You want someone to blame for this election and the ensuing madness that came in its aftermath? Blame the bastards that broke the Billy Goat.
I am a baseball purist and traditionalist. To me, the best aspects of the past time isn’t the home runs (or as Deadspin likes to call them, “dongers”) or the strike outs, but the little parts of the game that make it truly harder than it looks. Knowing where to throw the ball from center field when there’s a man on first as opposed to a man on second. The difference between a clean pickoff move to first and a balk. And how superstition and curses are real and keep the universe in check.
Baseball curses and lore are fantastic. Don’t wash your jock strap or change any part of your routine during a winning streak. If you’re on a hitting streak, use the same batting glove and walk up to the plate the same way. Playoffs? Grow a beard, because that helps ward off bad joojoo. But the curses help keep the universe from coming unwound. Those are the most important parts of the whole deal.
This year, the Cubs broke the Curse of the Billy Goat bestowed on them in 1945 by the owner of a local tavern because the team wouldn’t let him bring his pet Goat into Wrigley Field. According to legend, the team would never win another World Series. They broke the Curse this year.
Trump was elected.
There were other curses, too. In 2004, the Red Sox broke the Curse of the Bambino by winning the World Series.
Bush was re-elected.
The following year, in 2005, the White Sox destroyed the Curse of the Black Sox by capturing the Championship.
A few weeks later, suicide bombers in Jordan killed 60 people. In a lesser tragedy, Reggie Bush won the Heisman in December of that year, over a considerably more athletic and eventual National Champion Vince Young.
Are you still happy that the Cubs won?