Its like when Sox fans basically KILLED Bill Buckner - when even if Billy makes the play there is no guarantee Boston would have won.
Red Sox cheered Buckner Opening Day 1987.
Red Sox fans killed Sox Mgr McNamara for not subbing Dave Stapleton at 1st for defensive purposes for the hobbled Buckner.
It was mostly the press that mocked Buckner, not the fans.
I think the fans hounded Buckner for years. Not all of them, by any means, but more than enough to make his life awful.
"Fans heckled Buckner at Fenway the following season, before the Red Sox released him. He received death threats."
"Buckner tried to stay in Boston, but fans heaped so much abuse on him and his family that he decided to move to Idaho." History (dot) com.
It's just how it was, Banks. Did the media play a part? When do they not. But Buckner was damned by a substantial percentage of the Nation.
Not to say that McNamara was let off the hook.
Kid is wrong in thinking that we (almost any of us) believe
any single play guarantees a win. Ask a RS fan in 1986 if it would have guaranteed a win and most of us would not only say no, but also say "we'd probably have just found another way to lose." Eeyore had
nothing on us! Post 2004's ALCS? The "snatch defeat from the jaws of victory" assumption is largely gone, but it has not been replaced with a Pollyanna-esque assumption of victory.
But it sure improves the chances, compared to what happened!
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