Nadir

[astrozombie]

Game 7, 2003. I was watching with my friends who were Yankee fans - the kind of Yankees fans who asked questions like "who is Andy Pettitte?" and "is Jeter still on the team?" Ya know, people who really appreciated the history of the franchise and were deeply committed to watching the season (sarcasm). Boone hit the homerun and after a fraction of a second, I just went back to my place and fell asleep in my clothes. I'm not sure my friends even noticed what happened.
Also, I know this sounds like Monday morning quarterbacking, but I swear at some point the next morning after thinking about it for a couple of hours I remember thinking that the Sox were going to go ballistic and go for it in 2004. I quickly went from despair to - I wouldn't call it quite excitement - but there was a palpable sense that the Sox were not going to take that loss sitting down. Instead of being crushed, I wanted the next season to start ASAP. I didn't think they would actually win the WS, (or even trade for Schilling), but I remember thinking that team would be pissed and out for blood.

 

[Big Papi's Mango Salsa]

Game 7 of 2003. Easily.

I was a senior in college (Penn State) so the amount of people around who really didn't care about that game was in many ways a blessing. My girlfriend and her roommates were having a Halloween party that night, and she stopped in to check and see if I was coming, sometime around the 6th inning. I told her I'd be there after the game. Obviously we know what happened, Boone hit that home run and I remember just sitting down on the living room floor of my apartment and just staring at the wall until sometime early the next morning.

Oddly enough, the only thing that really made me feel any better was watching the Marlins then take down the Yankees and consoling myself with the though of "there was no way we'd have beaten that Beckett kid either, so might as well have lost before it got to that point - I really hope we trade for him this off-season."

By the time Game 3 of 2004 came around, it just seemed more inevitable that we'd never win than necessarily a "nadir." After that, as we all know, the world changed dramatically.

 

[Hendu At The Wall]

12 years old in '86. Delivering Boston Globes at 5 in the morning and primary memories are the headlines, and the moments I could stand to watch. Clemens in '86 was everything. We finally had a pitcher and he could strike out 20.

That whole post-season was wild. Insane NLCS. The ALCS game 6, with Hendu carrying the ball over the wall, then the home run down to our last strike. Hard to remember, but we still had extra innings and a game 7 to survive. Globe subhed "Henderson can gloat, but almost was goat." The world series with the Shiraldi gut punch, but I was still young enough to believe Game 7 would go better. Still got my 75th anniversary Fenway cap signed by Shiraldi in '87. I was baptized a fan for life and figured a championship was around the corner.

Fast forward to '03, living in Brooklyn. Pedro was a god, and Papi not quite yet. The next morning, riding the subway with Yankee fan kids about 12, celebrating. At least they're happy. It's not zero sum, but in sports there are winners and losers. At least they're happy, I told myself.

Game 3 '04. A huge moment in a season of nothing but huge moments. Walking home down 0-3, I said to my friends, "I feel stupid saying this, but I still feel like they have a chance." My friend said, "Yeah, but the thing is -- it's never happened before."

 

[InstaFace]

Excellent post Ripley. For me Game 7 of the 2003 ALCS was rock bottom. I had people over - I knew the risks but was past caring and the Sox seemed to have the energy going their way. The 0-3 hole in 2004 just seemed like a repeat of the previous year's absurdity. I guess that was less of a sting and more of a dull ache.

That was rock bottom for me too, because it was the end of the series, not merely some indignity along the way to the end of the series. I remember it to perhaps an odd degree. Courtesy of a SoSHer, I'd gotten a last-minute ticket to Game 6, with John "The Napkin" Burkett emerging triumphant to take it to a decider. That night I had gone down to "the red sox bar" in manhattan with my girlfriend and another friend both of whom were from the Boston area, and found that the line to get in went around the corner so we ended up at a somehow-designated overflow location on the next street. It, too, was very crowded, but we'd managed to get seats, and more or less get served all night.

As the 8th inning unfolded, a silence gradually fell over what had been a pretty boisterous bar. People stopped ordering drinks. Conversations ceased or became hushed. Of course we'll score again, we just put up near record numbers for an MLB offense. Of course Timlin and Williamson will hold the line, of course... and then came the 11th. As the ball left the bat of Aaron Boone, three people stood up from their tables or spot on the floor, put their arms in the air, and cheered - marking themselves as the only Yankees fans who'd somehow found themselves in a 99% Red Sox bar in Manhattan on that fateful night. Once their dismembered parts were disposed of and the stains cleaned, we proceeded to - oh, just kidding. But it was darkly funny nonetheless: they cheered, then looked around for someone to high five or wondering what the hell was going on, why wasn't the bar erupting? ...and then the realization of where they were and what just happened hit them, and not knowing what to do but knowing they were marked, they each slunk out of the bar, hopefully having already paid their tabs. Just GTFO'd, before any Sox fan had recovered from the shock enough to start wondering if they ought to grab these fools. Smart dudes, by Yankee fan standards.

And then the shock did hit the rest of us, as moans and sobs came up softly, tabs were paid glumly, and the hush of a bar with hundreds of people became steadily more eerie. Everyone had to get out of there. A line formed at the door, as the step up to the street from the basement-level venue slightly impeded the flow. The three of us walked out to Christopher St and hailed a cab, and rode back uptown to school - and none of us said a single word, the entire ride home. Not even a "God that sucked" or "I can't believe what just happened". I went directly to bed and I'm pretty sure they did as well. And then the next day, I logged on to SoSH to discover oldheads saying that 1986 was worse. How, I'm not sure. I was 20, and I'd sure never felt anything worse. But that was what passed for comfort right then - look guys this absolutely blows, this is a depressing moment of existential despair for us all, but trust me when I say that this other thing 17 years ago was somehow even worse. In those times, that was all the wisdom we could muster for ourselves.

And it was all we had available to us 360-ish days later, as Rip faced the scene from the OP. All except the mild comfort of one thing - sure, that loss was awful, but the series wasn't over. There was time to salvage some dignity, time to make a stand, time for these guys to show up and at least make us feel like they were worth all the cheering, all that 16-1 winning run from August. There was at least a tiny bit of hope - just a fool's hope, but not nothing, and a drowning man will grasp at anything available.

