Boston Red Sox: Take the Good with the Bad

I spent the night of Game Five of the ALCS this year slumping in front of the TV on my couch thinking about the past.

I remembered how one of my earliest memories was seeing the ball go through Buckner's legs on a black and white TV. I remembered going to ALCS Games One and Two in both '88 and '90 with my uncle and the terrible silence that enveloped the Kenmore Square T stop after both of those Game Twos.

I was there for Game Five against the Yankees in 1999 when Jimmy Williams got tossed for arguing the absolute worst calls in the history of playoff baseball and a (large) handful of jackasses in the stands littered the field with debris. (This was easily the worst moment of my baseball life.)

I thought about that sinking feeling in my stomach when Grady walked off the mound without Pedro.

Then I thought about the good times. I thought about seeing Bruce Hurst pitch a 10-inning complete game. Seeing Ortiz get that base hit in 2004’s Game Five. I remember walking back to Kenmore after Oil Can Boyd pitched a great game with fans chanting his name all the way home. I recall seeing Schilling pitch Game Two of the World Series in 2004.

I remembered "Morgan Magic" and Bob Stanley picking me up from the stands during batting practice so that my uncle could take a picture of me (then seven years old) with him. Then there was being in a bar with friends when the Sox finally won it in 2004 and being able to put a World Series Champions pennant by my grandfather's grave—and then it all happened again.

Then I thought about the future and the children I would like to have some day—no, Mom, not now. Would my children be able to appreciate how special it was to have your team win it all? 

In 2004, most of New England wept with joy when it happened. We all thought about Ted Williams and Bill Buckner. I called my uncle, who took me to Fenway so many times and explained it all to me. I wished my grandfather were alive to see it.

If my children never went though what we all went through, what would it mean to them?

By the seventh inning, I decided that if I had sleeping children right then, I would wake them up and have them watch the Sox lose 7-0 in Fenway to an expansion team with the worst stadium in the history of baseball. I would explain to them that this was terrible. 

The players they spent the whole year cheering for, the same ones who were hanging on the wall, were going to let them down—and it would hurt.

But hey, there's always next year. Do you know how old your dad was before the Red Sox won it all? Did you know that your great-grandfather lived to be 74 years old and the only time they won in his life was when he wasn't even two years old?

If you want to know the joy of victory, you need to know what it feels like to lose. This is just getting you ready for the next time they win. So you can know what it felt like for me in 2004.

And then Ortiz hit a homer making it 7-4 for the Rays.

Ah, now this was the Sox of my youth. This will really make my kids understand the pain that must come before any true victory. Make it interesting then stomp on everyone’s heart, just like the good old days!

Then it was tied.

They can't really do this again.

Then they did it again.

And I think that would have been an even better lesson for my children.