The past two walk-off World Series home runs occurred only five years apart, but when you watch those at bats, they appear to be from wholly different eras—and they are.
Max Muncy of the Dodgers hit his walk-off homer off Nathan Eovaldi of the Red Sox in 2018 World Series Game 3. Back then, in the era when players could take as much time as they wanted, the average nine-inning regular season game took three hours.
Adolis García of the Rangers hit his walk-off homer off Miguel Castro of the Diamondbacks in 2023 World Series Game 1. The average nine-inning game this year, thanks to the introduction of the pitch timer, took 2:40—20 minutes less despite the same number of pitches per game (297).