 

[InstaFace]

I've written this before, but it's fun to watch Pedro face Jeter leading off game 5. Pedro quickly goes 0-2 and then whiffs him on the next pitch. Most intense first batter crowd response I can ever remember. Crowd in a frenzy.

Another log on the fire of "2004 ALCS Game 5 was actually one of the best, most-dramatic baseball games ever played". The crowd was out for blood from the first pitch and sustained it for FIVE HOURS AND FORTY FIVE MINUTES. At the start of Game 4, I think half of Fenway was still in the same shock Rip describes from the previous night. Not many people really believed, they just were pot-committed and showed up. Things got going in that game, but it wasn't electric from before first pitch. But by Game 5, most people had already talked themselves into the possibility of a comeback. Definitely Game 5 was the one most in our favor - we've got Pedro starting, it's at home, frankly he should've won Game 1. Even if it all goes down in flames in the Bronx, we'll have salvaged something. We're fuckin' winning tonight. You watch that video, and there's an intensity there that makes the game hold up over the years. I'm not sure it's the very first game I'd show to someone to try and get them into baseball, purely because of its length - but it wouldn't be far off the top of the list either.

 

[Was (Not Wasdin)]

86 was the worst for me. It was a really bad year all around for me, and that WS loss was just the capper (crapper?). I drove home from school to be with my dad for game 6, and when they lost he said "These Fcuking Guys. They are never going to win a World Series while I'm alive." He was right, he passed in 1998.

75 and 78 were tough, but I was young and foolish enough to think "They'll get back there."

After game 7 in 2003, I told anyone who would listen that it really didnt matter, because no one was going to beat the Marlins anyway, they had that "team of destiny" feeling. I was doing it to make myself feel better, but being right helped a little bit.

The suck of both 2003 and and the first 3 games in 2004 were minimized by the Patriots' success. I think the defending champion Pats were 6-0 by the first pitch of Game 4 in 2004, and looking like the best team in the NFL.

 

[tims4wins]

Another log on the fire of "2004 ALCS Game 5 was actually one of the best, most-dramatic baseball games ever played". The crowd was out for blood from the first pitch and sustained it for FIVE HOURS AND FORTY FIVE MINUTES. At the start of Game 4, I think half of Fenway was still in the same shock Rip describes from the previous night. Not many people really believed, they just were pot-committed and showed up. Things got going in that game, but it wasn't electric from before first pitch. But by Game 5, most people had already talked themselves into the possibility of a comeback. Definitely Game 5 was the one most in our favor - we've got Pedro starting, it's at home, frankly he should've won Game 1. Even if it all goes down in flames in the Bronx, we'll have salvaged something. We're fuckin' winning tonight. You watch that video, and there's an intensity there that makes the game hold up over the years. I'm not sure it's the very first game I'd show to someone to try and get them into baseball, purely because of its length - but it wouldn't be far off the top of the list either.

Paging @BaseballJones

 

[BaseballJones]

Paging @BaseballJones

You rang?

View: https://www.amazon.com/Forgotten-Game-2004-ALCS-Yankees/dp/1642939889

I'm actually doing a radio interview tomorrow morning (7:40am eastern) about this, on WILI in Willimantic, CT, with longtime UConn sports color guy Wayne Norman. Will be a very fun conversation.

 

[Pedroia's Itchy Nose]

For me it's 2003 for sure, albeit not for any particularly dramatic reasons. I don't have any story about the circumstances that made it particularly gutting for me in comparison to any other random Sox fan. Game 3 in 2004 didn't hit me the same way, largely because a small part of me never stopped believing that they would pull it off. That part of me woke up when I learned about the history of "Tessie," which was first performed in it's new rendition by the Dropkick Murphys on 6 7/24/04 -- the day of the Varitek brawl game. That game was a turning point in the season for a lot of folks, and the credit usually goes to Tek and Mueller. For me, Tek and Mueller deserve a ton of credit but the small part of me that believed (believes?) in magic was immediately fixed on the idea that the curse was broken by that song. I'm not certain if I learned about the history of "Tessie" that day or soon after, but when I did, that magical thinking part of my brain just decided that this was going to be the year and nothing could change it. So after game 3, while my rational, conscious mind thought that the season was most certainly done, a part of me was thinking that this will just make the eventual victory sweeter. After game 4, my conscious mind started to think "maybe there's a chance." After game 5 it became "this really could happen." After game 6 it became "this really is happening." And after Damon's slam it became "we are absolutely 100% winning this." But that small part of me never didn't believe, and I think that's why game 3 didn't have nearly the sting.

 

[chrisfont9]

You rang?

View: https://www.amazon.com/Forgotten-Game-2004-ALCS-Yankees/dp/1642939889

I'm actually doing a radio interview tomorrow morning (7:40am eastern) about this, on WILI in Willimantic, CT, with longtime UConn sports color guy Wayne Norman. Will be a very fun conversation.

Buying this now. I think I’m the target audience, it’s defo the game I remember least.

 

[tims4wins]

For me it's 2003 for sure, albeit not for any particularly dramatic reasons. I don't have any story about the circumstances that made it particularly gutting for me in comparison to any other random Sox fan. Game 3 in 2004 didn't hit me the same way, largely because a small part of me never stopped believing that they would pull it off. That part of me woke up when I learned about the history of "Tessie," which was first performed in it's new rendition by the Dropkick Murphys on 6/24/04 -- the day of the Varitek brawl game. That game was a turning point in the season for a lot of folks, and the credit usually goes to Tek and Mueller. For me, Tek and Mueller deserve a ton of credit but the small part of me that believed (believes?) in magic was immediately fixed on the idea that the curse was broken by that song. I'm not certain if I learned about the history of "Tessie" that day or soon after, but when I did, that magical thinking part of my brain just decided that this was going to be the year and nothing could change it. So after game 3, while my rational, conscious mind thought that the season was most certainly done, a part of me was thinking that this will just make the eventual victory sweeter. After game 4, my conscious mind started to think "maybe there's a chance." After game 5 it became "this really could happen." After game 6 it became "this really is happening." And after Damon's slam it became "we are absolutely 100% winning this." But that small part of me never didn't believe, and I think that's why game 3 didn't have nearly the sting.

