Double Curse of '86
October 20, 2006 12:19 AM   Subscribe

The Double Curse of '86 - Many sports fans remember the game 6 error (youtube) of Bill Buckner that cost the Red Sox the championship. But a supposed new discovery seems to show that that the Sox were saddled with not one curse - but two. It could be real or just a new angle for the 20th anniversary. (previously on metafilter)
posted by bob sarabia (32 comments total)
 
In case you're wondering why Buckner would wear a Chicago glove, he played for the Cubs from 1977 - 1984 and then was traded to Boston in 84.
posted by bob sarabia at 12:53 AM on October 20, 2006


I tire easily of Sox fans' talk of curses. At least they've had some close calls. Cubs fans get jack.

My poor devoted great-grandfather never missed a game and went to his grave with nothing but a long distant youthful memory of the Cubs as champs. At least he had that. The rest of us get jack.
posted by Pollomacho at 1:02 AM on October 20, 2006


erm, are the sox playing this year?
posted by hypersloth at 2:49 AM on October 20, 2006


Buckner's error is a memorable baseball moment, and a great piece of video. But in the spirit of accuracy, if not the spirit of staying on-topic, that error in NO WAY lost the Red Sox that championship.

By the time the ball rolled up toward Buckner it was a TIE game. Bill makes the play and maybe the Red Sox win, but maybe they don't. Also, it was game 6, and losing that game only forced a game 7, which the Red Sox lost handily.
posted by dirtdirt at 4:18 AM on October 20, 2006


Thanks for digging up old nightmares. I was finally over it ... a little roller up the bag! ARGGHHGHH

Curses Batman... When the Red Sox did win it was 86 years since their last one... I'm just saying that the 86 series wasn't the one we were supposed to win.
posted by Gungho at 4:22 AM on October 20, 2006


I can't let a discussion of Game 6 go by without linking to this.
posted by Mayor West at 5:16 AM on October 20, 2006


Exactly, dirtdirt. Buckerner's error was the culmination of a meltdown that inning involving Rich Gedman and Bob Stanley. I don't feel like looking it up, but I'm pretty sure Buckner was a lifetime .300 hitter, with more career hits than Joe Dimaggio.

I can watch that sort of thing, and images of Babe Ruth, an awful lot easier since the Sox won the WS two years ago.

Here's a real derail-- what an amazing game last night. Chavez's catch, Suppan working around Rolen's error in the 6th, Molina's HR, Wainwright's curveball out of nowhere in the 9th... a classic.
posted by ibmcginty at 6:05 AM on October 20, 2006


that error in NO WAY lost the Red Sox that championship
I disagree.

posted by kirkaracha at 6:14 AM on October 20, 2006


I can't let a discussion of Game 6 go by without linking to this.

Ahh, that took some of the sting out of last night. Fucking Beltran, watching strike three go by, what did he think he was doing? What a waste of an unexpectedly superb pitching job and that incredible catch by Chavez... mutter grumble... fuckin'... Goddam Mets...

Anyway, thanks, Mayor West, that did my heart good.
posted by languagehat at 6:17 AM on October 20, 2006


Ahh, that took some of the sting out of last night. Fucking Beltran, watching strike three go by, what did he think he was doing?

It is taking all my strength to subdue my rage at Beltran for going out like a fucking chump, however, a friend of mine noted that through the divisional series and the NLCS Beltran went to 0-2 in the count and then took the next two or three pitches for balls on nearly all his at bats. Apparently he was working the same M.O. here. The way I see it though, you are down two runs in the bottom 9 with bases loaded and the entire series on the line you FOUL THE MOTHERFUCKING PITCH OFF TO STAY ALIVE GOD FUCKING DAMMIT ESPECIALLY WITH DELGADO UP NEXT FOR FUCK'S SAKE.
posted by spicynuts at 6:37 AM on October 20, 2006 [1 favorite]


Spicynuts and languagehat, I know it sucks to see Beltran go down looking, but Wainwright's curveball was terrific last night. He froze Beltran and Floyd with it for strike 3 (got Beltran to foul it off for strike 2, too), and got Reyes to line out to center on a curveball, too.

