The centenary All-Ireland hurling final in 1984 was famously transported to a refurbished Semple Stadium, Cork beating Offaly with ease.
The 100th anniversary of the National Hurling League has naturally attracted far less hoopla - in fact, borderline no hoopla - and there has been some disquiet over both the venue and the scheduling arrangements for the final.
In Cork, where demand for hurling tickets has been notably hot lately, they're not impressed at being grouped together on the same bill as the 1B decider, county board chairman Patrick Horgan branding the decision as a "shambles."
Alongside that, some pundits, Shane McGrath and Brian Carroll among them, have called for the hurling league finals to be moved to Croke Park, following the football template.
The GAA could be forgiven for being caught unawares by that particular clamour. The hurling league final has always been a moveable feast, with Croker holding just three this century. (In 1999, Cusack Park in Ennis was deemed a grand enough stage for the Tipp-Galway league decider).
Last year's GAA financial report showed a massive jump in income generated from the hurling league, a detail solely attributed to Cork's appearance in the final, which produced a sellout crowd in SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh. This year, in a slightly smaller venue, we've another sellout.
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This season's league has already seen a new record posted. The Cork-Tipperary game in Páirc Uí Chaoimh attracted a crowd of 30,910, an all-time record crowd for a 'regular season' league game.
The great Cyril Farrell put it succinctly on the Smaller Fish podcast this week when he observed that Cork have "two separate followings - a more mature following and then a younger crowd that have never seen them win much."
It's obviously the latter who are lighting flares on the terraces at Munster Championship games and propelling much of the hype that surrounds the current Cork side.
In their yearning, they're not dissimilar to the 20-something Irish fans in Prague last week, desperate to see the Boys in Green at a World Cup with their own eyes, rather than on Reeling in the Years.
It's been a good league for Cork in terms of shedding off the trauma from last year's All-Ireland final debacle, reminding them that they're still very close to the holy grail.
Ben O'Connor has, unwittingly or not, made himself the centre of attention with a few colourfully candid post-match interviews, becoming hurling's answer to Damien Duff.
None of O'Connor's outbursts about the oppressive influence of the referees' assessors "above in the stand" were particularly original. Brian Cody was banging more or less the same drum from about 2007 onwards.
There was a touch of irony about his 'where have all the broken hurleys gone?' lament.
After all, analysts have noted that the absence of broken hurls nowadays has less to do with over-zealous officialdom - though it may be a partial factor - and more to do with hurling's evolution into a possession sport, in which overhead pulls and groundstrokes are generally discouraged by coaches.
This was a trend in which the O'Connors' Newtownshandrum club were very much pioneers in the early 2000s, their once controversial style being heavily embraced by Donal O'Grady's Cork team of the time.
O'Connor's Cork are perceived to have upped the ante physically, especially after their narrow win in Salthill, when Mark Coleman and Rob Downey were lucky to escape red cards.
Michael Duignan observed on the RTÉ GAA Podcast this week that Tommy O'Connell had earned a regular starting spot under O'Connor on account of the aggression he brings in the middle third.
This, too, may be overstated given that Cork did come out on top, eventually, in an incredibly bruising and lightly refereed Munster final last June.
Their hunger for goals remains undimmed. For the second league running, they are comfortably the highest goalscorers in 1A, with 14 in total.
Six of them did arrive in a rather facile victory of Offaly in Round 7, though it was a small wonder they only managed three away to Kilkenny. Hurler of the Year nominee Brian Hayes, still an incredibly potent weapon in the full-forward line, is responsible for five of them.
Cork's only loss in the league came in the Gaelic Grounds, though the game is of limited relevance given O'Connor's relatively experimental line-up on the night. Though they lost by eight that evening, the Cork manager was strikingly chipper in his post-match interview and even voiced approval of Sean Stack's refereeing display.
For his named team this weekend, Micheál Mullins has gotten the nod at wing-back ahead of Coleman, while William Buckley is down to start in the full-forward line.
Limerick are aiming for a fourth league title in the John Kiely era. In the early phase of their dominance, they won back-to-back leagues in 2019 and 2020, the latter being completed deep in the Covid period, where the league final against Clare doubled as a Munster SHC first round.
Since then, they've tended to take or leave the league. Though their players have always remained on-message, insisting they've targeted every league equally, it's hard for outsiders to square their abject league showings in 2021 and 2022 with their subsequent triumphant marches to the All-Ireland title.
They did pick up a third league win in swaggering fashion in 2023, devouring Kilkenny in the final. Significantly - or perhaps not - this was followed up by a scratchy Munster campaign, in which they came perilously close to being eliminated. Their last two league campaigns have been indifferent.
This one appeared to be more of the same with a loss to Waterford in their opener.
They've won five from five since then, a run highlighted by a thundering 15-point victory over Tipp in Thurles. Their second quarter power-play against Galway was awesome, although they faded in the second half and might have lost altogether had Brian Concannon connected with a last-minute rebound attempt.
Had that gone in, we'd be previewing a Cork-Galway league decider.
This season has been notable for the increased player turnover in attack. Aidan O'Connor - whose father Joe captained Limerick to a league title in 1992 - has gone from being a bit-parter to their primary free-taker in attack.
He hit 0-06 from play in the Thurles demolition job, as did Shane O'Brien at full-forward. Cathal O'Neill, another player who has yet to start an All-Ireland final, is established at wing-forward and fired 1-06 from play against Galway.
It's anticipated that today will be the second (third if you include Munster League) of several Limerick-Cork clashes this year and certainly not the most important.
Cork thrashed Tipperary in last April's league final - their first in 27 years - and almost no one referenced it by year's end.
Nonetheless, both protagonists stress they'll be going full-tilt for silverware this afternoon.
The Cork manager did utter the timeless phrase "ah sure, 'tis only the league" in the aftermath of the win over Tipperary but he's adamant that there'll be no shadow-boxing this Sunday, citing his own failure to win a league as a player.
"I have no league medal and I'd love to have one," O'Connor told reporters this week. "It's the second-biggest competition in our game."
O'Connor lost league finals as a player in 2002 and 2010. To go one better as a manager will be a tall order.
With the benefit of home advantage, their still peerless record in finals, and the motivation at having to atone for last year's Munster final defeat, we'll give the nod to Limerick to claim their fourth league crown for the current generation of players.
Before all that, and much to Cork's annoyance, the 1B decider between Clare and Dublin will be played off as the curtain-raiser.
Both teams have already achieved more or less what they wanted out of the league.
After their win over Wexford, Brian Lohan was fairly blunt in admitting they didn't want to get stuck in the second tier for more than one season and "letting standards drop". He also expressed concern about what the absence of games against the top tier would mean for their Munster tilt.
On the plus side, Lohan acknowledged it gave him more leeway to try out players. They used well over 30 players, with Diarmuid Stritch and Jack O'Neill impressing.
Clare did win the league game between the sides in Ennis but needed a late, late Tony Kelly goal to edge a highly competitive encounter.
The Dubs did go one better than last year and secured promotion, albeit only on score difference. They had almost blown it against a depleted Wexford side in Croke Park.
They had been reduced to 13 men in a tempestuous game, Niall Ó Ceallacháin and Keith Rossiter giving each other the hair-dryer treatment at one particularly heated moment late on.
Trailing by a point, the numerically disadvantaged Dubs managed to rustle up an equaliser, Chris Crummey lashing it over.
Three years ago, Dublin faced Clare in Limerick in an All-Ireland quarter-final and were utterly annihilated.
They've developed significantly since then and stunned the hurling world with their takedown of Limerick last summer. Clare, with de facto home advantage and a 100% record, are favourites but a closer game is expected.