Urban legend that the brawl was a turning point. They didn’t start playing better until a week into August.

Also, that game was late July, not June.

 

[BaseballJones]

Buying this now. I think I’m the target audience, it’s defo the game I remember least.

Thanks! Hope you like it!

 

[Didot Fromager]

A little different for me. I was so emotional over how they just rolled over and died in the 1990 ALCS with the A's that I stopped watching them for about five years. I was a little kid in the Chuck Schilling-Arnie Early-Lu Clinton era but my father entertained me with stories about 1946, 1948, and 1949. I was well versed in how they always fell apart at the last possible minute. The Impossible Dream was a shock but Luis Aparicio falling down was this year's Denny Galehouse. Fisk and Carbo were amazing but game 7 wasn't a surprise. Bucky Dent was a surprise but how different from '49 was '78? And in retrospect, we should have seen the ball rolling through Buckner's legs in the beads of sweat dripping from Schiraldi's face.

What made '90 worse than all of that for me was that it was the capstone of an era of Yawkey, Sullivan, LeRoux, collusion, and greed, venality, and ineptness. None of the games were close, game 1 was a blowout, and Dave Stewart and Dennis Eckersley made the Sox look hopelessly incompetent. I couldn't take it anymore and just walked away from baseball. Missed the Hobson era as a result, which I guess is a good thing.

I was back by 2003 but Boone's HR wasn't all that different than '86 or my dad's stories about '48. Not nearly as bad as watching closeups of Stewart as he ground us to pulp under his heel.

 

[DennyDoyle'sBoil]

Game 6 1986, easily. I was a sophomore in college, in a dorm with a few Red Sox fans and a number of Mets fans. They were also Giants fans, so they rooted for the Bears (who had beaten them in the playoffs) against the Patriots earlier that year and were pretty fucking cruel. I knew game 7 was an afterthought. I remember how hopeful I was after game 2, and then game 6 just was Lucy and the football. I thought about trying to find a bookie to bet money I didn't have on the Mets winning game 7.

The funny part is that there turned out to be a silver lining. At the time, I was smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. I had tried unsuccessfully to quit a few times. I had a guy who got me cartons cheaply, and I always had cigarettes around and it was so hard to quit. Anyway, I woke up after game 6 feeling miserable. I thought to myself that since I was already feeling pretty low, it was the perfect time to quit. What was a little more misery? Problem was, I still had like 7 or 8 packs. I gave them away. Haven't had a cigarette since.

 

[Humphrey]

Damon slam, I think. That was the ohmygodthisismaybehappening moment for me. I was still 100% terrified going into game 7. I was still 100% terrified after Sveum had the runner thrown out at the plate in the first. After Papi homered on like the next pitch, my only thought was that it should have been a 3 run homer, not 2. But when Damon hit the grand slam I thought... ohmygodthisismaybehappening.

This.... the two or three run lead was a staple of past disasters (1975, 1978, 1986 (6 and 7), 2003); and in most of those ballgames there were several opportunities to add on to that lead. That made it 7 and even though there was a brief moment of distress when Pedro came in, that soon passed.

 

[DennyDoyle'sBoil]

This.... the two or three run lead was a staple of past disasters (1975, 1978, 1986 (6 and 7), 2003); and in most of those ballgames there were several opportunities to add on to that lead. That made it 7 and even though there was a brief moment of distress when Pedro came in, that soon passed.

I was still a little shaken after the Pedro inning. To me, the moment I knew the Red Sox would win the world series was Belhorn's home run off the foul pole. Even though they had only scored 2 runs and Pedro had actually recovered pretty well in that inning, the crowd was buzzing and I was buckled in for a stressful couple of innings with a tired bullpen. Belhorn removed any doubt, and also made me think -- ok, there's something different about these guys.

 

[cantor44]

This.... the two or three run lead was a staple of past disasters (1975, 1978, 1986 (6 and 7), 2003); and in most of those ballgames there were several opportunities to add on to that lead. That made it 7 and even though there was a brief moment of distress when Pedro came in, that soon passed.

When Pedro starting giving up runs, I freaked out - yelling at the TV, incensed. My wife ordered me to go take a walk (we were living in Brooklyn). As I walked around the block, I could hear people watching and reacting to the game through apartment windows. I walked back into our apartment at just the moment Bellhorn's fly ball clanked off the foul pole. It took me until THAT to believe they would win.

 

[tims4wins]

I was still a little shaken after the Pedro inning. To me, the moment I knew the Red Sox would win the world series was Belhorn's home run off the foul pole. Even though they had only scored 2 runs and Pedro had actually recovered pretty well in that inning, the crowd was buzzing and I was buckled in for a stressful couple of innings with a tired bullpen. Belhorn removed any doubt, and also made me think -- ok, there's something different about these guys.

When Pedro starting giving up runs, I freaked out - yelling at the TV, incensed. My wife ordered me to go take a walk (we were living in Brooklyn). As I walked around the block, I could hear people watching and reacting to the game through apartment windows. I walked back into our apartment at just the moment Bellhorn's fly ball clanked off the foul pole. It took me until THAT to believe they would win.

I think we were ALL a little shaken during the Pedro inning in the moment. But once he got out of the inning, we probably all had a huge sigh of relief. And I think the Bellhorn HR off the pole was the final "yup, it is officially happening" moment.

Edit: but to be completely honest, every time I see the Sierra squibber off the bat, I think it is going to take some weird bounce/spin and Pokey won't glove it cleanly and the inning will continue etc. We are all deeply, deeply, scarred.

 

[DennyDoyle'sBoil]

I think we were ALL a little shaken during the Pedro inning in the moment. But once he got out of the inning, we probably all had a huge sigh of relief. And I think the Bellhorn HR off the pole was the final "yup, it is officially happening" moment.

Edit: but to be completely honest, every time I see the Sierra squibber off the bat, I think it is going to take some weird bounce/spin and Pokey won't glove it cleanly and the inning will continue etc. We are all deeply, deeply, scarred.

Yeah, we were just so traumatized. But the part where we should have known was actually in the first inning. Damon gets thrown out at the plate for the second out, after Manny gets a hit. Literally the next pitch -- 30 second later -- Papi decides there will be no squander and puts one in the seats. The Belhorn home run was the same. Just when you thought it might be more of the same, the Red Sox found a way. It was something. Never anything like it and probably never will be.

