Will Rubenstein

Brooks Robinson leaps through the air toward pitcher Dave McNally, catcher Andy Etchebarren and first baseman Boog Powell on the Memorial Stadium mound on Sunday, October 9, 1966 — moments after center fielder Paul Blair caught Lou Johnson's fly ball for the final out of Game 4, the Baltimore Orioles' 1-0 victory that completed a four-game sweep of the defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers. McNally and Don Drysdale each allowed four hits in a game finished in one hour and 45 minutes, and the only run was Frank Robinson's one-out home run in the fourth inning — his second homer of the Series, both off Drysdale. The Dodgers put two men aboard in the ninth before Johnson's fly ended it: Baltimore's third consecutive shutout. Los Angeles scored two runs in the entire Series — none after the third inning of Game 1, a run of 33 straight scoreless innings, a World Series record — and batted .142 as a team. Game 1 had opened with Frank and Brooks Robinson hitting back-to-back first-inning home runs before Moe Drabowsky struck out 11 Dodgers in relief; 20-year-old Jim Palmer four-hit Los Angeles in Game 2, outpitching Sandy Koufax in what became the final game of Koufax's career; Wally Bunker's six-hit shutout won Game 3, 1-0, on Blair's home run. Frank Robinson, acquired from Cincinnati for Milt Pappas the previous winter, was named Series MVP after a Triple Crown season in which he became the first player to win the MVP award in both leagues — and before 54,458 fans, the franchise, the old St. Louis Browns in Baltimore since 1954, had the first championship in its history. ⚾ The Orioles allowed two runs in four games and finished the Series with 33 straight scoreless innings — is their 1966 pitching performance the greatest in World Series history? 👇️