But in the modern era of baseball, the starter is almost always out of the game by the 9th inning, and any late inning heroics have to be performed against the other team's closer, who usually has one of the lowest ERA's on the team.
And in order for there to be heroics, it usually means you're trailing in the game.
So really, getting the starter out of the game has little to do with late inning heroics. They're certainly not a 'fairytale'.