Babe Ruth's Called Shot

October 1, 1932. Game 3 of the World Series. Wrigley Field, Chicago. The crowd had been on Babe Ruth since the Yankees arrived in town -- cursing him, spitting toward him and his wife, throwing lemons from the stands. The Cubs dugout hadn't stopped riding him for three straight games. Ruth was 37 years old, playing in his 10th and final Fall Classic, and he didn't care about any of it. What happened next became the most debated moment in baseball history.

The Spark

The hostility didn't come from nowhere. Before the 1932 World Series started, the Yankees had declared war on the Cubs over money. Mark Koenig -- a former Yankee shortstop who'd joined Chicago midseason and helped them clinch the National League pennant -- got voted a half-share of the Cubs' World Series pool by his own teammates. Ruth, who'd played alongside Koenig during the '27 and '28 championship runs, viewed it as cheap and classless. He said so publicly. He said it repeatedly. He called the Cubs "cheapskates" to the press, and the Cubs fired back from the bench with everything they had.

By Game 3, the heckling had turned personal. Chicago's players shouted about Ruth's weight, his age, his wife. The fans joined in. The Wrigley Field atmosphere wasn't just hostile -- it was ugly.

The At-Bat

The game was tied 4-4 in the fifth inning when Ruth stepped in against Charlie Root, the Cubs' right-hander. The bench jockeying intensified the moment Ruth walked to the plate. After a called strike, Ruth raised one finger -- one strike. After a second called strike, he raised two fingers. The crowd roared.

Then came the gesture.

Ruth pointed outward. That much isn't disputed -- film footage confirms he extended his arm. Where he pointed, and why, has fueled nine decades of argument:

He pointed at center field, calling his shot -- promising to put the next pitch over the wall in that exact spot. He pointed at the Cubs dugout, telling his tormentors they still couldn't get him out. He pointed at Root, letting the pitcher know he wasn't finished.

Root threw. Ruth swung. The ball sailed deep over the center field wall at Wrigley -- an estimated 440 feet into the temporary bleachers. Ruth circled the bases laughing (one account has him holding up four fingers as he rounded second, mocking the Cubs for every run he'd driven in). Lou Gehrig followed with a home run on the very next pitch, but nobody remembers that part.

I looked out to center field and I pointed. I said, 'I'm going to hit the next pitched ball right past the flagpole.'

Two Stories, One Legend

Ruth told two distinctly different versions. Early on, he said he'd been pointing at the Cubs bench -- telling them they still had strikes left but couldn't finish him off. Later, in a filmed interview, he claimed he'd called the shot outright, pointing to center field and promising the home run.

The fact that Ruth changed his story doesn't settle the debate -- it deepens it. He might've recognized that the called-shot version made better mythology and leaned into it. He might've been telling the truth the second time and downplaying it at first. Ruth understood his own legend better than anyone. He knew which version people wanted to hear.

Charlie Root denied the Called Shot until the day he died. "If he'd pointed at me," Root reportedly said, "I'd have stuck the ball in his ear." Root believed Ruth was gesturing at the dugout, not at center field. He took it personally -- the suggestion that a batter had called a shot off him -- and never let it go.

The Film

Grainy footage from Game 3 confirms Ruth extended his arm and pointed. The camera angle and film quality don't resolve intent. You can see the gesture. You can't see what Ruth was thinking. Multiple analyses over the decades have produced the same conclusion: the evidence shows what happened, but it can't prove why.

Why It Stuck

The Called Shot endures because it captures something real about Ruth, regardless of whether he actually called it. A 37-year-old slugger, in his last World Series, facing a hostile crowd and a bench that wouldn't shut up -- and responding with a home run that landed exactly where the legend says he pointed. The story works whether it's true or mythology (and it's probably somewhere between the two).

For the Yankees, the gesture defined something bigger than one at-bat. It was the franchise's swagger compressed into a single image -- the idea that the best player on the best team could announce what he was about to do and then do it. Gehrig's performance across the four-game sweep (.529 batting average, 3 home runs, 8 RBI) drove the championship. Ruth's gesture drove the mythology.

Frequently Asked Questions

Did Babe Ruth really call his shot in 1932?

The honest answer is nobody knows for certain. Film footage confirms Ruth pointed outward before hitting the home run, but the grainy film can't determine whether he was pointing at center field, at the Cubs dugout, or at pitcher Charlie Root. Ruth himself told two different stories -- first saying he pointed at the bench, later claiming he called the shot. Root denied it until his death.

When did Babe Ruth's Called Shot happen?

The Called Shot occurred on October 1, 1932, in the fifth inning of Game 3 of the World Series at Wrigley Field in Chicago. The game was tied 4-4 when Ruth hit the home run off Cubs pitcher Charlie Root. The Yankees won 7-5 and completed the sweep the following day.

What pitcher did Babe Ruth face during the Called Shot?

Charlie Root, a right-handed pitcher for the Chicago Cubs, threw the pitch that Ruth hit for the Called Shot home run. Root denied for the rest of his life that Ruth had called the shot, reportedly saying: "If he'd pointed at me, I'd have stuck the ball in his ear."