 

[tims4wins]

Yeah, we were just so traumatized. But the part where we should have known was actually in the first inning. Damon gets thrown out at the plate for the second out, after Manny gets a hit. Literally the next pitch -- 30 second later -- Papi decides there will be no squander and puts one in the seats. The Belhorn home run was the same. Just when you thought it might be more of the same, the Red Sox found a way. It was something. Never anything like it and probably never will be.

I agree but - as I wrote upthread - my immediate thought after the Papi HR was not “fuckin a” - it was “we should have 3 runs on the board, not 2”.

 

[TomBrunansky23]

I'll go a bit far afield on this one...1990 ALCS, game 4. We were already down 3-0 to the absolute juggernaut (and eventual World Champion) Oakland A's, after having been swept by the same outfit in 1988. Clemens was my guy then, my favorite player and it wasn't close. It was an afternoon game back here (like a 12:30 start out west!). I ran home from school just in time to see the Rocket get tossed in the second inning for arguing balls and strikes with plate umpire Terry Cooney. Game over, series over, season over.

 

[Bowhemian]

I'll go a bit far afield on this one...1990 ALCS, game 4. We were already down 3-0 to the absolute juggernaut (and eventual World Champion) Oakland A's, after having been swept by the same outfit in 1988. Clemens was my guy then, my favorite player and it wasn't close. It was an afternoon game back here (like a 12:30 start out west!). I ran home from school just in time to see the Rocket get tossed in the second inning for arguing balls and strikes with plate umpire Terry Cooney. Game over, series over, season over.

This is a good one. I loved Clemens. And I fucking hated him after that display.

 

[BrandyWhine]

I was 33 in 1986 and had lived through 1967 and 1975. I will forever be grateful that in 1975, the day after game seven the UMass Daily Collegian's headline read "Red Sox beat Reds three games to four".

October 25, 1986. I was at my parents house with my wife. My dad had turned 70 earlier in the week and we'd celebrated his birthday earlier in the evening.
When Schiraldi got the second out I turned to my mother and said, "Mom, I didn't think I'd ever live to see the Red Sox win the World Series but they're finally going to do it."
But they didn't. On the way home I told my wife "It was like watching a good friend get beat up."

I hope my comment to my mother wasn't the reason the Sox lost the Series. I guess I'll never know.

 

[bob burda]

I’m sure being 15 had a lot to do with how terrible the ‘78 playoff game was for me, but it was more than just that game.

Being only 2yrs into baseball consciousness as of ‘72, that particular season was a disappointing result but also the start of worse, which was the ‘74 collapse. Then ‘75 came, which was a redemption and so much fun for a kid in the final yr of little league, and the team had a bunch of young stars where the oldest of them was Fisk at 25, so it seemed like they should own the baseball world for the next decade, but it just wouldn’t go.

Then the ‘78 team came along to apparently fulfill a portion of that promise….but no.

The whole thing was devastating in that context plus the way that season went….to have them lose 14 of 17 in Sept (a team that good/talented able to do this only through Zimmer’s incompetence), and go from 7 games up to 3.5 down in that time frame, then to go on an 8 game winning streak to force the playoff game, and getting a lead against Guidry (who was ’99 Pedro that one year) but blow it - then have Piniella miraculously stop a ball he lost in the sun (which ends the game if it gets by him), while still having Yaz coming up against a tiring Gossage to tie or win it….and then it all ends on a zero drama nothing pop up to 3rd base (WTF?!).

It was the nut punch of nut punches - ‘86 still including the Hendu game as a balm, though yeah, WS G6 was hard to take; 2003 being infuriating and so depressing; the ‘04 “down 0-3 experience”….all of it bad - but I’m still pissed about ‘78, and will never forgive Don Zimmer for his venal ineptitude and causing me such adolescent grief.

 

[Louisisasoxfan]

I once leaned my head on a public restroom wall. Ew. The wool/poly blend of a New Era cap acted as a shield, but still. I had been standing over a urinal in the men’s restroom of the Piccadilly Pub in Franklin, and as the reality of the 19-8 defeat at the hands of the Yankees tumbled over me like so many bricks, I kind of slowly leaned forward and my forehead gently met the wall in front of me. I think it was plaster, not tile, but don’t hold me to that.

This is just not meant to be, I told myself. Probably because of something I did.

Because it was personal, of course. How could it be any other way? The Sox, they had my name. They knew who I was. My Social Security number was on file somewhere in the bowels of their offices, a microchip had been implanted in the skin under my forearm, surely all of this was One Big Middle Finger to me and my existence, some sort of moral judgment on my activities to this point. I had not led a good enough life yet. I didn’t deserve any sort of baseball happiness. All their postseason foibles were an attack on me, nobody else. Red Sox Nation? Pfft, what do they know? This is all on me. They’re doing this to screw with ME. For my sins, my failings, my decayed humanity. Me.

So I leaned my head on a public restroom wall. Not something I’d advise doing, generally, even at a place as genteel as a suburban Piccadilly Pub.

It was just not meant to be.

Going into the evening the Yanks were up 2 games to none, but the Sox were back at Fenway and a win would make it a series again. It was a see-saw battle for 3 innings, then the Yankees became extremely rude guests and ran away with things, to the point where one might find themselves leaning against a filmy bathroom wall and wondering what the point of it all was.

Grady Little had horrifically botched things the year before, clutching defeat from the jaws of victory against these very Yankees at the most crucial moment possible, a rug-pull played on those Sox fans who truly believed the team’s accursed past was simply due to random bad luck. Or bad management. Or personnel failings.

This indignity, this Grady, this Boone, piled on top of Buckner and Dent and Jim Burton and Armbrister and Ruhle and Aparicio and Jack Hamilton and Enos Slaughter. There were generations of men and women from the corners of New England and all points in between who were sick to their stomachs and looking at themselves in bathroom mirrors wondering why it ever had to be this way. Why? Why?

The Yankees had just beaten the Red Sox 19-8, taking a 3-0 lead in the 2004 American League Championship Series. There would be no World Series for the Sox that year, no redemption for those left prostrate by Grady Little’s idiocy the year before. Baseball does not do karma. The game is its own reward, win or lose. A harsh but needed lesson, brutal in its finality.

