I don't even remember who we were playing, but a ball got hit hard to center and Murray charged the hell out of it to make a dramatic basket catch and everybody went insane. The play probably wasn't really that spectacular, but the basket catch in deep center plus the crowd reaction was just plain cool.

Another time (could it have possibly been the same game? I'm not sure), we were playing the A's and a ball got hit to shallow left that Rich Aurillia made a great play on, then spun around, threw home, and beat the runner by just half a moment. The Giants went on to win the game.

This year I was at the game against the Braves where Niekro knocked one out in the ninth to get us back in a game that eventually ended as the first walk off win I've ever been to. Since I was a big Niekro-booster at the time, that knock was especially sweet.

And of course, my Candlestick story is the first game I ever went to. The Giants were playing the Braves. Danny Darwin got the start, and seeing as how Danny Darwin got the start we inevitably lost something like 14-3. BUT, it was also the only game I ever got to go to with my gandfather and we spent the middle innings showing each other the finger positions on our respective "trick" pitches, using the Giants souvenir ball that he bought me in the first.

The first two moments may be lacking something compared to you guys who have been to hundreds of games over the years, but that first game was something special.

As a point of interest, my Dad's first game was actually the infamous sixteen inning Juan Marichal/Warren Spahn game, but he was too young at the time to remember it and only found out he was there sometime last year.

Any more first game memories? Those are always nice to think about.

The Giants had been 5 games behind the Reds before the series and the sweep pulled us to within one.

I was in the upper deck of center field, which means the Stick was basically full.

Krukow shut the Reds down in the first game, and led most of the second game as the crowd's frenzy built to the crescendo.

The Giants had just dominated the First Place Reds, as we knew on that day the division was ours....

I can remember Eric Davis in his prime, amking jaw dropping catches turning line drive shots in the gaps into outs.

I can remember everyone one around us just going wild and high fiving people I didn't know all around us.

I remember not being able to see the whole outfield because of the configuration of the Stick, but also not giving a crap.

Screaming back and forth on the escaltor down to the parking lot, and then being stuck in traffic as people were hooting and honking like we had just won the World Series....

Was my first taste of that kinda of euphoric win, even bigger than some of the old Dodger vs Stick games

Also, with a hat tip to Bill Simmons, here's a YouTube clip of the Grateful Dead singing the Star Spangled Banner on opening day of 1993. Again, apparently I was there, but barely remember it.

I also saw Hershiser pitch for SF against LA on July 4 in '98, which was kinda cool.

Strangely, my favorite live moment was at Yankee Stadium when Bonds put one in the upper tank and hearing Yankee fan gawk in amazement.  Schmidt K'd 13 Yankees that day and Nen shut them down with a tight win in the 9th. Two seconds after the last out my buddy and I were on a taxi to Belmont to watch Perfect 10 blow the Triple Crown.  Then singing "When The Giants Come To Town" in a bar in New York with 20 other Giants fans at 4 AM.

Good times.

But wait, there's more.  A couple of weeks later, he and some other Giant (a mediocrity, as I don't recall who) were signing autographs at some season ticketholder event at Candlestick.  I had a 13-game package, so I guess I qualified.  I had my scorebook, and opened it to Brian's Famous Homerun.  When I got to the front of the line, I said, "Hey, I have your homerun in my scorebook; would you sign it?"  And he actually lit up, saying, "Oh, COOL!"  And he signed it.  It gave him real pleasure to see that, for some reason.

And it later occurred to me that players probably never see scorecards, as they are busy during the games.  They might be aware that some fans do something called "keep score" and they know what some of the symbols are (e.g., the position numbers), but it's probably an oddity to see their own exploits memorialized on paper by a fan.

Next, September 2001.  I am lucky enough to get to attend lots of games in 311, and as it's the Box section below the walkway and right on top of home plate, it's mostly season ticketholders-- so we get to know each other fairly well.  Kind of an extended family.  There was a wonderful, frail old woman named Jan who was in the disabled seats of that section.  Jan used to yell "Get a hit... Please!" And it charmed all of us.  She had been ailing for awhile, and through the 2000 and 2001 seasons, we had all come to love Jan.  We knew she was in hospice, and her husband would come to the games as a distraction, and would fill us in on Jan's progress (wrong word, but you know what I mean).  

Then September 11th happened.  Pause in baseball.  Pause in life.  

The first game back after September 11, 2001 is something I will never forget.  The profound happiness at being outside on a sunny day in September -- the real summertime of San Francisco-- and the profound happiness and gratitude at being with familiar faces was mixed with the sadness everyone still felt about 9/11.  There was silence between innings, no stupid music, no frivolousness.  And unfortunately for our section, no Jan's husband.  We knew what it meant.  Later that week, we got word that Jan died.  I am tearing up as I write this.  I was never so glad to tear off and shred a calendar page as I was when October 1, 2001 arrived and we could turn our backs on that goddamned month of September.

But that first game after 9/11 was amazing: everyone sang the national anthem, really belted it out.  Everyone in our section hugged each other.  Everyone was so grateful to have something so wonderful and enduring as baseball to watch, maybe reminding us that our nation is also wonderful and enduring.

Those are just a couple moments.  Thanks for the question!  It's great to revisit What Baseball Means to our lives from time to time.

That's what i got and they were pretty amazing.

Game 3: Thompson homers off Les Lancaster to give the lead and the win.

Game 4: Williams homers off Scott Wilson in like a 12 pitch at bat to give the Giants the lead and the win.

Game 5: The aforementioned Clark single off The Wild Thing, when that still meant something, to give the Giants the lead and the pennant.

Bedrosian saved all three, looking less and less effective as he went, almost blowing the last game with three straight singles to bring up Sandberg with the tying and go-ahead runners on base. I'll never understand why Ryno, a noted fastball hitter who struggled against sliders all series long, went after Bedrock's first pitch slider, down and away. He grounded weakly to second in an AB that was positively Felizesque, and I thank him. I hugged my buddy from high school who drove me to the game in his mom's Taurus, but I don't think he hugged back. I was pretty jazzed.