Bill Buckner is a modern version of Fred Merkle. Merkle, in the end, could boast a lengthy and respectable career with the New York Giants, but that career was never enough to erase the indelible legacy that was left by a single infamous rookie-season blunder. Merkle thus played forever in the shadow of a mistake that was often distorted into something that it never actually was at the time. (In the famed play in which he left the field without touching second on a teammate's apparent game-winning base hit, Merkle was only following standard practice of his era; and Merkle's out was not, as reported, the single "boneheaded" maneuver that lost a pennant for the Giants, since New York found other ways to let the season slip away in the three September weeks after the notorious gaffe.)

Buckner's fate, of course, was reversed. One excusable error at the end of a solid big-league career is now destined to haunt Bill Buckner's legacy forever in baseball's history books. The actual fatal damage to the Boston championship cause was done both before and after Buckner's fateful boot in the 10th inning of World Series Game 6. Here again, Bill Buckner's fate was most similar to Merkle's. Fred Merkle did not single-handedly lose a pennant for the Giants. His team had several golden opportunities to rebound from adversity, including a makeup game with the rival Cubs; and the failure of the Giants to remain in first place was a true team effort spread across the season's final stretch run.

By the same token, Buckner did not single-handedly lose a World Series, either, no matter how enticing such simplistic analysis may seem. The Red Sox had already given away a two-run extra-inning lead on the very pitch before the ball that was hit straight to Buckner. (Had Billy Buck made the easy play, as expected, the game would have still been tied and headed to the 11th.) Equal blame falls on manager John McNamara for the Boston disasters at Shea Stadium. It was the manager who had brought on Bob Stanley in relief and who had also opted to leave a gimpy Bill Buckner in the defensive lineup with the season and the Series squarely on the line. And it was Stanley who carelessly and improbably wild-pitched in the crucial run that had kept New York hopes alive. And it is also true that the snakebitten Red Sox had blown an earlier, seemingly insurmountable Series advantage after winning the opening two games at Shea Stadium.

It also must be remembered that the 1986 Red Sox, like the 1908 Giants, had their opportunities for redemption after the fateful play that first sent them reeling. Boston would lead again in Game 7 and yet once more could not keep the Mets at bay. Bill Buckner had plenty of help in the Red Sox self-destruction scenario. And yet such is the nature of collective memory that a single image of that elusive ball squirting between Buckner's legs is destined to haunt Boston fans until the end of time.

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