I separated my forehead from the wall, exited the bathroom, and left the restaurant sometime after midnight on Sunday, October 17, 2004.

Thank you, that was an enjoyable to read.

I once leaned my head on a public restroom wall. Ew. The wool/poly blend of a New Era cap acted as a shield, but still. I had been standing over a urinal in the men’s restroom of the Piccadilly Pub in Franklin, and as the reality of the 19-8 defeat at the hands of the Yankees tumbled over me like so many bricks, I kind of slowly leaned forward and my forehead gently met the wall in front of me. I think it was plaster, not tile, but don’t hold me to that.

This is just not meant to be, I told myself. Probably because of something I did.

Because it was personal, of course. How could it be any other way? The Sox, they had my name. They knew who I was. My Social Security number was on file somewhere in the bowels of their offices, a microchip had been implanted in the skin under my forearm, surely all of this was One Big Middle Finger to me and my existence, some sort of moral judgment on my activities to this point. I had not led a good enough life yet. I didn’t deserve any sort of baseball happiness. All their postseason foibles were an attack on me, nobody else. Red Sox Nation? Pfft, what do they know? This is all on me. They’re doing this to screw with ME. For my sins, my failings, my decayed humanity. Me.

So I leaned my head on a public restroom wall. Not something I’d advise doing, generally, even at a place as genteel as a suburban Piccadilly Pub.

It was just not meant to be.

Going into the evening the Yanks were up 2 games to none, but the Sox were back at Fenway and a win would make it a series again. It was a see-saw battle for 3 innings, then the Yankees became extremely rude guests and ran away with things, to the point where one might find themselves leaning against a filmy bathroom wall and wondering what the point of it all was.

Grady Little had horrifically botched things the year before, clutching defeat from the jaws of victory against these very Yankees at the most crucial moment possible, a rug-pull played on those Sox fans who truly believed the team’s accursed past was simply due to random bad luck. Or bad management. Or personnel failings.

This indignity, this Grady, this Boone, piled on top of Buckner and Dent and Jim Burton and Armbrister and Ruhle and Aparicio and Jack Hamilton and Enos Slaughter. There were generations of men and women from the corners of New England and all points in between who were sick to their stomachs and looking at themselves in bathroom mirrors wondering why it ever had to be this way. Why? Why?

The Yankees had just beaten the Red Sox 19-8, taking a 3-0 lead in the 2004 American League Championship Series. There would be no World Series for the Sox that year, no redemption for those left prostrate by Grady Little’s idiocy the year before. Baseball does not do karma. The game is its own reward, win or lose. A harsh but needed lesson, brutal in its finality.

I separated my forehead from the wall, exited the bathroom, and left the restaurant sometime after midnight on Sunday, October 17, 2004.

Thank you, that was an enjoyable to read. Hauntings of past memories, a bleak present, and an underlying foreshadowing of what would be.

 

[grepal]

I am very jealous of everyone not old enough to have a rock bottom of Game 6 of the 1986 World Series.

Freshman in college, sitting home with mom, dad, and my younger brother (8th grade). The roller-coaster of that game finally seemed to turn the tide in our favor. Then a slow-motion car crash, followed by the floodgate of emotions opening as that winning run scored to pandemonium in New York. Dad turned off the TV, and nobody said a word. Then as my brother was leaving to head to bed, he said to me "we still have game seven". Dad replied deadpan, "No we don't. It's over." And it was.

1978 playoff game started by Yankee spy Mike Torres still tears at my gut. 1968 was a disappointment but I was 9. 1975 crushed me. 2004 made it all go away in sea of tears of happiness.

 

[Humphrey]

I was 33 in 1986 and had lived through 1967 and 1975. I will forever be grateful that in 1975, the day after game seven the UMass Daily Collegian's headline read "Red Sox beat Reds three games to four".

October 25, 1986. I was at my parents house with my wife. My dad had turned 70 earlier in the week and we'd celebrated his birthday earlier in the evening.
When Schiraldi got the second out I turned to my mother and said, "Mom, I didn't think I'd ever live to see the Red Sox win the World Series but they're finally going to do it."
But they didn't. On the way home I told my wife "It was like watching a good friend get beat up."

I hope my comment to my mother wasn't the reason the Sox lost the Series. I guess I'll never know.

The friends I were with were arguing about who on the Mets they wanted to see make the last out. I always blamed them for having that argument.

 

[Humphrey]

I’m sure being 15 had a lot to do with how terrible the ‘78 playoff game was for me, but it was more than just that game.

Being only 2yrs into baseball consciousness as of ‘72, that particular season was a disappointing result but also the start of worse, which was the ‘74 collapse. Then ‘75 came, which was a redemption and so much fun for a kid in the final yr of little league, and the team had a bunch of young stars where the oldest of them was Fisk at 25, so it seemed like they should own the baseball world for the next decade, but it just wouldn’t go.

Then the ‘78 team came along to apparently fulfill a portion of that promise….but no.

The whole thing was devastating in that context plus the way that season went….to have them lose 14 of 17 in Sept (a team that good/talented able to do this only through Zimmer’s incompetence), and go from 7 games up to 3.5 down in that time frame, then to go on an 8 game winning streak to force the playoff game, and getting a lead against Guidry (who was ’99 Pedro that one year) but blow it - then have Piniella miraculously stop a ball he lost in the sun (which ends the game if it gets by him), while still having Yaz coming up against a tiring Gossage to tie or win it….and then it all ends on a zero drama nothing pop up to 3rd base (WTF?!).

It was the nut punch of nut punches - ‘86 still including the Hendu game as a balm, though yeah, WS G6 was hard to take; 2003 being infuriating and so depressing; the ‘04 “down 0-3 experience”….all of it bad - but I’m still pissed about ‘78, and will never forgive Don Zimmer for his venal ineptitude and causing me such adolescent grief.

Because the tragedy played out over several months*, it wins in a category of its own. The game itself was bad but there have, of course, been worse (2003, 1986).

*It really started in June when Zimmer got the front office to disappear Carbo and, worse, they never replaced him with a comparable bench player; decided that they were not spending extra bucks to bring anyone in combined with no one in the farm system ready to help. Coming out of the All Star break was as bad a stretch (1-9 from July 20-28) as the September swoon.

