We all know the Red Sox did not win a World Series for 86 years after unloading Ruth, and the Cubs just might be carrying some heavy weight for past karmic transgressions.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The truth is that for those 86 long years when the Red Sox went without a World Series win, fans were not only in a recession, but trapped in a longstanding, deeply entrenched sports depression.
Having been aware of the Red Sox since the 1946 World Series, having been growled at by Ted Williams as a young reporter in 1960, having been present at the horror of 1986 and the comeback of 2004, I have seen the highs and lows of some other people's favorite team.
I am old enough to remember every Red Sox season since 1975. Baseball is long. Baseball takes forever. It's day in, day out, for six solid months - seven if you're lucky. Winning is always fun.
If you had to point to one thing that made it less likely that the Red Sox would win the World Series, I would say it was those people that go to Fenway Park to watch the games. And then the media around it.
We picked the Red Sox because they lose. If you root for something that loses for 86 years, you're a pretty good fan. You don't have to win everything to be a fan of something.
If you watch the history of baseball, teams come back, and sometimes they could have come back, but they give in or give up.
Everyone I knew was a Red Sox fan. Living up there in 1967 - the Impossible Dream season - that moment was incredibly compelling. I just naturally gravitated to the team. Nineteen seventy-five was arguably the greatest World Series of all time.
In over 160 years of recorded baseball history, no team had ever won a championship this way.
I am a huge Red Sox fan.
No matter what losses happen in a given season, the Red Sox always have next year.