Dead Men Walking
Joe PetaIn October of 1986 I was a 21 year-old bartender at the Holiday Inn Bethesda, working the hotel bar on the Saturday night of Game 6 of the 1986 World Series. For the game, we split the bar between Red Sox and Mets fans and promised free champagne for fans of the winning team. Down two runs in the bottom of the ninth with no runners on base, the Mets had Gary Carter at the plate. Carter hit a foul ball which to television viewers, appeared to go straight up in the air. A fervent Mets’ hater at the time, I was so anxious to celebrate the death of the 1986 team that as soon as the ball left Carter’s bat, I popped the champagne for the Red Sox fans thinking the game was over. However, the ball drifted just behind the home plate screen. While that single pitch is recalled by few -- even Red Sox fans I've told this story to don't recall how close they were to winning the 1986 Series even before any subsequent Mets' batter had two strikes on him -- what happen next has been talked about for twenty-five years. Twenty minutes after prematurely popping the cork, with Mets fans going crazy all throughout the bar, I thought I’d seen the most incredible ending to a World Series game ever. After last night, I don’t think that anymore.