Big rivals in the Big Apple

Will the current crop of Yankees be celebrating again?

By BBC Sport Online's Mark Barden

New York has been waiting 44 years for another Subway Series, and Mets fans will be hoping that history does not repeat itself.

In 1956, their Big Apple antecedents, the Brooklyn Dodgers, lost the World Series 4-3 to hated rivals local, the Yankees.

American League champions the Yankees came into the Series looking for revenge after losing 4-3 to the Dodgers the previous year.

That 1955 triumph would prove to be Brooklyn's only World Series success before the Dodgers' defection to the West Coast in 1958.

In truth, however, that win was but a blip in the Yankees' domination of baseball's ultimate prize.

The Bronx Bombers have won a record 25 World Series titles - their nearest rival, the St Louis Cardinals, have won nine.

Hoodoo

The key factor about Brooklyn's 1955 victory was it finally broke the Yankees' hoodoo over their neighbours.

In six previous World Series encounters between the clubs, the Yankees had reigned supreme, winning every one.

Ford got the win in game three in '56

But in '55, a Jackie Robinson-inspired Dodgers came back from losing the first two games to triumph 4-3 and claim a first world title for Brooklyn since the team's inception in 1900.

The 1956 Series proved to be a mirror image of 1955, with the Yankees losing the opening and second games but rallying to win the next three.

Brooklyn then levelled to 3-3 before the Bombers clinched the final game and their 17th world crown.

In the first game, Dodgers pitcher Sal Maglie gave up three runs on homers by Mickey Mantle and Billy Martin, but struck out 10 and took the win. Jackie Robinson and Gil Hodges both hit home runs as Brooklyn won 6-3.

Grand slam

In game two, the Yankees notched six runs in the first two innings, with Yogi Berra hitting a grand slam. But Brooklyn came back with six runs in their half of the second - three courtesy of a Duke Snider's homer - and eventually triumphed 13-8.

Yankees ace Whitey Ford, overshadowed in game one by Maglie's efforts, was more successful in the third, claiming a complete-game 5-3 win. He was aided by Billy Martin's game-tying solo homer in the second inning and Enos Slaughter's three-run shot in the sixth.

Yogi Berra was a guest of honour at the 1999 World Series

Tom Sturdivant duplicated Ford's effectiveness with the ball at Yankee Stadium the following day with a 6-2 win to even the Series.

Maglie's shone again in game five for Brooklyn, giving up just two runs and keeping New York hitless until Mantle's homer in the fourth.

But the day belonged to Yankees pitcher Don Larsen.

Close calls came in the second and fifth innings, but he was almost unplayable. When Brooklyn's Dale Mitchell failed to connect in the ninth, Larsen had pitched the perfect game - a feat still unequalled in World Series history.

Reliever

To get their challenge back on track in game six, Brooklyn started reliever Clem Labine, with the Yankees using fast-pitching Bob Turley.

No runner scored for either side until the 10th inning when, with two out, Jackie Robinson's hit into left field sent Jim Gilliam home from second base, forcing New York into a deciding seventh game.

But it wasn't to be for Brooklyn. Dodgers starter Don Newcombe was punished by a brace of two-run homers from Yogi Berra and a solo hit by Elston Howard.

Bill Skowron upped the Yankees' total to nine with a grand slam, while starter Johnny Kucks helped to keep Brooklyn scoreless.

The Yankees lost their crown to the Milwaukee Braves in 1957 but, as with the '55 loss to the Dodgers, got their revenge the following year and have since won world titles in '61, '62, '77, '78, '96, '98 and '99.

The Mets were established in 1961 and claimed their first world crown in 1969. Their second came in 1986, and they will be hoping that the latest Subway Series gives them a third.