On this day in 2003: Aaron Boone hit a dramatic walk-off home run in the bottom of the 11th inning of Game 7 of the American League Championship Series against the Boston Red Sox, sending the Yankees to the World Series.

40 comments

1. Still carrying his ass

2. In hindsight this is not great. It set up a massive choke against the Marlins and made him screw over the Yankees for many years as a manager.

3. What’s Doc Brown up to nowadays?

4. I miss the old Stadium

5. one of the greatest moments in yankee history that turned into one of the worst

6. The organization has been going downhill ever since outside of 2009.

7. Worst thing that ever happened to the Yankees in retrospect.

8. I didn’t know Bret was in the booth for this.

9. Everyone conveniently forgets we lost the WS to the fucking Marlins.

10. As big as this homer was the loss to the marlins and then the blown lead to the Sux the next year never made me appreciate this walk off.

11. Say what you want about him now, but this is timeless

12. This butterfly effect changed the course of Yankees history. This one singular swing is the reason Aaron Boone is the manager of the Yankees. If not for this swing, he’d probably just be known as Bret Boone’s less talented brother.

13. Did he know after this hit it would save his job status no matter what

14. Knowing everything that happened after that, I’d give that HR back in a second if it meant no Boone as a manager.

15. It’s crazy how one HR in 2003 lost the Yankees the World Series in 2024.

16. Ka-Boone!

17. The long-lasting effects of him hitting this home run have genuinely done more harm than good to the team as a whole

18. This moment ultimately made me a Yankee fan thanks to the 2003 Series and the burning desire for fucking Jeffrey Loria to not win a World Series. That didn’t come true, but it lit the torch for me moving to being a fan once the Expos were gone after the next season.

    If not for Boone I could have ended up a Sox fan, if not for Steve Bartman (yeah, I know it wasn’t really his fault) I could have ended up a Cubs fan. I’m OK with how things turned out.

19. That home run is the reason why the Yankees organization has been in a continuous state of dysfunction since

20. Why were there two Yankees kneeling on the mound as Boone was rounding the bases?!

21. I was there! I was 13 at the time. We got up ready to leave because I had school the next day, work for my dad, and we lived in jersey. I was so upset because I just wanted to stay and watch the game obviously. We came down from the upper deck on the first base side walked all the way down and was standing behind the Yankee dugout just taking one last look before we go. Then Boone came to the plate and hit that home run! The stadium was shaking with the crowd cheering going crazy. Instantly stopped me from crying lol. What a great night!

22. Really the ripple effect of this is crazy. If Boone doesn’t hit this HR and the Yankees had gone on to lose this game, the 2004 collapse probably doesn’t happen and Boone is never given the managerial position.

23. This place is fucking tiring

    An objectively great moment and all you’ve got are people whining about Boone being the manager now

    None of you actually enjoy baseball, you just enjoy complaining

24. Where is the video of the monkey paw curling?

25. Still paying for his one moment 20 something years later…Aaron bleeping Boone

26. Mo went 3? What a dawg.

27. A memory I’ll have for the rest of my life. I was living in a university dorm at the time, watching with 4 or 5 other Yankees fans and when he hit this we all went running through the halls like madmen. Amazing.

28. Yankees history inflection point

29. I can’t believe I didn’t remember Bret Boone being in the booth and watching.

30. Low energy call by Buck. Fucker

31. It’s too bad about that

32. I wonder what the analytics would have said about sending him up to the plate in that spot.

33. And we’ve been held hostage since 2017 because of this one moment lol

34. RIP Tim McCarver and Tim Wakefield.

    Great moment for the Yankees. However, for all that joy we paid for it the following year blowing the 3-0 lead.

35. Nothing better than Sad Pedro

36. I was working nights in Midtown Manhattan in Times Square right where the ball drops on New Year’s when this happened.

    The team was all gathered in the break room, which was in the center of the building. When he hit the home run, we heard a tremendous roar from outside. Turns out they were showing the game on the big screen TV in Times Square and thousands of people were just standing around watching and they all exploded when the ball went out. The walk back to the train that night was one of the best walks I ever had.

37. You guys are insufferable complaining about this

38. The last roar of the old Stadium.

39. RIP Wakefield. I miss those 2000’s Yankees Redsox matchups.

40. An unforgettable moment