Sports players and fans are very superstitious. To continue a winning streak, they wear the same socks or shirt for weeks, afraid washing will take away the good luck. A famous story about collecting and superstition was just retold in an interview in the Intelligent Collector with Grant DePorter, a serious sports collector. His father ran a hotel popular with players and Grant started collecting as a boy. In 2004 he bought the infamous “Bartman” baseball. It had led to the Cubs’ loss in Game 6 of the 2003 National League Championship Series. Bartman, a fan seated in the front row along the left corner wall, reached for a foul ball in the 8th inning and deflected it, causing the Cubs’ left fielder to miss the catch. It was ruled a foul ball (a strike) not fan interference (batter would have been out). The Cubs and Marlins continued to play, but the Cubs gave up 8 runs, lost the game 8 to 3, then went on to lose the series.

DePorter bought that ball at auction for $113,824, planning to destroy it and the memory of the play. He worked with a special effects expert, and had a party on a Chicago street closed for the event by Mayor Daley. The ball was blown up and the pieces were saved. The next year, some of the pieces were used to make spaghetti sauce that 700 fans got to eat. In 2016, the Cubs finally won the World Series. The bad luck curse had finally ended. Did it help to destroy the foul ball? Or was the almost $114,000 wasted?

 

 Photo: Al Podgorski / Chicago Sun-Times