 

[Skiponzo]

The whole thing was devastating in that context plus the way that season went….to have them lose 14 of 17 in Sept (a team that good/talented able to do this only through Zimmer’s incompetence), and go from 7 games up to 3.5 down in that time frame, then to go on an 8 game winning streak to force the playoff game, and getting a lead against Guidry (who was ’99 Pedro that one year) but blow it - then have Piniella miraculously stop a ball he lost in the sun (which ends the game if it gets by him), while still having Yaz coming up against a tiring Gossage to tie or win it….and then it all ends on a zero drama nothing pop up to 3rd base (WTF?!).

The kicker for me then, and still all these years later, (I was 11 in 1978) was the fact that for the WHOLE FUCKING 1979 SEASON WPIX showed that replay at the beginning of their telecasts. G-Dammit that pissed me off and still kinda does.

 

[BrandyWhine]

The friends I were with were arguing about who on the Mets they wanted to see make the last out. I always blamed them for having that argument.

That helps; thanks.

 

[Pedroia's Itchy Nose]

Urban legend that the brawl was a turning point. They didn’t start playing better until a week into August.

Also, that game was late July, not June.

You're absolutely right, just hit the wrong key. It's 7/24 not 6/24. And it's also true that the Sox didn't immediately catch on fire after the brawl game. They did play the next 12 games at a 7-5 clip, which is about a 95 win pace compared to the 88 win pace they were playing at before that point. You're right though that they really went on a tear starting around the second week of August. While the brawl didn't mark the absolute beginning of the Sox's best stretch of the year, I don't think the feeling that it was a turning point was entirely unjustified. It certainly was the prevailing narrative of the time, and still is today to an extent.

For me though the brawl was never the key thing, it was the song. I actually didn't even realize that the song debuted on the same day as the brawl game until I looked it up while writing my previous post!

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

You're absolutely right, just hit the wrong key. It's 7/24 not 6/24. And it's also true that the Sox didn't immediately catch on fire after the brawl game. They did play the next 12 games at a 7-5 clip, which is about a 95 win pace compared to the 88 win pace they were playing at before that point. You're right though that they really went on a tear starting around the second week of August. While the brawl didn't mark the absolute beginning of the Sox's best stretch of the year, I don't think the feeling that it was a turning point was entirely unjustified. It certainly was the prevailing narrative of the time, and still is today to an extent.

For me though the brawl was never the key thing, it was the song. I actually didn't even realize that the song debuted on the same day as the brawl game until I looked it up while writing my previous post!

I think the reason the brawl game is significant in the lore of 2004 is it showed that there were cracks in the Mo Rivera legend. Mueller doesn't hit that walk-off and maybe he doesn't get the single that brought Roberts home in Game 4.

 

[RobertS975]

My nadir far and away was also game 6 in 1986. The Red Sox were mere moments away from winning the championship.. We were practically celebrating the win as it slowly unraveled and finally slipped away. It's hard to remember that there was still a game 7 to go through!

 

[Humphrey]

I think the reason the brawl game is significant in the lore of 2004 is it showed that there were cracks in the Mo Rivera legend. Mueller doesn't hit that walk-off and maybe he doesn't get the single that brought Roberts home in Game 4.

Up until Mueller hit that homer, Joe Castig would describe any Rivera pitching appearance in the same tone of voice as the loss of a pet or family member.

 

[Kull]

Yeah definitely '86. Watching the nightmare unfold in Game 6 was impossible to internalize. It didn't seem possible they could actually lose that big lead simply because of all the Hendu magic that happened in the ALCS. The Sox were never as clutch as they proved to be in that series. Not just a game or two either, but they did all that AND finished the deal! And then won the first two games of the Series on the road! It HAD to be our year. I knew it in my bones. But losing Game 6 in the way it was lost? There was no rational way to respond, so I simply bit my oak coffee table as hard as possible...left a nice set of imprints too. Not that it helped....

 

[Leskanic's Thread]

It's a little tough to differentiate, since 1986 was obviously closer to glory...but I was only eight at the time. Still, I was up late, fired up, and bouncing on the couch. I had visions of celebrating the last out by running out the front door and going up and down the street, shouting to wake up the neighbors. Then everything fell apart and...it's all kind of a blur. I don't know if an eight year old can be shell shocked by watching sports, but if they can be, I was.

2003 I was 25. I had been living in New York up through February that year, when I suffered an injury and needed to be back in my parents' MA home to recuperate. I ended up needing multiple surgeries, so recovery took a while. I was (allegedly unrelatedly, but, c'mon) laid off from work. I still went back down to the city from time to time when I could to visit my girlfriend and see friends. I was there, in some basement bar around the corner from a too-packed Riviera, to watch the game 3 brawl with two Boston-based friends and a bunch of other Sox fans there as a kind of Riv overflow. As tensions rose, we felt like we were in a bunker in enemy territory. Probably because we were.

The week before, I had taken a bus down to NYC to see REM at MSG (a lot of acronyms)...so I didn't see Trot's walk-off home run in game 3. I was on the bus back home during game 4, listening on my walkman's radio. So, after I got back to Massachusetts following game 3 in the ALCS, I decided I had to go back to not seeing the games -- I was in my room listening to the radio broadcast for games 4-7. It was months before I saw any images of the 8th inning or Boone's home run.

One reason this loss might be the nadir is because I was older, of course...as were my parents. My grandfathers had both passed on, though they had been old enough that they were around as kids when the Sox used to actually win (though I think only one of them rooted for them back then). The looming threat of time was starting to feel a little more real -- my quarterlife crisis was rooted in the classic "I'll live a whole life and never see them win, will I?" More materially, that night was probably the final straw in my fraying long-distance relationship. My girlfriend was a baseball agnostic. She lived with her sister in Manhattan; the sister had adopted the Yankees because her boyfriend (now husband) was a Yankee fan, but she was the kind of transplant who liked the 2000 Series matchup because "whoever wins, New York wins!" None of them really grasped the idea of why one would continue rooting for a team that did nothing but let you down. But my girlfriend had gotten sucked in to the narrative and my passion, and had started really liking players like Ortiz, Manny, Pedro, and Nomar. About 15 minutes after the game, she called to see if I was doing ok -- apparently her sister and her boyfriend were almost too worried about me to celebrate. (Almost.) My girlfriend said something like "I know it didn't end well, but I'm really happy that we got to share this together." And I said that I was not happy about that, because now she was stuck caring about this team that would never do anything but hurt us. Which was...not a nice response to a very kind and loving sentiment. It took a few more weeks, but we were broken up with more than enough time to cancel Thanksgiving travel plans.

