The 1967 World Series is referred to, in Ken Coleman’s The Impossible Dream, as “the series nobody lost.” Coleman describes Jim Lonborg as just not having enough steam to make it through Game 7 on two days’ rest. Six innings, six earned runs just isn’t going to get the job done, sadly. As I mentioned in a response to Puma, there’s no talk of curses or anything. Just a great World Series that didn’t break the right way.
Obviously, we’re all referring back to 1967 when considering this World Series—no one even had to listen to the announcers at Game 1 to understand why Yaz was on the mound—Yaz who is less available to the public than I am. But there’s something valuable to looking back to then, too. The 1967 Series is pre-”Curse,” pre-Munson/Fisk, pre-media inflating this Yankee/Sox rivalry to the point where I wonder how much I hate the Yankees just because ESPN tells me to.
Puma, in his comment, seems to suggest that the “curse” is about the Yankees. It’s about beating the Yankees. We sell Ruth, the Yankees win 26 rings, and we win nothing. Part of the stupidity about the myth is that it’s set up in such a meaningless fashion. The Sox would never win a ring by beating the Yankees—so as rivals, they can only be rivals for the pennant. But no one complains that the Sox have “only” won the penant four times since World War II. No one says that that sort of record is indicative of a curse—or of choking or anything. In the past 60 years, it’s pretty much been the same eight or so teams winning the pennant. So even with the best odds, the Sox would have made it, what, 7.5 times? Five seems to be a pretty decent rate. Since 1945, only three teams have been to the WS more times than the Sox (from the AL): New York, Oakland, and Baltimore. The latter two have been six times—so only once more than the Red Sox. Furthermore, though Puma notes correctly that the Sox are 1–3 in the postseason against the Yanks, this victory this year still isn’t the “first” time the Sox beat the Yanks since the sale of Ruth: Every year the Sox made it to the World Series (46, 67, 75, 86) are, by definition, years the Sox beat the Yanks.
So the curse, even if it existed, had to be about not being able to win the Series. That’s why it’s dumb that the Yankees fans have been the group to relish the curse the most (after, I guess, familia Shaughnessy), to even be waiting in Game 7, facing elimination, with their stupid Babe Ruth portraits and “1918″ chants. The Yanks have not “always”—or even ever—stood between the Sox and postseason success. Most notably, it’s been the Cardinals, Reds, and Mets; not one a team I hate. I hated the Mets until college, but now they’re almost my most likeable NL team—their fans hate the Yanks maybe even more than the Sox fans do—and, c’mon, how is it not possible to like the mid-80s Mets? The Sox fucked themselves in 86—Stanley had no business coming out, Buckner should have been benched, etc. But they still had Game 7 to win, and they blew that, too. They fucked themselves in 78, too (perhaps the birthdate of the current rivalry), when the Gerbil left Spaceman on the bench.
What I’m setting up here, then, is the question I was rehearsing in my comment to Whet:
Will there be any—and I mean any—curse shit among the fans at Busch?
I say no. None at all. Cards fans are variously called the greatest in the world—a true baseball town with a firm reverence for tradition. They know the Curse is junk. Even without the anti-Semitism of the Curse of the Bambino, they know to disregard it, I think.
To me, should that be the case, there’ll be a lesson in all of that.
I’ve been very impressed with the Sox lately, even getting pretty damned optimistic. I think the Red Sox have swung and missed at a total of 18 pitches from Cardinal pitchers. That’s simply not going to yield wins for St. Louis, especially not now that the Red Sox bullpen is in cruise control (despite the mess of Game 1). I’m excited. And I’m sad—since I also admire the Cards. I admire their ability push aside the McGwire mediocrity and become a pennant-winning team without him. Still, the Sox are filling everyone with confidence.
And that confidence, of course, is part of the idea of the suffering Sox fan. Of course we’ll be confident going into the WS—how else will the crushing defeat be more crushing? But it won’t happen. Sure, being up 2–0 means little, but it doesn’t mean as little as being at 1–1 or down 0–2.
Plus, this team just wants it, badly. They were so close last year, and this year they’ve managed to show that they’ve learned: they cut the dead weight, added a hero, and had heroes emerge from the ashes of last season. This is how baseball is supposed to work, btw.
Larry just emailed me from Budapest, though, with some words on his own conflict. They’ve sucked him in again, too. In 86, remember, the Sox took the first two from the Mets, too, figuring they only needed one win in Fenway to seal the deal. Confidence can kill you, but the point is to remember the words a fan once posed to the bosox list:
Remember, God put the Red Sox on the earth to test us.
So start thinking: No DH, Cardinals are unstoppable at home, Suppan will be getting whiffs.
But I still love my Sox.
And now I’m finishing this terribly disjointed piece.
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