he pitched a complete game in a 13–1 rout of the Cardinals. The Tigers went up 2–0 in the second inning on RBI hits by Willie Horton and Bill Freehan. In the third, the Tigers sent 15 batters to the plate and scored 10 runs off of three Cardinals pitchers. Jim Northrup's grand slam highlighted the inning. Al Kaline added a home run in the fifth inning. The Cardinals' lone run came off an RBI single by Julián Javier with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, but that was all they could do against McLain. Game 7 In a fitting end to this Series (and the final game of Roger Maris' career) the two teams' hottest pitchers, Mickey Lolich and Bob Gibson, squared off in a classic duel, until an infamous hit over the head of Curt Flood. Like McLain in Game 6, Lolich was starting on only two days' rest. Lolich and Gibson matched zeroes for six innings, but in the top of the seventh, Gibson surrendered two-out singles to Norm Cash and Willie Horton. Jim Northrup then hit a hard smash to deep center; Curt Flood, who won numerous Gold Glove awards in his career, misjudged it and briefly started in on the ball before turning around to go back. The ball one-hopped the warning track, two runs scored, Northrup wound up with a triple, and Lolich had all the runs he needed. Flood has been criticized by some who believe he would have caught the ball had his first steps been back instead of in. Jim Northrup said, "[Flood] slipped a little, but the ball was 40 feet over his head. He never had a chance to catch it." However, his teammate Denny McLain claimed in his 1975 book that "Flood blew it." Orlando Cepeda, in his 1998 autobiography Baby Bull, asserts that Flood would have caught the ball, had he not misjudged it. In the October 29, 1968, issue of The Sporting News, both Flood and manager Red Schoendienst indicated they would have expected the normally sure-handed outfielder to catch such a ball. By starting in, Flood had to both reverse direction and then regain his acceleration. He then slipped on the wet grass before recovering his speed, and by that time the ball was well beyond him. Bill Freehan then doubled in Northrup, and in the top of the ninth, Don Wert added