It'd be one thing if Beltran just watched a fastball go by, but Wainwright's curve was real tough to hit last night. Tough to anticipate, too-- he's a rookie, pitching against Beltran with an 0-2 count. I expected him to nibble at the edges, try to get Beltran to chase something out of the zone. Instead, an unexpected, unhittable 12-to-6 curveball.

The bigger question is, why didn't Randolph send someone up there to bunt, rather than sending Cliff Floyd up there, with guys on first and second and no one out and the top of the order coming up?
posted by ibmcginty at 6:56 AM on October 20, 2006


Thanks, spicynuts, that did my heart good too. Wish I could have watched the game with you; the cats just don't have their hearts in it.

ibmcginty: What you say is true, but you are down two runs in the bottom 9 with bases loaded and the entire series on the line you FOUL THE MOTHERFUCKING PITCH OFF TO STAY ALIVE GOD FUCKING DAMMIT ESPECIALLY WITH DELGADO UP NEXT FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

Oh, and why didn't Randolph send someone up there to bunt? Because the fucking Mets can't fucking bunt. They've never been able to bunt in all the years I've been a Mets fan (25 years now, yikes). Fucking Mets...
posted by languagehat at 7:03 AM on October 20, 2006


There was a theory bantered around by bored sportswriters in the mid-late 90s that in a playoff series the team with fewer former Cubs was more likely to win.

And Wainwright's curveball really was unhittable. Only Reyes could get a piece of it, and all he could do was fly out. I've never seen a curveball with such a tight break -- most 12-to-6 pitches are sweeping curves like Barry Zito's. It reminded me a lot of Randy Johnson's slider back when he was unhittable.
posted by dw at 7:03 AM on October 20, 2006


You are saying that Carlos Beltran cannot get a small piece of his bat on a rookie curveball? Not even enough to slap it into the expensive seats behind the Mets dugout? Fine...then suck it up and step into it and take a shot in the back!

Kidding about that last part.
posted by spicynuts at 7:24 AM on October 20, 2006


Tom Glavine can bunt.
posted by ericost at 7:25 AM on October 20, 2006


Whatever, the Cards don't have a chance against the Tigers. It'll be like the last time these idiots made the WS.
posted by spicynuts at 7:42 AM on October 20, 2006


Yeah, I'll watch the Series just to see the Cards get their teeth kicked in.
posted by languagehat at 7:48 AM on October 20, 2006


The "Curse" of 1986 is that the Red Sox had a below-average hitter who was also a poor fielder playing first base. You need a guy who can pick it or a guy who can mash, on of those. But at least he only finished second in the league in grounding into double plays!
posted by rogue haggis landing at 8:22 AM on October 20, 2006


Bill Buckner was a FIVE time MVP who hit .289 over 22 seasons. In 1986 he hit .267 with 102 RBIs and 18 HRs. That is not exactly below average. By comparison in 1986 Keith Hernandex hit 13 HRs and had 83 RBIs. Over 17 seasons he hit .296.
posted by spicynuts at 8:52 AM on October 20, 2006


Oh and to put it in even better perspective:

2006 Carlos Delgado: .265 38 HRs 114 RBIs

2006 Carlos Beltran: .275 41 Hrs 116 RBIs

And I'm a Mets fan.
posted by spicynuts at 8:56 AM on October 20, 2006


Whatever, the Cards don't have a chance against the Tigers. It'll be like the last time these idiots made the WS.

Yeah, I'll watch the Series just to see the Cards get their teeth kicked in.


I hope this thread is cathartic for you two. Get it out of your systems and move on.
posted by F Mackenzie at 9:11 AM on October 20, 2006


You are coming into a thread that is about an obsession with one play that happened 20 years ago and you are telling me to get last night out of my system and move on? Clearly you are not a baseball fan.
posted by spicynuts at 9:21 AM on October 20, 2006


Clearly I'm a Cardinal fan. thpbbbt.
posted by F Mackenzie at 9:22 AM on October 20, 2006


Even Met fans (the few astute ones) say the Buckner error is over-rated.
posted by wfc123 at 9:23 AM on October 20, 2006


Bill Buckner was a FIVE time MVP who hit .289 over 22 seasons. In 1986 he hit .267 with 102 RBIs and 18 HRs. That is not exactly below average.

