By Gus "Walk-Off" Fields
The first pitch of the night left the yard. So did the last meaningful one.
Pete Crow-Armstrong opened Monday's crosstown clash at Wrigley Field with a leadoff home run, then closed it out hours later with a walk-off shot in the 10th inning, lifting the Chicago Cubs to a 7-5 win over the crosstown-rival Chicago White Sox, according to ESPN.
It's the kind of night that gets remembered on a barstool for years. Crow-Armstrong, the Cubs' centerfielder and an MVP candidate this season, became the first player since 2010 to homer to lead off a game and then homer to walk it off in the same game, ESPN reported.
Think about what that means. You hit one before most fans have found their seats, then you hit the last one after everybody's on their feet, extra innings, ballgame on the line. Two different home runs, same night, same guy, same magic.
Wrigley Field has seen its share of walk-offs — that's the whole romance of the place, the ivy and the late-summer shadows and the crowd that won't leave till it's over. But bookending a night that way, first pitch to final swing, is rare enough that ESPN had to reach back sixteen years to find the last man who did it.
The Cubs needed all ten innings to get there against a White Sox club that gave them a fight, matching them run for run before Crow-Armstrong ended it. For a Cubs team chasing October with Crow-Armstrong at the center of its lineup and its highlight reel, it's the sort of game that does more than fill the win column — it's the kind teammates and fans point back to when they explain why they believed.
Final score's the last thing that mattered here.
— Compiled from reporting by ESPN.
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