Game 1 in 1921 {{Linescore|
Yankee Stadium was filled with 61,658 fans on October 2 for Game 1. Those without tickets gathered at
City Hall to watch the game's progress as charted on two large scoreboards. The Yankees started Pennock, the team's only 20-game winner that season. The future
Hall of Fame pitcher, nicknamed "
The Knight of Kennett Square" for his hometown, had a 3.62
ERA in 266 innings during the regular season, and had finished third in the American League
Most Valuable Player Award balloting behind winner
George Burns and runner-up
Johnny Mostil.
Taylor Douthit led off Game 1 with a
double to left, In the bottom of the third, Ruth singled and Meusel
bunted him over, but Ruth split his pants sliding into second, prompting radio announcer
Graham McNamee to exclaim, "Babe is the color of a red brick house!" Doc Woods, the team's trainer, ran out and sewed up Ruth's pants, much to the amusement of the crowd. The score was still tied at one apiece in the bottom of the sixth, just as rain began to fall. Ruth
lined a single past third baseman
Les Bell. Meusel again
sacrificed Ruth to second. Gehrig followed with a single, scoring Ruth and giving the Yankees the lead. Lazzeri lined a shot to left but Gehrig, on a headfirst dive, was
tagged out at third by Bell.
Game 2 {{Linescore| The second game was played the next day, October 3, at Yankee Stadium in front of a crowd of 63,600. and paid for by the city's top businessmen. As one of the game announcers (either McNamee or Carlin) described the situation: It was measured at over and had cleared the wall in center field, crashing through the window of an auto dealer across the street from the stadium. After Ruth hit three home runs in Game 4 on October 6, newspapers reported that Sylvester's condition had miraculously improved. After the World Series had ended, Ruth made a highly publicized visit to Sylvester's home, in which the boy said to Ruth, "I'm sorry the Yanks lost the series". In the spring of 1927, Sylvester's uncle visited Ruth and thanked him for saving the boy's life. Ruth asked how the boy was doing and asked the uncle to give the boy his regards. After the man left, Ruth, who was seated next to a group of baseball writers, said, "Now who the hell is Johnny Sylvester?" There have been many alternate versions of this event. One version, which was later portrayed in
The Babe Ruth Story, claims that Ruth went to Sylvester's hospital bed and promised him in person that he would hit a home run for him. On October 9, Ruth followed up on Sylvester and told him he would "try to knock you another homer, maybe two today". The game was lopsided from the start. In the top of the first inning, Shawkey gave up three runs on three hits, with the runs coming from a Jim Bottomley double and Les Bell single. Alexander encountered a minor setback in the fourth inning. To open up the bottom of the inning, Bob Meusel launched a
triple into left field and scored on the following ground out by Lou Gehrig. Alexander shut down the Yankees for the rest of the inning, and the Cardinals held on to a 3–1 lead. In the top of the fifth inning, the Cardinals expanded their two-run lead. Tommy Thevenow hit a single to left fielder Babe Ruth. Alexander laid down a sacrifice bunt and was tagged out by first baseman Gehrig, but was successful in advancing Thevenow to second base. Wattie Holm, substituting for Taylor Douthit as center fielder, followed by hitting a single into center field, scoring Thevenow on the play. Billy Southworth and Rogers Hornsby followed with groundouts in the infield to end the inning. Rogers Hornsby had to determine who he would put in to replace Haines as pitcher. Although Grover Cleveland Alexander had pitched a complete game the day before and may have spent the night drinking (Alexander later denied this, saying that Hornsby specifically told him to limit his celebrating since he might be needed the next day), Hornsby decided to trust him after Alexander said he "had it in easy in there" in Game 6 and would be ready whenever Hornsby needed him. ==Aftermath==