a high popfly to Brown. You could tell that the crowd knew their baseball, because I heard four or five people jokingly cry out, “Oh Nooooo! He dropped the ball.”

So, as if on cue, he dropped the ball. I don’t remember the exact game situation or who won, but the run scored in a close contest, and I just remember thinking, this guy needs to go play in Japan or Antarctica where no one’s ever heard that Santo call.

If it had been any other player, it wouldn’t have been funny, but being Brant Brown made it perfect.

…that I always get a kick out of is when a ball is hit into the ivy and causes a previously hidden ball to emerge. Now there are two or more balls, and the outfielder isn’t certain which one is the game ball.

I always liked the games when Dascezno would pitch. And when Les Lancaster moved to left field for a batter while Paul Assenmacher came in.

I think this may have happened during Willie Stargell’s last season when he weighed about 275. He tried to steal second, possibly on a botched hit and run, and the throw beat him by about thirty feet. He stopped about ten feet from the bag, looked at the umpire, and gave him the timeout sign. It was hilarious!

The Larry Biittner “hat trick” play is also one of my favorites.

but I was fortunate enough to be at the Red Sox-Orioles game in 2004 where Manny Ramirez cut off a throw from center field, allowing David Newhan an inside-the-park homerun.

Newhan hit a liner to the Monster in center, and Manny cut off Johnny Damon’s throw – diving to do so in the process.

I think everyone in Fenway wondered if they’d really seen that play correctly.

jumping down to all fours to blow a bunt foul as trickled down the 3rd base line fair.

Vince Coleman tore the entire rear end out of his pants on a slide into 3rd at Wrigley in ’85 or ’86 one time…..he gave literal meaning to the term—“showng your butt”

in game 2 of the playoffs. Looking at retrosheet his name was Michael Tejera. In the bottom of the 8th with Cubs up 12-4 and ON THE FIRST pitch he somehow got so disoriented , HE THREW THE BALL DIRECTLY INTO THE MARLINS DUGOUT on the first base side of course. He did not stumble or anything and all anyone on both teams could do was laugh themselves silly. It does not of course show up in the box score as anything more than a ball but it was insane. Kasey had a link to it but I don’t know if MLB has taken it down as they try to do with all youtube game clips.

(and I apologize for not remembering when) where one of our outfielders threw the ball in, missed the cutoff man, and it skipped past the entire infield before Soto (?) finally stopped it in foul territory. Watching five professional ballplayers go after this lazy dribbling throw and all miss was like something out of a Tex Avery cartoon.

Great thread idea, and a good excuse for me to look up what turns out to have been a game on Friday, April 25, 1980 – Cubs hosting the world champeen Pirates. Dave Kingman was in left, and my friends and I (part of a crowd of 7714) were right behind him, a couple of rows up in the bleachers and over towards the line.

In the second inning, Willie Stargell came up; 40 years old and WAY beyond his official weight of 188 pounds, and never a speedy guy even in his prime. But he poked a ground ball single into left, and went chugging down to first.

Kingman trotted up to the ball and got ahold of it, and then….well….kind of stood there. He pumped once but didn’t throw….pumped again but didn’t throw….even as everyone in the bleachers was suggesting that he do so.

From our angle we had the play completely in front of us, and we saw Stargell make the turn at first. I swear I remember seeing his eyes light up as he realized what was going on, and without hesitating a moment, he just kept lumbering majestically towards second.

Kingman eventually chucked the ball in to second, but Stargell was already dusting himself off by the time it arrived, having legged a routine single into a double for perhaps the first time in his outstanding career.

This was back in the day when expectations were low, so the mood in the bleachers was pretty hilarious. And Kingman was (almost) forgiven when he homered into our section in the 8th to cement a 5-3 Cub win.

Fun day at the park.

It’s a visual…I won’t post the image directly because its pretty large.

What’s wrong with this picture?

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/130/407441059_5bc26b64e5_b.jpg

asking for timeout from the homeplate ump, as he steps away from the plate. The ump is obviously cheesed with him, because he doesn’t grant time.

Hill realizes it as the pitcher is throwing to the plate, and in one motion jumps back into the box and hits a single to right center field. Hilarious! Not sure when it was, I think it was a game in Florida for some reason.

This home game against the Dodgers in late 2006. A comedy of errors it was. (The game, I mean, not the season. No, wait, the season, too). Freddie “Boom-Boom” Bynum (batting second and playing second base!) got a hat trick of E’s with three. Jacque Jones – check. Cesar “Grabby Hands” Izturis – check. Derrek Lee – yes, DLee! – check.

The contest was tied in the bottom half of the 11th when Izturis hit (what else?) a slow roller up the middle and pinch runner (and now vanished Cubs pitching prospect) Juan Mateo hobbled/stumbled home to score the winning run, hurdling Russel Martin’s outstretched leg like a lame horse.

