Friday, July 20, 2007

It was just about this time last year that a little black bird alighted on the Fenway grass, much to the delight of the tipsy crowd.

“Bird! Bird! Bird!” they chanted as the injured grackle hopped around the infield, his tiny form clogging the base paths. The Beatles’ “Blackbird” blasted from the PA.

Then, a few days later, it was revealed that after the game the cute ‘lil feller was eaten by a red-tailed hawk.

And from that point forward, our season went down the tubes in the most awful way imaginable.

Recognizing my opportunity, following the footsteps of the great Dan Shaughnessy, I coined a phrase: “The Curse of the Grackle.”

I even wrote a book about it.

(Although mine has not sold quite as well as CHB’s.)

Well, I have some bad news for you all.

Phoenix film editor Peter Keough, a longtime Red Sox diehard, was at that miserable, sodden game last night. “By the 7th inning, I thought I was back in 1965,” he says. “There were about 8,000 people and a tomb-like silence.”

He was also at Wednesday's game. And he noticed something disquieting from the stands:

Some baby starling or other fledgling apparently had fallen from its nest and was holed up just behind shortstop. It could barely fly, so unless someone came close it remained still. It ended up somewhere in left field. I don’t know what happened to it or if anyone else noticed it, but I fear it may portend the same outcome as last year’s grackle.

May God have mercy on us all.

7/20/2007 11:37:15 AM by Mike Miliard | Comments [0] |  
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