Back in the days when baseball teams were baseball teams, the old Milwaukee Braves were in the race for the National League pennant. In a crucial late season game against the Chicago Cubs, pitcher Mel Famie had thrown a perfect game through seven innings. In the seventh inning his arm suddenly went lame! The trooper that Mel was though, he tried to continue. With two outs Ron Santo hit a skyrocketing shot which Hank Aaron made a leaping catch of at the wall to keep the perfect game intact.

In the dugout between innings Jesus Alou notices Mel was in pain and asked him what was the matter. “I don’t know,” Famie replied, sucking down a beer, “the arm just went out, but I’ll be alight.” So in the eighth inning Mel proceed to strike out Kenny Hubbs, Billy WIlliams and Ernie Banks on nine pitches. But when Mel came to bat in the bottom of the eighth, Cub pitcher Larry Jackson hit Mel with a pitch on the elbow and his arm went out again. Before going out to pitch the ninth inning Famie drank himself another beef. When he reached the mound he was his old self again and struck out the side to get his perfect game.

Over the last few weeks of the season catcher Del Crandell noticed that every time Mel’s arm went out, a beer between innings would magically heal it. So Mel arranged with Crandell to have a six-pack stashed behind the water cooler just in case.

The Braves went on to play in the World Series against the New York Yankees. The series was tied at three games apiece, and the deciding game was at Yankee Stadium in New York. With the game scoreless in the bottom of the ninth and Mel pitching magnificently (he had been sucking a beer between almost every inning), the Yankees managed to get the bases loaded. By now Mel’s beer exploits had become national news, and the pitcher’s mound was showered with Pabst Blue Ribbon cans by die-hard Brave fans who had made the trip. Eddie Matthews persuaded Mel to chug one last beer for good luck. Famie downed the beer in ten seconds, but proceeded to throw a ball that was a fraction of an inch outside and walk in the winning run.

After the game Howard Cosell was interviewing Casey Stengal. Casey held up the Pabst beer can Mel had emptied and said to the national television audience, “This is the beer that made Mel Famie walk us!”