Danny Jackson Opens Up on Little-Known Royals World Series Feat

Fans of the Kansas City Royals know the 1985 World Series as one of the great comebacks in team history.

What many of them may not know is that pitcher Danny Jackson did something in that series that no other pitcher has done in the postseason, according to MLB.com, and he had no idea about it for 30 years.

The Royals were down three games to one against the St. Louis Cardinals when Jackson took the mound for Game 5 in St. Louis.

Kansas City led 4-1 in the seventh inning when Jackson struck out Terry Pendleton, Tom Nieto and Brian Harper on nine pitches, the only immaculate inning in postseason history.

The Royals went on to win 6-1, and that win started the comeback that ended with a title.

Jackson almost did not get the chance, since on the very first pitch of the inning Pendleton hit a foul popup near the third-base dugout, and George Brett slid feet first into the dugout chasing it before just missing the catch.

Jackson pitched all nine innings that night, allowing one run on five hits.

Nobody talked about it at the time, because the term immaculate inning was not in use yet and the TV broadcast never mentioned it.

Jackson only found out at the 2015 World Series, when he was sitting in the stands with his family and a trivia question on the scoreboard brought it up.

"It took me 30 years to know that I even did it," Jackson told MLB.com. "I had no idea."

Jackson was only 23 that October, and Game 5 was not even his first big moment of the playoffs.

He had already thrown a shutout in Game 5 of the ALCS against Toronto when the Royals were facing elimination in that series too.

In the regular season, he went 14-12 with a 3.42 ERA over 32 starts and 208 innings.

He went on to have a long career, with a 23-8 record and a 2.73 ERA for the Cincinnati Reds in 1988, when he finished second in the National League Cy Young voting.

He still makes his home in Kansas City, where he spent five of his 15 big-league seasons.

Stories like this one are part of what makes the Royals special to their fans, and they hit home after a rough year.

The 2026 club finished 69-93 and fifth in the American League Central, and the World Series that just ended was a wakeup call for the whole division.

The 1985 team won because young pitchers like Jackson came up big when it counted.

Kansas City needs that same growth from its current staff, and there is a strong case for building the rotation around pitcher Noah Cameron as one of those young arms.

I love that Jackson's moment is finally getting its due, and I hope it pushes the front office to think about how the next title team gets built.

There was already at least one lesson to take from the 2026 playoffs, and Jackson's story shows what young pitching can do in October.