The New York Yankees celebrate after winning the World Series in New York on Wednesday. The Yankees beat the Philadelphia Phillies 7-3 in Game 6. (Photo: Kathy Willens/AP Images)
Yankees Win Their 27th World Series
With Game 6 victory over the Phillies, Yankees take the title for the first time since 2000
This article is an update of the article originally posted on 11.03.09.
The New York Yankees are back on top.
The Yankees claimed their 27th World Series championship Wednesday with a 7-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies. They won four games in the best-of-seven series. The Phillies won two.
In Game 6 Wednesday, the Yankees gave their home crowd of 50,315 fans a lot to cheer about. Japanese slugger Hideki Matsui smacked a homer, a single, and a double. Each hit brought in two runs, giving him six runs batted in (RBIs) for the night. Matsui’s six RBIs in a single game tied a Series record, set in 1960.
Matsui won the Most Valuable Player (MVP) award for the Series. “Godzilla,” as fans call him, had eight hits in the Series in only 13 at-bats—a .615 batting average. Of his hits, three were home runs. He knocked in a total of eight runs.
“Winning the championship is such a great feeling,” Matsui said through an interpreter. “I guess you can say that this is the best moment of my life right now.”
The Phillies’ Chase Utley put on his own display of power. Utley hit five home runs over the six games. That tied a World Series record set by New York Yankee legend Reggie Jackson in 1977.
Utley and the National League (NL) Phillies won last year’s Fall Classic. They had hoped to become the first NL team since 1976 to win the title in back-to-back years. But the American League (AL) Yankees proved to be too strong. The Bronx Bombers, as the Yankees are known, won the Series for the first time since beating the New York Mets in 2000.
Road to the World Series
Despite falling short of the championship, the Phillies showed they were a tough team during the 2009 season. They won 93 games and lost only 69 before the playoffs, leading the hard-fought NL East division. In the playoffs, the Phillies lost only one game in each of the first two rounds.
Yet many saw the Phillies as the underdogs in this World Series. The Yankees won the AL East division with 103 wins and only 59 losses. They then swept the Minnesota Twins in three games to advance to the AL Championship Series. There, the Yankees finished off the Los Angeles Angels, four games to two. It was the 40th time the Yankees have won a pennant—or league championship—in the last 89 years.
The Yankees’ 40 World Series appearances set a record in baseball. So do the team’s 27 World Series wins. The St. Louis Cardinals hold second place, with 10 Series wins.
Sweet Victory in a New Home
Yankees fans are always hungry to claim a championship. But a Series victory this year seems especially sweet. The Yankees started the year in a brand-new Yankee Stadium. It replaced the old Yankee Stadium built in 1923—the place where the Yankees basked in so much glory. Bringing the World Series trophy to the new stadium tells fans that the Yankee championship tradition is alive and well.
BE CHART SMART
 | Read today's story, then complete this activity about teams that have played most often in the World Series. | |
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