The One That Left Yankee Stadium

He isn't the only one who thought it was fair.

Frank Howard hit a ball out of Yankee Stadium. That part is not in dispute. It was ruled foul, and Bobby Murcer, a Yankee, standing in the outfield in pinstripes with nothing to gain by saying so, went on the record afterward saying it was fair.

Understand what that means. In 85 years, nobody ever hit a fair ball out of the old Yankee Stadium. Not Ruth. Not Gehrig. Not DiMaggio. Mantle got closest, twice, and both times the ball slammed into the copper facade below the roof and dropped back onto the field. Fans used to walk into that ballpark and point up at the spot. That was the ceiling of what was possible, and it stood for as long as the building did.

Howard was 6-foot-7 and something like 275 pounds. They called him the Washington Monument and the Capital Punisher, and in 1970 he led the American League in home runs, RBIs, and walks, because pitchers had run out of ideas. At RFK, the Senators painted the seats white where his home runs landed so people could look up and see how far a baseball could go.

An umpire's arm went up and the record book stayed closed. But a man in the stands and a Yankee in the outfield both saw the same thing, and neither of them ever let it go.