Baseball's Best Night Ever
How the 2011 Wild Card Race Produced the Greatest Finish in MLB History
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Pub Date May 18 2027 | Archive Date Feb 1 2027
Globe Pequot | Lyons Press
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Description
The Atlanta Braves held an eight-game lead in the Wild Card standings to begin the final four weeks of the season, only to watch the Cardinals storm back and pull even before the final night of the regular season. In the American League, the Red Sox held a nine-game lead in September, a lead that was never before relinquished in the history of the sport, before the Rays rallied to tie them heading into September 28. It was a baseball fan's dream, but even the most creative and big-dreaming fanatics could not have imagined just how the playoff fates for each team would be determined. A 13-inning thriller in Atlanta led to the Braves completing their collapse and allowing the Cardinals to sneak into the postseason, while the Red Sox coughed up a lead with two outs in the ninth inning just moments before the Rays beat the Yankees on a walk-off home run in the 12th inning.
Baseball's Best Night Ever provides an in-depth look at the figures behind the wildest night our nation's pastime has ever seen, and the improbable heroes that etched their names into baseball history. There was Dan Johnson, who spent the previous season in Japan and hadn't logged a hit since April before hitting a game-tying home run for the Rays in the bottom of the ninth. Robert Andino, a fringe major leaguer, hit a walk-off single for the Orioles, the second game-winning hit he recorded against All-Star Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon in the span of one week. There were pitchers who faked their name and age to get to the majors. There were stars like Carl Crawford, who left the Rays for the Red Sox, only to help his former team complete a miracle (in more ways than one, thanks to his part in the left field wall at Tampa's Tropicana Field being lowered years before to eventually allow Evan Longoria's game-winning homer in the 12th clear the fence). The intersecting of narratives and career paths that led to the clashing of clutch hits and agonizing gaffes happening at once makes for a perfect story—one that has yet to be the subject of a book.
[INCLUDES 20 B&W PHOTOGRAPHS]
Marketing Plan
Positioning Statement:
On September 28, 2011, Major League Baseball produced the single greatest night of regular-season drama the sport has ever seen — two historic September collapses, decided in the final innings, unfolding simultaneously across four ballparks in four cities. Baseball's Best Night Ever, by longtime WFAN sports writer Ryan Chichester, is the definitive account of the night the Atlanta Braves blew a season-long Wild Card lead to the St. Louis Cardinals and the Boston Red Sox surrendered their own historic September lead to the Tampa Bay Rays — capped by Evan Longoria's walk-off home run just minutes after Boston's bullpen collapse. Chichester traces the improbable chain of characters — journeyman slugger Dan Johnson, fringe infielder Robert Andino, a lowered outfield wall, and a shaky Red Sox bullpen — whose intersecting fates turned one night into the sport's defining modern classic, arriving as the first full-length book treatment of the story.
Market
Market Opportunity and Audience:
Perfect for readers of The Best Game Ever (Mark Bowden), Moneyball (Michael Lewis), The Boys of Summer (Roger Kahn), and other character-driven, single-game or single-season baseball narratives
The Braves entered September 2011 with an 8.5-game Wild Card lead and finished the month 9-18; the Red Sox held a 9-game AL Wild Card lead on September 3 — at the time, the largest such lead ever surrendered in MLB history. Both collapses resolved in the same 4-hour window on the same night.