In 1986 Bill Buckner was 36 with shot knees and an on base percentage (adjusted for his ballpark) 20 points below league average and the aforementioned double play problem. Look at his OPS+ (on base percentage plus slugging percentage as a percentage of the league average; 100 is league average, higher is better) for the years around 1986:

age 30 1981 130
age 31 1982 116
age 32 1983 101
age 33 1984 91
age 34 1985 106
age 35 1986 98
age 36 1987 79
age 37 1988 73

That's the classic line of a guy at the end of the line. In the three years 1984-1986 you're looking at a guy basically right at the league average, with no defense and no speed. His raw numbers look superficially OK because of the park, and he gets 102 RBIs because Wade Boggs and Marty Barrett were on base all of the time in front of him and people were scared of Rice after him. But Buckner wasn't a hitter by 1986, and he couldn't play the field. That's not a championship first baseman.
posted by rogue haggis landing at 9:55 AM on October 20, 2006


Oh and Buckner never won an MVP. Scroll down; he got votes for it 5 times, coming in 10th, 10th, 14th, 17th, and 25th. He won a batting title in 1980 and that was about it. For his career he was a solid ballplayer, but he was never great, and in 1986 he was done.
posted by rogue haggis landing at 9:59 AM on October 20, 2006


That's not a championship first baseman.

Dave Bergman/Darrell Evans
Scott Spiezio
Mark Grace
Tino Martinez
Jeff Conine

Those are championship first basemen with Buckneresque, or sub-Bucknerian, hitting performances.

And it's easier to drive in 100 runs on some teams than others, to be sure, but they don't just hand out 100-RBI seasons.
posted by ibmcginty at 10:09 AM on October 20, 2006


Do people actually believe in sports curses? I'm not being snarky, I'm honestly asking. I don't follow sports at all, but I have seen my otherwise easygoing co-workers go from calmly talking to standing up and screaming in rage at a tv over some poorly executed play. I've seen completely rational people engage in superstitious silliness to ensure that their team will win. These are the same people who would look at you funny if you avoided crossing a black cat's path or threw a pinch of salt over your shoulder if you spilled it on the table. But they will explain that if they don't wear their jersey every game day, the Packers will lose.

So what is it about sports that makes people believe this stuff? (if they do, in fact, believe it)
posted by quin at 11:09 AM on October 20, 2006


If you have to ask, you'll never know (as they say). All I can tell you is that I'm an intelligent, rational guy in most ways, but I'm quite capable of standing up and screaming in rage at a tv over some poorly executed play (in fact, I was doing that just last night), and during the actual sequence of events so brilliantly reproduced in Mayor West's YouTube link, both I and the guy in whose East Village apartment I was watching the game froze in place, unwilling to make the slightest move that might jeopardize the incredible string of luck the Mets were having. (When it was all over and the Mets had, incredibly, won, we poured out into the street—I say "poured" advisedly, because we were drunk as hell by then—and joined the rest of the inhabitants of the city who were out celebrating; it was the highlight of my civic life as a New Yorker.) It obviously reflects some deep atavistic belief in correspondences between the microcosm and the macrocosm, between here and there, some ancient need for meaning in a random universe; you can scoff if you like, but I wouldn't be without it. We're humans, not computers made of meat.
posted by languagehat at 1:51 PM on October 20, 2006


Screw the red sox. They took themselves out of contention by refusing to add black players to their rosters for fear of alienating their fan base- they were the last team in baseball to integrate. Shrink the talent pool you can draw from, compete with great teams on the east coast that integrated (and got great players out of it), and it's no wonder that they sat out so many playoffs.

There was no curse- only their just deserts.
posted by jenkinsEar at 2:29 PM on October 20, 2006


His error didn't cost them squat. The game was already tied.
posted by skepticallypleased at 2:25 PM on October 21, 2006


His error didn't cost them squat. The game was already tied.

And after his error the game was untied. Jesus, he didn't lose the game by himself, but he was a part of it, and that was a big play. To say the error didn't cost them is absolutely false.
posted by justgary at 7:55 AM on October 25, 2006


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