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KRIEGER: Holliday etches his redemption in blood

By Dave Krieger, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published October 2, 2007 at midnight

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It could not end that way. It just couldn't.

Not with those chants of MVP! MVP! taking on a satirical ring. Not with the kid Rocks' Paul Bunyan having misjudged a flyball and lost the lead, mocking all the work he had done to make himself a solid defensive outfielder.

That could not be the postscript on his dazzling season.

It could not. He would not let it.

And so when Matt Holliday stepped to the plate in the bottom of the 13th inning of the longest game ever played to determine a playoff berth, he was going to deliver, and each of the 50,000 souls at this most memorable big league ballgame in Colorado history seemed to know it.

After all, Kazuo Matsui and Troy Tulowitzki had already ripped offerings from the greatest closer of all time, San Diego's suddenly aged Trevor Hoffman.

It did not take long. Came that powerful swing and that familiar crack and the ball rocketing toward right field, over the head of the Padres' Brian Giles and off a scoreboard still displaying scores from the day before, the final day, except for this one.

There went the big man, all 235 pounds of him, racing around the bases, sprawling into third, Tulowitzki scoring ahead of him to knot again a score that had been knotted for what seemed like forever.

And now he was 90 feet from expunging that nightmare flyball, 90 feet from delivering the most joyous run in his team's short history.

Jamey Carroll hit a short fly to right. At first, it looked like it might fall in and Holliday danced off third. But it held up as Giles settled under it and Holliday jumped back to tag up.

Giles caught the ball and Holliday charged for the plate. No doubt. No hesitation. He was going to score the run that sent his team to the postseason or he was going to knock himself out trying. He nearly did both.

As the throw arrived, Holliday dived for the plate. His faced bounced in the dirt as he swept his left arm for the dish.

The ball escaped the grasp of catcher Michael Barrett. Umpire Tim McClelland, so slow with his strike calls he had irritated fans all night, took his time once more.

He saw Holliday lying prostrate in the dirt. He saw the ball rolling free. He spread his arms, palms down. Safe.

The crowd erupted as Coors Field has never seen. MVP! MVP! came those chants again as Holliday tried to get up and then collapsed again to the ground.

It was the strangest tableau: The kid Rocks pouring from the dugout in celebration, the fans roaring, the fine ballyard itself rocking and rolling, while club personnel surrounded Holliday on the ground beside home plate.

When he finally arose, with assistance, he looked dazed, blood visible on his chin. He had given every ounce of desire and will to make up for his mistake.

"Had we not won, I probably would have had nightmares about that all winter," he said afterward.

In all of big league history, there has never been a game like this. The closest came in 1959, when the Dodgers, in their second year in Los Angeles, took 12 innings to beat the Milwaukee Braves for the National League pennant. But that was a best-of-three playoff, not a single game, and the Dodgers were up one game to none, meaning they could have lost and played another day.

Not the Rocks. This was one game for everything, one game to obliterate 12 years of futility and insults and make a name for themselves on a national stage, even if half the nation was in bed by the time they did it.

It had set up just as they hoped. They had overcome an early Padres lead to forge a fragile one-run advantage.

Manager Clint Hurdle used three pitchers in the top of the sixth to keep the Padres at 5 and had his bullpen set up just the way he wanted.

Then, with a man on second and two out in the Padres' eighth, came the opposite field fly ball from Giles. Holliday misread it and couldn't get back fast enough. It fell for a double, the game was tied, and the tension stretched into extra innings.

"I took a bad step, missed the ball," Holliday said.

When the Padres finally scored a pair in the top of the 13th, the kid Rocks had them right where they wanted them.

Chasing the impossible, the home team did what it had done throughout the season's final month.

"Same as it's been all year," Holliday said. "We had a job to do."

Of course they scored the three they needed to win. Of course Holliday scored the winner. And of course those chants of MVP! MVP! reverberated again through the night.

Long after most of the crowd had gone, Holliday finally emerged from the dugout to greet the hardy souls who had waited. The Rockies' MVP, if nobody else's.