Widely cited by broadcasters, journalists, and MLB itself as the greatest night in regular-season baseball history, with four winner-take-all finishes decided within minutes of one another across ESPN, MLB Network, and regional broadcasts
September 28, 2011 fell early in the Twitter (X) / second-screen era and MLB Network's build-out, making it one of the first sports events fans nationwide experienced together in real time across a live, multi-game feed — a format that is now standard practice in sports media
MLB's current expanded Wild Card format (three Wild Card teams per league since 2022) traces directly back to the drama of this single night, giving the book a clear throughline to how the sport's postseason works today
Built-in regional fan bases with a direct rooting stake in the story: Tampa Bay, Boston, Atlanta, and St. Louis, plus Baltimore, where Robert Andino's Orioles played spoiler against the Red Sox, and New York, where the Yankees were the Rays' opponent that night
Sustained appetite for baseball nostalgia and deep-dive storytelling, reflected in MLB Network's own retrospective programming, team-specific podcast networks, and fan-run YouTube channels that continue to revisit classic finishes
Author Credentials:
Ryan Chichester has written daily articles covering New York sports for WFAN, the nation's first and most prominent all-sports radio station and part of the Audacy network, for the past five years
On-site sports coverage includes the World Series and multiple MLB playoff series, as well as the NFL and NHL playoffs and PGA events
Ten years of daily sports writing and coverage, beginning as a baseball writer at SB Nation — direct ties to the SB Nation team-blog network for cross-promotion (Pinstripe Alley, DRaysBay, and others)
Four regional journalism awards from the Connecticut Society of Professional Journalists
Columns written for WFAN have generated page views exceeding 500,000
Direct access to WFAN's roster of nationally known on-air hosts and producers for interviews, call-ins, and cross-promotion
Audacy affiliation opens the door to author appearances across sports radio stations nationwide, including in the book's core target markets
Established relationship with WEEI in Boston (Audacy-owned), positioned to capitalize on strong regional interest in the Red Sox collapse
Baseball consistently drives more social and traffic engagement at WFAN than any other sport, including football, underscoring built-in audience appetite for this subject
Based in Red Bank, New Jersey, positioning the author for regional New York/New Jersey press in addition to national sports-radio reach
Publicity
Print, Broadcast & Major Media:
National sports media: ESPN.com / SportsCenter, MLB Network (MLB Now, Hot Stove, MLB Central), MLB.com, The Athletic, Sports Illustrated / SI.com, USA Today Sports, Yahoo Sports, Bleacher Report, CBS Sports, FanGraphs, Baseball America
National newspapers & wire: The New York Times, The Washington Post (sports coverage only), The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, The Associated Press (national sports wire)
Regional/team-market newspapers: Tampa Bay Times, Boston Globe, Boston Herald, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Baltimore Sun, New York Post, New York Daily News, NJ.com / Asbury Park Press, amNewYork
Regional sports television: NESN (Red Sox), YES Network (Yankees), team-rights regional sports networks serving Atlanta, St. Louis, and Tampa Bay, MLB Network's daily studio programming
National sports radio & syndication: WFAN (New York — author's home station), CBS Sports Radio, The Dan Patrick Show, The Rich Eisen Show, ESPN Radio
Audacy network stations (cross-market author access): WEEI (Boston), KMOX (St. Louis), 620 WDAE (Tampa), 92.9 The Game (Atlanta), 105.7 The Fan (Baltimore), 670 The Score (Chicago), 94WIP (Philadelphia)
Podcasts:
Baseball Analysis & Daily Coverage: Effectively Wild (FanGraphs), Foul Territory, The Windup: A show about Baseball, MLB Network Radio (SiriusXM), The Book of Joe (iHeart Radio)
Team-Specific (Locked On Podcast Network): Locked On Rays, Locked On Red Sox, Locked On Braves, Locked On Cardinals, Locked On Orioles, Locked On Yankees
Baseball History, Nostalgia & Storytelling: Baseball Isn't Boring, Pinstripe Alley (SB Nation Yankees — author's former network), DRaysBay (SB Nation Rays), Baseball by the Book
General Sports & Pop Culture: Pardon My Take (Barstool Sports), The Dan Le Batard Show, The Bill Simmons Podcast (The Ringer)
WFAN & Audacy Network Shows: Boomer and Gio (WFAN), WEEI drive-time programming (Boston)
Social Media & Digital Marketing
Author Platform & Built-in Demand:
Cross-promotion across WFAN and the wider Audacy digital network — social channels, on-site articles, and push notifications
Author's existing social following, built from ten years of daily sports writing and on-site MLB, NFL, NHL, and PGA coverage
Annual September 28 anniversary hook for organic engagement on X/Twitter, Threads, and Reddit (r/baseball and team subreddits including r/tampabayrays, r/redsox, r/atlantabraves, r/cardinals, and r/orioles)
Booktok and Bookstagram outreach targeting the growing sports-narrative-nonfiction community
Newsletter placements: The Athletic's baseball newsletters, Baseball America's newsletter, and MLB.com editorial features
Available Editions
| EDITION | Paperback |
| ISBN | 9798256600679 |
| PRICE | $24.95 (USD) |
| PAGES | 272 |