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“Curse of the Bambino” Started 105 Years Ago This Week!
“The Red Sox should exhume the body of Babe Ruth transport it back to Fenway and publicly apologize for trading Ruth to the Yankees!” – Flakey former Red Sox pitcher, Bill “Spaceman” Lee
Baseball players are a superstitious lot by nature; and so when something like a trade goes south, it can have lasting effects as it becomes firmly embedded into the team’s baseball lore. Every team has made bad trades that come back to haunt them. Cub fans had to endure the Brock-for-Broglio trade for decades; for Cleveland fans, it was Colavito for Kuenn. There are many others.
(Featured photo beautifully colorized by Don Stokes)
But the “mother of all bad trades” occurred one hundred-five years ago this week, December 27, 1919, when the Yankees bought Babe Ruth from the Red Sox for $125,000 and guaranteed a $300,000 loan, initiating the “Curse of the Bambino.” The sale of the 25-year-old “Bambino” started a spell of bad luck that lasted for 86 years, not ending until 2004 when the Red Sox won the World Series, their first since 1918. The “Curse” became a focal point of the Yankees–Red Sox rivalry over the years. “Curses” can take on a life of their own. Again, as a Cub fan, I’m reminded of the infamous “Billy Goat curse” put on the team during the 1945 World Series, sending the Cubs into a 70-year tailspin.
During the Deadball Era, prior to the sale of Babe Ruth to the Yankees, the Red Sox had been one of the most successful franchises in baseball. They won five of the first fifteen World Series titles (1903, 1912, 1915, 1916, 1918), more than any other major league team during this time. And the Yankees? Just the opposite. They went from being a lackluster, unsuccessful team during the Deadball Era with no pennants, to being the most dominant professional sports franchises ever. In the 84 years after the sale, the Yankees played in 39 World Series, winning 26 of them, twice as many as any other team in the major leagues. Over the same period, the Red Sox played in only four World Series and lost each in seven games.
The term “Curse of the Bambino” was not commonly used until the publication of the book The Curse of the Bambino by Dan Shaughnessy in 1990. In standard “curse lore,” Red Sox owner and theatrical producer Harry Frazee used the proceeds from the sale to finance the production of a Broadway musical, usually said to be No, No, Nanette. In fact, No, No, Nanette did not see its first performance until five years after the Ruth sale and two years after Frazee sold the Red Sox in 1921.
Attempts to Break the Curse
Over the ensuing 88 years, there had been many attempts to break the curse. The most notable include:
- Placement of a Red Sox cap atop Mount Everest and the burning of a Yankees cap at its base camp.
- The finding of a piano owned by Ruth that he supposedly pushed into a pond near his Sudberry, Massachusetts farm. This was considered a fortuitous omen and a possible end to the curse.
- The “Official Witch” of Massachusetts, Laurie Cabot, was sought out to end the curse in 1976, but to no avail.
- Musician Jimmy Buffet once performed a comedy curse-breaking ceremony at a Fenway Park concert in 2004, the year the curse was broken.
- After being traded to the Red Sox, Curt Schilling appeared in an advertisement for the Ford F-150 pickup truck hitchhiking with a sign indicating he was going to Boston. When picked up, he said he had “an 86-year-old curse” to break .”
The End of the Curse!
The curse finally ended dramatically in 2004. In a fitting matchup between the two teams that had started the curse, the Red Sox squared off against the Yankees in the American League Championship Series. The Red Sox had lost the first three games, including losing Game Three at Fenway by the lopsided score of 19–8. They were trailing 4–3 in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game Four, but tied the game against Mariano Rivera and then won it on a two-run homer by David Ortiz in the twelve inning. The Red Sox won the next three games to become the first and only major league team to win a seven-game postseason series after losing the first three games.
The momentum of the ALCS victory propelled them to a four-game sweep over the Cardinals in the World Series, the team that had beaten them in the 1946 and 1967 Fall Classics. With the final out being a grounder back to pitcher Keith Foulke, Fox commentator Joe Buck famously called the grounder with: “Back to Foulke. Red Sox fans have longed to hear it: The Boston Red Sox are World Champions!”
Was the “Curse of the Bambino” real? Or was it just a series of incredible coincidences that lasted 88 years? Don’t ask me….I’m a Cub fan! Maybe your answer to that question will go a long way to determining just how superstitious you are!
Gary Livacari
We’d love to hear what you think about this or any other related baseball history topic…please leave comments below.
Photo Credits: Featured photo beautifully colorized by Don Stokes; Others from Google search
Source of information: “Curse of the Bambino” Wikipedia page
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