Red Sox Nation By guest contributer Huck I’d like to paint you a picture of what it’s like to live in New England in the fall: Act I, Scene i Phone rings Your Humble Narrator: (breathless) Hello? It’s Game 5 of the ALCS, and the Red Sox have just tanked it in the ninth. Down two runs and they can’t even put a runner on base, make a show of it. I’m a little hurt. I don’t mind admitting it… I cried a little. Mostly from the excruciating pain of the bleeding ulcer that reappeared about 3 weeks before the end of the regular season. And I’m sure that telemarketer could hear the wincing pain in my voice. She knew there was no sale here. Not because I was busy and she was interrupting me, but because she knew that a Red Sox ninth inning means that any fan’s anxiety level is so high that she should fear for her life. The Red Sox nation was in the hospital waiting room, fists clenched, waiting for the doctor to come back with the test results. No one wants a sales pitch when they discover that they’re facing death. The Red Sox woes have lasted nearly a century, to be sure. But for me (and for most every Red Sox fan I know) it began in Game 6 of the ‘86 World Series. Since then I’ve been convinced that they’re always on the verge of blowing it, and they rarely disappoint. I speak for most fans when I say: rest in peace, Bill Buckner, we know it’s not you’re fault (ed. note: Mr. Buckner isn’t dead). And you can all take that “Curse of the Babe” bullshit and cram it up your ass with a giant rubber dildo. He should be on our side. We made him a great ball player, and New York made him a broken down old drunk. Babe’s ghost should be the breath behind every Nomar home run. The real curse of the Red Sox… the Yankees. Deeper than my love for the Red Sox is my abhorrence of the Yankees. They are a noxious pustule on the face of God. Watching them win year after year is like watching your smarmy, cocky boss get promotion on top of raise on top of award. Maybe he earned it… but he didn’t deserve it. Forget the inherent arrogance of the Yankees (name one other professional team that doesn’t print the players’ names on the AWAY uniforms). Every athlete that joins their team turns gray and lifeless. Roger Clemens left the Blue Jays and turned into the Stepford Rocket. Darryl Strawberry has to quell the pain with handfuls of blow. Derek Jeter – an over-rated version of Garciaparra – scrapes away layer after layer of dignity with each credit card commercial. Sure, you could blame all this on the fact that the New York Yankees sold their souls to – and are contractually obligated to be routinely anally raped by – Satan… but you can’t blame the Prince of Darkness for everything. Take the above scene, but put it in a New York context: Phone rings New Yorker: Yeah? Embellishment? Sure. But I like to think that somewhere out there, there’s a pissed off Yankees fan, and that his pain runs deep and true until the rage builds and he can taste the bile. Maybe I’m just an old softy. And that’s what truly chaps my ass. Yankees fans will never understand this type of pain, will never be awash in misery when the home team dives again, and yet again. In a way, I feel sorry for the Yankee fan. Because when the Red Sox finally win, it’s going to be like Mardi Gras on X with a $600 an hour hooker. Yeah, that’s it… I feel sorry for them… It looks like our beloved Beantown Boys might have to wait another year. For me, the season ended when our star pitcher beat up a 72 year old man. Maybe he had it coming, maybe not. The romantic in me likes to think that Don Zimmer has some horrific secret in his past which he never atoned for… like calling Lt. Calley a chicken, or something. But let’s face it, making the elderly cry at a press conference puts us pretty deep in karma arrears. So long as Kerry Wood isn’t caught gang raping a litter of puppies… looks like the Cubbies are my team.
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