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The summer of 1997 in sports It used to be that summer and baseball existed in synonymy--summer meant baseball and baseball meant summer. The awakening of a country to the season of its heartbeat coincided with the baseball season, and the totalitarian rule of America's pastime over summer recreation was twofold -- either you watched baseball during the summer or you played it.
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The summer
of 1997 illustrated just how vast and multifaceted the mosaic of American
sports has become. Now that hockey and basketball, havens from the
winter snows, delay their defining moments until the sunny summer days
of June, and the emergence of a living legend has fans flocking to the
golf course, the once lazy days of summer now comprise a busy stage on
which compelling sports drama unfolds each week. Summer is now a
season of marquee championships, in hockey, basketball, golf, and tennis,
and 1997 yielded captivating champions, both unlikely and predictable,
unknowns and superstars, in blowouts and edge-of-your-seat finishes.
We begin with what started the summer with perhaps the most intriguing
story of all, in the city of Detroit, Hockeytown. 