Before Jalen Brunson arrived new york two years ago, the most relevant the Knicks have been in 20 years was during “Linsanity,” that brief period during the 2012 season when a little-known second-year player came out of nowhere and caught fire in inexplicably, he shot and scored. as if he were the second coming of Bernard King. Jeremy Lin was especially popular with the younger generation of Knicks fans who didn’t remember Patrick Ewing or Willis Reed. But what Gen Zers may not have known was that before Linsanity, there was an even bigger sports craze called “Fernandomania.” Unlike Linsanity, which, unfortunately for us Knicks fans, amounted to nothing more than a few weeks of fun and national media attention, Fernandomania actually led to a championship and the birth of a true sports star who became a baseball legend. The titular character of Fernandomania was Fernando Valenzuela, the lefty Los Angeles Dodgers phenomenon that broke out on base-ball stage like a glass rocket and propelled the Dodgers to the 1981 championship.

Valenzuela, who died Oct. 22 at age 63, wasn’t the greatest pitcher in baseball history or even the greatest left-hander in Dodgers history; Sandy Koufax and Clayton Kershaw surpassed him in both categories. But along with Pedro Martinez, Dwight “Doc” Gooden and pre-injury Kerry Wood, Valenzuela is on the short list of the most exciting pitchers in baseball history. He’s on an even shorter list of first-year prodigies like Madison Bumgarner and Adam Wainwright who led their teams to titles in their rookie seasons. And he’s also literally on a roll of one: He’s the only player in the 150-year history of major league baseball to win the Cy Young Award in his rookie season.

Fernando Valenzuela was born on November 1, 1960, in Etchohuaquila, Mexico. When he was 17 and pitching for a Mexican league team in 1978, a Dodgers scout discovered him by chance, and the team signed him to a minor league contract the following year. Valenzuela was called up to the majors in 1980, when he made 10 relief appearances without giving up a run. His official rookie season, and the summer that would launch Fernandomania, came the following year. Valenzuela won his first eight starts, five of which were complete shutouts, giving up runs as infrequently as a desert traveler takes sips of water from his canteen. Fans flocked to Dodger Stadium in record numbers, captivated by his pitching prowess and mesmerized by his unusual network, unlike anything a baseball fan had ever seen. He would corkscrew 180 degrees, kick his right leg up like a cabaret dancer and cast his eyes skyward as if lost in a trance before quickly turning back and shooting one of its five different chains, including a practical one. uninhabitable screw, back to dazed batteries.

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Despite the bright start to his career, Valenzuela’s prime was short-lived compared to other all-time greats, mostly due to a shoulder injury he suffered in 1988. After the Dodgers released before the start of the 1991 season, Valenzuela became a baseball vagabond and “learned how hard the road was / going down and then up another man’s stairs,” as Dante is told in The Divine Comedy when his ancestor Cacciaguida warns him of his impending exile in Canto XVII al Paradiso. Valenzuela would go on to pitch for five more MLB teams over the next seven seasons and one Mexican League team before retiring in 1997. However, Valenzuela’s passion for the game was not yet consumed and he continued to pitch for the Mexican League of winter. teams reached 40 years.

Valenzuela’s death comes at a poignant time as the Dodgers prepare to face the New York Yankees in this year’s World Series. Yankees-Dodgers is the most common World Series matchup in sports history — baseball’s equivalent of the Celtics-Lakers NBA Finals. But the Yankees and Dodgers haven’t met in the World Series since 1981, the year Valenzuela swept the Dodgers to the National League pennant. During that ’81 streak, the Dodgers dropped the first two games and faced a seemingly insurmountable 3-0 hole. LA sent its rookie sensation to the mound in a must-win Game 3. Valenzuela, despite not being as dominant as he was in the regular season, still won the game, turning around the series, which the Dodgers won in the latter in six. games — their first World Series victory against former New York rivals since 1963. Hopefully Valenzuela’s spirit will be with the Dodgers during this Fall Classic to help them beat those damn Yankees again.

Daniel Ross Goodman is a Washington Examiner contributing writer and author, most recently, of Soloveitchik’s Children: Irving Greenberg, David Hartman, Jonathan Sacks, and the Future of Jewish Theology in America.