20th Anniversary of Baseball's Famous Potato Incident

My brother sent me a link to this article that reminded me that August 31st was the 20th anniversary of baseball's famous potato incident. (I remember reading about the incident and seeing it on the local newscasts back in 1987, but I hadn't thought about it for a while.)

The link tells the story really well, but here's the synoposis. Dave Bresnahan, the back-up catcher for a minor league team, had been planning this particular prank for a while. (The article discussions some of his preparations.) There was a runner on third base and he was catching. He threw a potato (that he had prepared) --- that was shaped roughly like a baseball and on which he had drawn appropriate markings --- to third base ostensibly to try to pick off the runner. Bresnahan purposely made a bad throw and the potato sailed into left field. Meanwhile, the runner tried to score because he thought the catcher had thrown the ball away. However, Bresnahan tagged him with the actual baseball when the runner got to the plate. The umpire ended up awarding home plate to the runner and Bresnahan was released the next day. (Note that Bresnahan was likely going to be axed very soon anyway and is now much more famous than he otherwise would have been.) The potato is proudly displayed in the Baseball Reliquary.