Get your Chicago White Sox lockout fix with memorable postseason home runs

Major League Baseball is in the middle of a lockout, so who knows when we will be getting Chicago White Sox baseball back.

The 2022 season could start on time but the labor fight between the owners and the players has both sides entrenched. We could be looking at the possibility of not having baseball for a while.

The last major move the Chicago White Sox made before the lockout was re-signing Leury Garcia. Garcia provided one of the few highlights in the Chicago White Sox 2021 postseason appearance when he hit a huge 3-run home run in Game 3 of the American League Divison Series.

The Chicago White Sox are expected to make the playoffs whenever this labor issue gets resolved and we have 2022 season.

Instead of watching millionaires battle billionaires, and in honor of Garcia coming back to the Southside, let’s relive some of the other memorable postseason home runs in Chicago White Sox history—in chronological order.

Last Century…

October 6th, 1917: With one out in the bottom of the fourth, Oscar “Happy” Flesch stepped to the plate to face New York Giants’ pitcher Slim Sallee. Flesch proceeded to hit the White Sox’s first postseason home run in Game 1 of the World Series. The home run would also be the deciding run as the White Sox won 2-1. The Sox would go on to win the World Series four games to two over the Giants.

October 9th, 1919: Shoeless Joe Jackson hit a two-out, solo home run in Game 8 of the World Series–the World Series was best of nine back then. Jackson hit the only Sox home run in the famous Black Sox World Series.

Jackson was implicated along with seven other players in fixing the World Series. Jackson first admitted he took five grand but later claimed he was not part of the fix. He did hit .375 in the series and he was acquitted of charges he threw the series. He was still famously banned for life by Major League Baseball commissioner Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis.

It would be a long 40 years before the White Sox made the World Series again.

October 1st, 1959: The White Sox finally broke their 40-year playoff drought with a World Series matchup against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Game 1 was at Comiskey Park and the Sox faithful saw Ted Kluszewski blast two home runs.

The White Sox blew out the Los Angeles Dodgers 11-0 for their first postseason win in 40 years. Unfortunately, the Dodgers won the series in six games.

October 9th, 1993: The White Sox were down 3-2 to the Toronto Blue Jays at the Skydome in Game 4 of the American League Championship Series. Frank Thomas came to the plate in the top of the sixth against Todd Stottlemyre. The Big Hurt blasted a home run that possibly needed a passport to re-enter the stands with how far it flew to tie the game.

The White Sox would go on to win 7-4 and tie the ALCS at two games a piece. Alas, the Blue Jays won the next two games to advance to the World Series.