Baseball as we all know is a game of winners and losers. The event that <b>Jacques Barzun</b> alludes to culminated with one of the most famous events in major league baseball history, <b>Bobby Thomson's</b> so called "shot heard 'round the world." That three run "walk off" home run decided which New York National League team would face the mighty Yankees in the World Series, the Giants or the Dodgers. Unfortunately for Barzun, he was a Dodger fan. As they say, history is written by the winners, and here is the story of that event from the winner's point of view: <br><br>  In 1951, <b>Willie Mays</b> began his storied career with the Giants. He would go 0-12 before getting his first hit, a home run to left field of the Polo Grounds off <b>Warren Spahn</b> of the Boston Braves. Just like Mays, the Giants got off to a slow start that year, by April 29th, they were already 10 games below .500. It probably didn't matter, the Dodgers were running away with the season. <br><br>By August 11th, the Giants who by now had turned themselves around and had a respectable record of 59-51, were still 13.5 games behind their crosstown rivals. The next day they beat the Phillies 2-1 and went on to win the next 15 games, including sweeping two double headers on consecutive days from the Cubs. The streak would end on September 3rd, but they'd only lose four more games that month. Brooklyn by contrast at the same time was playing .500 ball. With two games left in the season, the Dodgers found themselves tied with the Giants and the best they could hope for was to win their final two games against the Phillies to force a three game series to determine the National League Champ, which they did. <br><br>In the add-on series, the Giants took game one 3-1 in Ebbets Field while the Dodgers stormed back in enemy territory taking game two, 10-0. <br><br> That left the third and deciding game to be played on October 3rd in the Polo Grounds. On the radio before the game, announcer Gordon McClendon said these prophetic words:<br><br><i>Twenty years from now, the fans will be talking about this afternoon's hero as yet unknown... and if there's a goat, his name will echo down the corridor of time.</i><br><br>The starting pitchers that day were Sal Maglie for the Giants, and Don Newcombe for the Dodgers. In the top of the eighth, with the score tied at one, the Dodgers scored three runs off Maglie and by the bottom of the ninth, with a three run lead they seemed poised to take the pennant. But it was Newcomb's turn to wear down. He was pitching on only two days rest and after giving up singles to Alvin Dark and Don Mueller, he seemed ready and willing to take himself out, but Jackie Robinson talked him into remaining in the game. After Monte Irvin popped out, Whitey Lockman doubled, driving in Dark and advancing Mueller to third. <br><br>Dodger manager Charlie Dressen went to the bullpen and brought in Ralph Branca despite his having given up several home runs that season (including the game winner of game one of the series) to the next batter, Bobby Thomson.<br><br> Now it has been well established that the Giants had set up an elaborate system of stealing signs from opposing catchers, but Bobby Thomson went to his grave denying that he knew the second offering from Branca would be a fastball high and tight. All we know is that the Giants slugging third baseman lined that pitch over the head of Andy Pafko and the extremely short left field fence of the Polo Grounds, into immortality. With one swing of the bat Thomson brought his team from being two runs down and done for the year, to being the National League Champions. That home run, perhaps the most famous in baseball, has gone down in history as &#8220;the shot heard 'round the world.&#8221; On deck at the time was Willie Mays. <br><br> After one of the greatest comebacks in Major League history, the subsequent World Series was a little bit anticlimactic aside from the fact that the opponent of the Giants was the Yankees, marking the only time when three teams from the same  city would finish in first place of their respective leagues. 1951 was truly the golden year for New York baseball. <br><br>Oh yes, I almost forgot, the Yankees won the Series in six games.