Lou Gehrig Benches Himself, Ending the Streak at 2,130

On May 2, 1939, Lou Gehrig walked into manager Joe McCarthy's office at Briggs Stadium in Detroit and told him to write someone else's name on the lineup card. After 2,130 consecutive games, the streak was over.

Gehrig knew something was wrong. His batting average had cratered to .143 in eight games. His legs wouldn't cooperate. A few days earlier, after fielding a routine grounder, his teammates had congratulated him on the play, and the praise stung because it meant they had noticed how difficult ordinary movements had become. "They were patronizing me," Gehrig later said.

Babe Dahlgren replaced him at first base. Gehrig carried the lineup card to home plate before the game, and when the public address announcer told the Detroit crowd that Gehrig's consecutive games streak had ended, the fans gave him a standing ovation. He tipped his cap, returned to the dugout, and sat down.

Six weeks later, on June 19, doctors at the Mayo Clinic diagnosed him with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, the degenerative disease that now bears his name. He was 36 years old. He would never play again.

The streak had begun on June 1, 1925, when Gehrig pinch-hit for Pee Wee Wanninger. The next day he started at first base, and he didn't leave the lineup for fourteen years. He played through broken fingers, back spasms, and beanballs. Cal Ripken Jr. would eventually surpass the record in 1995, but no one has surpassed the way Gehrig ended it, walking away quietly because he felt he was hurting the team.