As for 19-8...my friends and I turned the game off when the lead hit double digits and watched Fletch instead, monitoring the score on a computer. I remember being bummed, but far from at my lowest -- at least this time they didn't go right up to the brink of victory before falling apart. I appreciate they had the goddamn common courtesy to be swept like true losers.

After watching in three different locations for games 1-3 (including the dear departed Sligo in Davis Square for game 2), my roommate and I watched game 4 alone in our living room. He went to bed after the 8th inning because he had to get up early for work the next day. So I turned the volume way down on the living room tv and moved a chair about two feet in front of it. For some stupid reason that seemed entirely logical at the time, I took a dollar out of my wallet and laid it in front of the tv, telling the Sox and the baseball gods and anyone else who would listen that I would just like to buy one run, just one little run to keep the season going. I had to stifle some very loud noises as the 9th unfolded, all the way up through Ortiz popping up to end the inning. The bottom of the next three innings, I took a fresh dollar out and put it down, pulling them away when they weren't the one accepted to buy the run. The two bills that remained after Ortiz's 12th inning home run stayed there for the next ten days.

I think we were ALL a little shaken during the Pedro inning in the moment. But once he got out of the inning, we probably all had a huge sigh of relief. And I think the Bellhorn HR off the pole was the final "yup, it is officially happening" moment.

Edit: but to be completely honest, every time I see the Sierra squibber off the bat, I think it is going to take some weird bounce/spin and Pokey won't glove it cleanly and the inning will continue etc. We are all deeply, deeply, scarred.

I am deeply jealous of the people who had moments of true confidence before it was all over. I remember walking around a Brooks drug store (I think it was Brooks) getting snacks before game 7, and my game 3 thoughts kept echoing around my mind. Wouldn't it just be like them to come all the way back from 0-3 down to force a game 7...and then blow it at the last minute again? The Damon slam helped. The Bellhorn home run helped more. But I didn't really believe it was happening until the ball was in Minky's glove.

Hell, I spent the bottom of the 9th in game 4 of the World Series with a thought pulling at the back of my mind: "wouldn't it be the worst way to lose to be the first team to come from 0-3 down by tying game 4 in the 9th inning and then winning the series...and then taking a 3-0 lead, having a lead in the 9th of game 4, and losing four games in a row?" I didn't think it would happen...but I couldn't count it out. Again: ball in Minky's glove or it didn't happen.

I agree but - as I wrote upthread - my immediate thought after the Papi HR was not “fuckin a” - it was “we should have 3 runs on the board, not 2”.

I still think Damon was safe.

 

[tims4wins]

He was out by like a foot

 

[MiracleOfO2704]

We were already down 3-0 to the absolute juggernaut (and eventual World Champion) Oakland A's

Except that was the Pinella Reds’ year. I’d be so pissed as an A’s fan of the era to have that roster, 3 WS appearances, and only the one win in the Earthquake Series.

I wasn’t around for 1978, and was only 4 for 1986. So for people around my age, it has to be 2003. I don’t remember the particulars anymore, but between my grandmother being sick with what turned out to be pancreatic cancer and the way that game ended, I was a wreck. I just remember afterwards, lying in bed watching (I think) NECN’s repeating broadcast, catatonic over the way it happened.

As far as 2004 Game 3, I went to support a friend as she made her first on-stage appearance for one of the theatre department’s productions, checked my phone for updates, and mentally quit on the series. Until the next night, that is, when I balled myself on my upstairs neighbours’ couch, listening to WEEI on a Walkman while popping my head up to watch after every pitch (there was a ~5 second delay between radio and Fox HD).

 

[TFisNEXT]

Absolutely, yes. With the modification, for myself at least, that with the Pats also winning it all in both 2003 and 2004, it was the apex of both my NFL/Pats and MLB/Sox fandoms. I watched every inning/minute of every game, I knew the rosters top to bottom, I knew all of the opponents rosters top to bottom, I was so heavily invested. Certainly helped that I was 22-23 at the time and it was my first two years in the "real world" with no other commitments or responsibilities. Perfect storm for sports fandom.

You and I are very similar age as 2003 was my college graduation year so the second half of that season was that “I have nothing else to worry about except sports” phase of my life. I was not in my career job yet but had a decent-paying job driving airport limos which left a 22 year old bachelor with extra money to spend at bars during Red Sox games. But even on the job, I’d have the Red Sox game on the radio and almost everyone I drove around was happy I did. I usually kept it on the forward speakers where I could hear but so often I’d get a “is that the Sox game, can you turn that up?” at me within the first few minutes of the ride.

That’s one reason it was such a privilege to experience that sequence of seasons at that age….we were the perfect age for maximizing the experience, and that was on top of a baseline where the rest of the population was wayyy more engaged than usual. It had that magical feel when you’re getting strangers asking you to turn the game up or just start talking about the Sox. We were old enough to feel real pain in the mid/late 1990s Red Sox failures, but young enough to be able to relay those brief heartbreaks into near-full time fandom for the peak Red Sox fever of the past several decades (if not much longer).

 

[tims4wins]

You and I are very similar age as 2003 was my college graduation year so the second half of that season was that “I have nothing else to worry about except sports” phase of my life. I was not in my career job yet but had a decent-paying job driving airport limos which left a 22 year old bachelor with extra money to spend at bars during Red Sox games. But even on the job, I’d have the Red Sox game on the radio and almost everyone I drove around was happy I did. I usually kept it on the forward speakers where I could hear but so often I’d get a “is that the Sox game, can you turn that up?” at me within the first few minutes of the ride.

