After beating the Texas Rangers on Sept. 3, the Boston Red Sox were 84-54. Although half a game behind the Yankees in the American League East, the Red Sox had a nine-game lead over the Tampa Bay Rays for the wild card and roughly a 99.6 percent chance of making the playoffs. Fast forward one excruciating month to a dead heat with Tampa coming into tonight's bitter imbroglio. Boston struggles ahead of laughingstock Baltimore by a single run until a rain delay clears the field, leaving them in the surreal position of rooting for the hated Yankees playing down in Florida. They can only watch from the sidelines as the rival Rays, tied with Boston in the pennant race but down 7-0 against New York, roar back to life with six runs in the eighth inning and a tie run on the final pitch at the bottom of the ninth. And then, after blowing two different strikes that would have salvaged the game, Boston loses to Baltimore, completing what is arguably the worst late-breaking collapse in the history of major league baseball.
posted by Rhaomi on Sep 28, 2011 - 196 comments

Which place looks safer? Which place looks more unique? Which place looks more upper-class? MIT is crowdsourcing a "perception network" to analyze people's subconscious judgments about urban spaces. Preliminary results for Boston, New York City, Vienna, Salzburg, and Linz (Austria). [more inside]
posted by desjardins on Sep 28, 2011 - 45 comments

The US Department of Justice has announced arrests in four states of ten alleged members of a “deep-cover” Russian spy ring whose ultimate goal was apparently to infiltrate U.S. policy-making circles. So much for burger diplomacy? [more inside]
posted by zarq on Jun 28, 2010 - 70 comments

EveryScape launched this morning. It's a ground-level mapping service similar to Google's "Street View", only it offers you an "autodrive" feature that automatically moves you through a city or down a ski slope. There are links to information about stores and restaurants in the view and the ability to go inside buildings and look around. It currently features views from Aspen, New York, Boston, and Miami. And of course the obligatory view of a colorful mime with a man-bag. [via]
posted by cashman on Oct 29, 2007 - 12 comments

The latest affront in a war of good vs. evil.
posted by lazywhinerkid on Jun 11, 2004 - 7 comments

Fan summits Everest, burns Yankee cap This is what I call a real fan. I tip my hat. (only a redsox fan can understand)
posted by justgary on Jun 20, 2001 - 19 comments