The first World Series I remember watching at all was 1996, and I’ve watched at least some of every World Series since, but the first World Series I really remember, the first one in which I was completely absorbed with the statistics and nuances and really understood the game with some level of sophistication, was 2001.
The 2001 World Series was the best World Series I’ve ever watched. No individual game reached Game 6 in 2011 levels, but three of them were really close. The bottom of the ninth of the seventh game included the greatest closer ever blowing a save and a walk-off hit, for goodness sake.