That’s one reason it was such a privilege to experience that sequence of seasons at that age….we were the perfect age for maximizing the experience, and that was on top of a baseline where the rest of the population was wayyy more engaged than usual. It had that magical feel when you’re getting strangers asking you to turn the game up or just start talking about the Sox. We were old enough to feel real pain in the mid/late 1990s Red Sox failures, but young enough to be able to relay those brief heartbreaks into near-full time fandom for the peak Red Sox fever of the past several decades (if not much longer).

Well said!

 

[Leskanic's Thread]

He was out by like a foot

How dare you let facts get in the way of my emotional truth??

(The throw beat him by more than a foot...but I don't know if the tag actually got down to make contact before Damon's foot snuck onto the plate between Posada's legs. He was most probably out...but it would have gone to a replay today. But McCarver was too busy fawning over Jeter executing a simple relay throw for any such analysis, and then Ortiz made it somewhat academic. Somewhat.)

 

[wiffleballhero]

If you had told me the day after the 1978 game that I'd run into multiple games competing for the nadir I would have said, "what is a nadir?" and then something to the effect of, "you've got to be shitting me? It is going to get this bad again and potentially worse? I'm only six years old, I can't take a lifetime of this. I'm out."

And yet, in the end (I've told this story before) I think the nadir for me was 03. After the ball left the bat the sense of rage that consumed me -- rage about losing, about Grady Little, about Lucy and the football and a lifetime of agony with this goddamn team was just too much. I simply grabbed a wooden baseball bat and proceeded to smash it on the concrete steps outside my apartment in Seattle. The entire neighborhood must have thought I was completely insane, and they would not have been wrong.

I SWORE I would never watch a second of baseball again in my life.

The combined A-Rod and Schilling sagas broke me within weeks.

I do wish I had kept the splinters of that bat.

 

[tims4wins]

How dare you let facts get in the way of my emotional truth??

(The throw beat him by more than a foot...but I don't know if the tag actually got down to make contact before Damon's foot snuck onto the plate between Posada's legs. He was most probably out...but it would have gone to a replay today. But McCarver was too busy fawning over Jeter executing a simple relay throw for any such analysis, and then Ortiz made it somewhat academic. Somewhat.)

Sorry wasn’t even being serious - was reversing the “he was safe by like a foot” famous comment about the Robert’s steal.

 

[The Talented Allen Ripley]

Thank you, that was an enjoyable to read. Hauntings of past memories, a bleak present, and an underlying foreshadowing of what would be.

I appreciate the kind words, and in all transparency, the bolded was really the thrust of my OP. I started the thread on the 19th anniversary of the 19-8 loss (10/17, game ended after midnight), which was also the 19th anniversary of the Dave Roberts game later the same day that started the remarkable reversal of fortune. My thought was that the thread would follow that prompt and we'd kind of relive Four Days in October together, but either my writing wasn't clear enough, or I greatly underestimated the need for SoSH to exorcise its heartbreak demons, despite 4 WS titles in the past 20 years. Probably a bit of both.

 

[TomBrunansky23]

Except that was the Pinella Reds’ year. I’d be so pissed as an A’s fan of the era to have that roster, 3 WS appearances, and only the one win in the Earthquake Series.

I wasn’t around for 1978, and was only 4 for 1986. So for people around my age, it has to be 2003. I don’t remember the particulars anymore, but between my grandmother being sick with what turned out to be pancreatic cancer and the way that game ended, I was a wreck. I just remember afterwards, lying in bed watching (I think) NECN’s repeating broadcast, catatonic over the way it happened.

As far as 2004 Game 3, I went to support a friend as she made her first on-stage appearance for one of the theatre department’s productions, checked my phone for updates, and mentally quit on the series. Until the next night, that is, when I balled myself on my upstairs neighbours’ couch, listening to WEEI on a Walkman while popping my head up to watch after every pitch (there was a ~5 second delay between radio and Fox HD).

Apologies for the historical mistake...they were the defending champions. They lost to the Gibson/Hershiser Dodgers in 88, won the Bay/earthquake series in 89, and lost to the Sabo/Nasty Boys/Eric Davis Reds in 90.

 

[grepal]

Game 7, 2003. I was watching with my friends who were Yankee fans - the kind of Yankees fans who asked questions like "who is Andy Pettitte?" and "is Jeter still on the team?" Ya know, people who really appreciated the history of the franchise and were deeply committed to watching the season (sarcasm). Boone hit the homerun and after a fraction of a second, I just went back to my place and fell asleep in my clothes. I'm not sure my friends even noticed what happened.
Also, I know this sounds like Monday morning quarterbacking, but I swear at some point the next morning after thinking about it for a couple of hours I remember thinking that the Sox were going to go ballistic and go for it in 2004. I quickly went from despair to - I wouldn't call it quite excitement - but there was a palpable sense that the Sox were not going to take that loss sitting down. Instead of being crushed, I wanted the next season to start ASAP. I didn't think they would actually win the WS, (or even trade for Schilling), but I remember thinking that team would be pissed and out for blood.

There was that, but following it up with game 3 in 2004, in a series I had looked forward to since the Boone homerun, I was as down in the dumps as far as sports can or has ever brought me down.

 

[RS2004foreever]

1986 - I had finished UVM and started BU Law in '85. I saw 23 games in '86 including playoff and World Series games (tickets were really that much cheaper) and I was in the area.
At no point in '03 did I really believe we were going to win. I didn't believe in '04 until the grand slam.

 

[astrozombie]

There was that, but following it up with game 3 in 2004, in a series I had looked forward to since the Boone homerun, I was as down in the dumps as far as sports can or has ever brought me down.

Speaking only for myself, game 3 did not bum me out that much. At that point, the Yankees looked like a buzzsaw and I was at peace with the idea that the Sox were simply getting outclassed by a better team. I can deal with a team I like getting destroyed. It's much harder to come thisclose and only have one thing break in the wrong direction and mess up the whole thing.

 

[chrisfont9]

1986 - I had finished UVM and started BU Law in '85. I saw 23 games in '86 including playoff and World Series games (tickets were really that much cheaper) and I was in the area.
At no point in '03 did I really believe we were going to win. I didn't believe in '04 until the grand slam.

Go Cats!

 

[RS2004foreever]

Go Cats!

I could never imagine a day when the BB team made the NCAA tournament more often than the hockey team. How bizarre.