Quoth Dusty, “Sheesh! We made a week’s worth of errors in one game.” (OK, I added the sheesh.) Check out the video clip with Len and Bob’s call here and the full game recap here.

In a game at Montreal on September 25, 1989, Dawson hit a flyball into the gap in left-center. Dave Martinez, playing center, made a very nice diving catch but hurt himself on the play. He caught the ball cleanly but let it drop out of his glove a few seconds later, while he was lying on the ground. The rule says that any release of the ball after a catch has to be “voluntary and intentional” and the umpires gave Dawson the benefit of the doubt – he kept running and got an inside the park home run.

Basically, everybody on the field was confused except, I guess, the umpires. The Expos thought it was a catch, and they didn’t try to get the ball back in. Dawson kept moving but he was jogging, looking around with a confused expression, wondering why nobody had called him out.

The Cubs lost that game but clinched the division the next night. I always remember this play as one of the strangest I’ve ever seen because, in my old VHS recording of the clincher, Harry and Steve discuss the Dawson home run a lot and show the replay of it at least once. Martinez missed the last few games of that season but I don’t think that it was a major injury. I feel kinda bad, laughing after a player got hurt, but the resulting mass confusion was pretty humorous.

I wonder if anybody remembers the game?

Joe West, in my opinion, is one of the worst umpires I have ever seen. On this one particular day, his strike zone was horrible and he was calling poor pitches strikes. Well, him and Andre Dawson got into and arguement and West threw Dawson from the game.

Well, instead of things naturally ending, West got this big fat grin on his face about everything Andre Dawson said. Hawk went nuts, went into the dugout, and then proceeded to throw a ton of bats, coolers, etc onto the field. I remember the cameras showing West with that big dumb hick grin on his face the whole time.

At the time of it, I was so mad and thought it was wrong for West to egg it on…. over time though, I just kinda look back with a smile because I have never seen Andre sooo mad…

A little pre-context: I’m not an anti-white sox fan, but I hate their fans. Really, the sox are just another team and yes it’s nice to beat the other team from Chicago, it’s not a HUGE deal for me. But their fans are atrocious and rude and I haven’t come across one, who upon finding out I was a diehard Cubs fan, didn’t look at me like i was doing drugs. There was an ad a few years ago on tv that was for season tickets (this was pre world series for them) and they had text like an instant messenger conversation in blue for the cubs and black for the sox. It said “They: Believe they are cursed. We: Believe them”. and just went on like this. That’s not what sports are about. Yes, you can root against other teams and etc, but it’s reached a new level with sox fans.

I guess the play itself wasn’t great but the context is. Cubs-Sox game at Wrigley, the one with the 9 run fourth inning. I’m with my friend who is a Sox fan, and pretty much the entire row behind me is loyal to the south side. I was shocked and disappointed at that fact. But anyways, Edmonds had just hit a homer to deep left and the crowd was back in the game a little after Marquis had let the score come to 4-1. So it’s now 4-2 and Fontenot steps up. My friend, who is furious that Contreras has given up a home run, turns to me and says “Who is this guy?” and I reply “Oh, it’s Mike Fontenot. He’s a good middle infielder, he can play a few positions, but doesn’t have much pop. Heh, he probably hasn’t hit a home run since little league!” and my friend smiles we return to watching the game. And wouldn’t you know it, on the first freaking pitch, he hits a bomb to left and I couldnt’ even watch the whole thing, I was bent over in laughter and my friend just stood up and started screaming and buried his head in his hands

Cubs v. Braves. Tie game bottom of 9th. I wish I could remember which player got the hit and which player was the baserunner, but I’ll work from vague memory.

Scott Thompson gets on first base for the Cubs, don’t recall if he got a hit or BB or what? Dave Kingman hits a single to Braves LF Jeff Burroughs, who could give Kingman a run for his money in a contest to determine who was the worst left fielder in MLB, Burroughs was over weight and he barely bent down for this easy ball hit right to him. It rolls between his legs and he faces the ultimate embarrassment for an outfielder of having to turn his back and waddle after the ball. It rolled to the wall and Thompson scores from 1B. Cubs win and the place goes crazy. This would be even funnier had Kingman scored from first, but I can’t remember anymore. I’ll look it up.

that was played during a torrential downpour. Nobody could figure out why it hadn’t been called and there was a particular flyball that had Alou running in and to his right before SHARPLY TURNING to his left, slipping and sliding face first as the ball lands. Moises had a look on his face that practically screamed, “Can we PLEASE call this thing?” Priceless.

Last year, Berkman’s sprint into the dugout when the lightning struck, and the Cubs’ dugout’s ensuing laughter, was pretty great.

Sunday, July 4th, 2004. Cubs vs. White Sox. Bottom of the ninth, 2 outs. Walk off Walk by Todd Walker. SWEEP!

My favorite all-time Cub play. Funny because Hector was . . . corpulent.