What kind of comeback do you think is more impressive in sports?

The Game Room
1

One in which there’s a significant difference in score and little to very little time left in the game, or one in which there’s a much more significant difference in score, but more time in which to close the gap?

To put in terms of specific games in a specific sport (though this question applies to whichever your favorite is), do you think comebacks like the 2015 NFC Championship Game is more impressive than comebacks like, well, The Comeback, or vice versa?

ETA: The heck? I thought I turned off the ability to vote for multiple options at once. Well, be careful of that when you vote. (Unless a mod can fix…?)

2

I prefer shorter comebacks. However, the poll options lead me to vote for 3X/3Y. Pretty much any comeback is more impressive if you triple the time and points left (if possible) – e.g. Plano East coming back from 24 down with 3:00 left against John Tyler in 1994 would be much more impressive to me if it were 72 down with 9:00 left.

3

The longer comeback, because the other team fully sees it coming and still can’t stop it.
If a team surrenders a 10-point lead in five minutes, then maybe they were just caught off-guard, but if they surrender a 30-point lead in fifteen minutes, then they really collapsed despite fully seeing it coming.

4

I like the long comeback, especially when one team has taken a really big lead early on.

In cases like this, the fans often believe the game is over, and even the players themselves (on both teams) sometimes go into autopilot mode, with not much in the way of real effort. But when the team that falls behind rallies, and begins working its way back, it’s great to watch, especially in sports like soccer where scoring is really difficult.

One game that comes to mind is an English Premier League game in early 2011, between Arsenal and Newcastle United. Arsenal took the lead in the first minute, they led 3-0 before 10 minutes were up, and by the half-hour mark they were up 4-0, which was also the half-time score.

In the second half, Newcastle opened its account with a penalty, had a goal (incorrectly) disallowed for offside, then scored immediately after that to make it 4-2. They were awarded another penalty with seven minutes to go, which they converted to make it 4-3. Then, with two minutes remaining, Cheick Tioté hit a screaming volley from outside the penalty area which curved away from the goalkeeper and into the net to tie it up 4-4.

Probably one of the greatest comebacks in English football history, even if Newcastle were helped somewhat by playing against ten men for much of the second half after an Arsenal red card.

Sometimes long comebacks are exciting even if the comeback team still ends up losing. One example is the 2002 Major League Baseball game between the Oakland Athletics and the Kansas City Royals which gave Oakland its record-breaking 20th straight win, and which was featured in the *Moneyball *movie and book.

Oakland were up 11-0 after 3 innings, but KC scored 5 in the 4th and 5 in the 8th, before tying it up with a run in the 9th. The Athletics then walked off in the bottom of the 9th on a Scott Hatteberg home run.

5

In the former, it’s mostly luck/random skill.

In the latter, the team is likely demoralized as hell, which might normally hurt their performance further, yet they manage to pull it off. So that’s more impressive.

As to what’s more interesting to watch, it depends, but I think the latter still. Sports where 90% of the outcome is determined in the last few minutes aren’t terribly interesting to me.

6

Okay, to make something clear, the poll options weren’t supposed to be taken that literally. :stuck_out_tongue:

7

Well 3X in 3Y could well include 3 X in Y sets so I’d say it has to be more impressive. On August 5, 2001, the Cleveland Indians were losing 14-2 as they came to bat in the bottom of the 7th. They scored 12 runs in three innings to tie it before winning in the 11th. Conversely scoring 4 runs in the bottom of the ninth inning to tie sounds much less impressive to me.

8

My first thought about a Great Comeback, since I’m a Cardinals fan, was Game 6 of the 2011 World Series.

In that game the Cardinals trailed by three with two innings to go, then by two with one inning to go, then by two again with one inning to go (Texas having scored twice in the top of the tenth), and won it in the eleventh.

Which seems like your first option–not a huge comeback, though with not a lot of time left.

(The Royals’ wild card game win over Oakland last October was similar–and also memorable.)

But then I wondered how much my views of those two games were colored by them being not just post-season games but elimination games (Texas would have won the Series if the Cardinals hadn’t come back), and I started thinking about regular season games I have seen.

And then it became obvious. I’ve seen a few games in which one team trailed, oh, 4-1 or something like that in the ninth, and came back to win, and it’s exciting and it’s dramatic and it’s…well, it’s memorable, but not MEMORABLE, if you know what I mean.

But then there’s the greatest comeback I have ever seen, one April day at Wrigley in 1976, when the Cubs led the Phillies 13-2 after I think four innings. The Phillies then went on a scoring rampage, went into the ninth trailing 13-12, scored three times in the ninth to take a 15-13 lead, and then after the Cubs tied it with two out in the ninth, scored three more in the tenth and won the game 18-16–a game that was not just memorable, it was MEMORABLE. (It helped that Mike Schmidt hit four homers.)

So my vote is for option 2.