Pitarresi: The game isn't over until the last out

Friday, Oct. 17, 2008

 

Whatever happened to the curse of the Bambino?

 

The Red Sox seem to be a pretty lucky – and good – team the last few years.

 

How about last night? Down 7-0 and coming back to win? Pretty sweet. The great thing about it was that a lot of the Red Sox fans I know didn’t see it. They gave up before the comeback started in the seventh inning.

 

I like the Red Sox and I don’t mind Red Sox fans, but what a bunch of fatalistic people! They always assume the worst.

 

Well, things were looking pretty gloomy, and the odds still are against Boston making the World Series, but the game isn’t over until the last out. And it wasn’t like it was the middle of the night when the game ended. Okay, it was a little after midnight, well before my bedtime. I do understand if you had to get up early to feed the chickens.

 

 Still, if you are a fan, you’ve got to hang in there. The classic example for me came at the Carrier Dome in 2002. Syracuse was 3-6 and playing No. 8 Virginia Tech. The game went into overtime, and Orange quarterback Troy Nunes threw an interception right away. There were 48,239 fans at the game, and when that happened, 20,000 of them went stampeding for the exits. I hollered down from the press box to people I knew, “Where are you guys going?” They just kept right on.

 

The problem was, about a half hour, 25 plays, and three overtimes later, Syracuse had won, 50-42.