Aint No Soppin' Me: Bambino's Curse Continues For Boston

NEW YORK—Although scientific thinking and skepticism loom large in our society, it must have been difficult for the 165,000 people who filed through Yankee Stadium’s turnstiles last weekend to believe that only earthly forces governed the latest meeting between the Red Sox and Yankees.

After Pedro Martinez pitched the Sox to a 4-2 victory in last Friday’s rain-delayed contest, the Yankees went on to win both of the final two games by a 9-8 score, with each of the victories coming in the Bronx Bombers’ final at-bat of the game.

The mere numbers and box scores, however, don’t tell the entire tale of this series.

The Red Sox should have swept the Yankees. Bostonians should have been able to celebrate their team pulling even with the Yankees atop the American League East standings. But an extraordinary course of events instead gave the Yanks a comfortable four-game cushion in the division.

On Saturday, the Yankees began the top of the eighth inning leading 6-3 with closer Mariano Rivera on the mound. The half-inning ended with the Yankees trailing 8-6, Rivera in the clubhouse with a sore shoulder and Yankee fans’ confidence shattered.

Still, the Sox managed to lose, in 11 innings.

Having the bases loaded in both the 9th and the 11th wasn’t enough for Boston to score a run off of struggling New York reliever Steve Karsay, and a weak ground-ball fielder’s choice by Robin Ventura that drove home second baseman Alfonso Soriano ultimately gave the Yankees the win.

Things didn’t get better for Boston the next day. Eight pitches into the bottom of the first inning, the Yankees had already scored four runs off Sox starter John Burkett. Even after Boston launched five of Jeff Weaver’s pitches into the stands for home runs, and even after they rallied back to build up leads of 6-5 and 8-7, the Yankees still prevailed.

In typical Red Sox fashion, the team made mistakes in crucial situations and lacked fortune when it counted most.

In the bottom of the ninth inning, after the apparently impending loss had subdued Yankees’ fans jeers of “1918,” Jason Giambi led off as the Red Sox infielders, expecting the former AL MVP to pull the ball, shifted to the right side of the diamond.

On the 10th pitch of his at-bat, Giambi checked his swing on a high-and-tight offering and tapped an excuse-me dribbler that rolled down past the unmanned third base position for a single.

Yankee Stadium roared, and those wearing Red Sox jerseys sat, silent and stunned. Everyone sensed the beginning of the end had arrived.

Bernie Williams followed Giambi by bouncing a single that (of course) skipped under the glove of right fielder Trot Nixon, allowing the runner to score and Williams to advance to third base. The Yanks went on to win with a bases-loaded walk drawn by Jorge Posada.

The Red Sox had once again snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

The phenomenon seen in the final two games of the series, and in so many other memorable moments—Roger Clemens’ ejection in the 1990 American League Championship Series, the ground ball trickling through Bill Buckner’s legs during the 1986 World Series, the unlikely Bucky Dent lofting a lazy fly ball over the Green Monster in 1978, the late-inning collapse in Game Seven of the 1975 World Series—is well-known as the Curse of the Bambino.

Whatever the Curse is—be it an unconscious lack of confidence on the part of the Red Sox, random forces that happen to benefit the Yankees, or in fact something otherworldly—one thing is apparent from last weekend’s series: the Curse continues.

Jason Giambi mused after Sunday’s game, “It’s unbelievable, the magic that kind of happens around here.”

To Red Sox and Yankees fans alike, it may not be unbelievable, but it may as well be magic.

And as the faithful from both cities saw last weekend, it will take something otherworldly—perhaps some favorable karma from Ted Williams’ ghost or Pedro Martinez acquiring the ability to start every single game or even, dare I say it, a players’ strike—to stop the Curse from allowing the Bronx Bombers to disappoint Red Sox fans once again in 2002.