The Chicago Cubs’ long-deferred trip to the World Series has brought joy to millions, but for one fan, baseball and joy can never again be so innocently mixed.
Many of us have woken up the way Steve Bartman did on the morning of October 14, 2003, knowing that we would attend a baseball game later in the day—in his case, Game 6 of the National League Championship Series, in which the Cubs, holding a 3-2 lead, needed one more win to advance to the World Series. None of us has returned home the way Bartman did that night: with a police escort to protect the most hated man in a city of nearly 3 million people. He had police protection the next day and for a time afterward. He essentially went into hiding. He was excoriated by sports talk-show hosts and legions of fans. He received death threats and still gets some today. The game he attended that night became known as the Bartman Game; the seat he sat in, the Bartman Seat.
“The Bartman story is a darkly representative one for our time. He could have been any of us”
What on earth did he do? In the eighth inning, with the Cubs leading, 3-0, he reached for a foul ball, possibly preventing Cubs left fielder Moises Alou from catching it. Then the Cubs’ shortstop kicked a routine groundball, the manager left the exhausted starting pitcher in the game, and the relief pitcher, when he did arrive, offered little relief. The Cubs’ self-fulfilling “curse” had gotten in players’ and fans’ heads once again. The team blew a game it was five outs from winning, and then blew Game 7 the next day, too, squandering yet another chance to get to the World Series. Ignoring this large cast of culprits, many fans pinned the blame on one man: Bartman.
The Bartman story is a darkly representative one for our time. He could have been any of us. Jon Ronson’s bestselling So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed examines the burgeoning culture of ridicule on social media and in today’s “sharing” universe, but Bartman’s ordeal took place before social media. He was victimized by older forces, among them...
Read the entire piece here at The American Conservative
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Paul Beston is managing editor of City Journal.
This piece originally appeared in The American Conservative