BUCKNER CAN'T LIVE DOWN BLUNDER.

Byline: Jimmy Golen Associated Press 

Ten years later, and it is still a fresh wound.

A ball rolled through Bill Buckner's legs during Game 6 of the World Series, costing Boston its best chance at a title at what is now 78 years and counting.

Surely, after all this time, Red Sox fans would have gotten over it. Surely, they would remember the 1986 Series for its excitement, not the pain. Surely, they would forgive Buckner and recognize him as a very good player who was just one of the goats on that fateful Oct. 25 day.

But mention of Buckner's blunder can still bring on tremors. His name is like some word association game in which the psychiatrist says ``Bill Buckner,'' and the Red Sox fan curls up on the couch and cries.

``You got to feel bad for the guy,'' said Bob Stanley, who threw the pitch that Mookie Wilson hit through Buckner's legs and into the cursed history of Boston baseball.

Not since Bucky Dent's playoff-game homer gave the Yankees the 1978 AL East title had Boston been so disappointed. Not since Johnny Pesky held the ball 50 years ago, hesitating on a relay throw and allowing the Series-winning run to score, had the Red Sox come so close.

``Through the history of the game they pin `hero' on one guy and put horns on another,'' said Pesky, the former shortstop now one of the team's coaches. ``I've been accused of this and that, what am I going to do? It's unfair. But if people want to do that, you're going to have to accept it.''

Buckner has accepted it, even if he doesn't like to talk about it. He moved out of the Boston area a few years back because of the constant reminders.

After being hired as hitting coach for the Chicago White Sox this year, though, he tried to deal with the topic head-on.

``Everybody knows about the World Series thing,'' he said. `` . . . (But) a lot more good things happened than bad.''

Taken as a whole, that is undeniably true. Buckner had 2,715 hits in 22 seasons, winning the NL batting title with the Chicago Cubs in 1980.

But only Buckner and his friends and family remember the good times. For everyone else, it is Game 6.

``Oh, you mean the Buckner thing,'' Pesky said when asked his memories of the '86 series.

On Oct. 25, 1986, the Red Sox, ahead 3-2 in games, had a 5-3 lead over the Mets with two outs in the 10th inning. Mets first baseman Keith Hernandez was already in the clubhouse, drowning his sorrows in a beer. The Shea Stadium scoreboard prematurely flashed its congratulations to the ``World Champion Boston Red Sox.''

Then Gary Carter singled. Kevin Mitchell singled. Ray Knight singled to score Carter and make it 5-4. Stanley relieved Calvin Schiraldi and threw a wild pitch to score Mitchell. Then Wilson dribbled one toward Buckner.

Like a mythological figure sentenced to roll a rock up a hill for eternity, Red Sox fans are still replaying Wilson's grounder, watching it roll through the black high-tops Buckner wore because of his sore ankles, watching it roll out of the TV picture down the right-field line.

And like the TV cameras that zeroed in on Buckner's mortified face after Knight scored the winning run, Red Sox fans have focused on the gimpy first baseman and his too-short glove.

No matter that there was still a Game 7, in which the Red Sox blew another lead. The ``Buckner Ball'' was the one actor Charlie Sheen wanted, paying $93,000 for it at an auction.

No matter that there were a host of others to blame for continuing the team's postseason misery:

Rich Gedman, who failed to move for a catchable wild pitch that allowed the tying run to score.

Stanley, who threw the wild pitch and, for the record, probably wouldn't have gotten to first base in time if Buckner had fielded the ball cleanly.

Manager John McNamara, who decided not to use Dave Stapleton as a defensive replacement to give Buckner, who toiled for the even more tragic Chicago Cubs before coming to Boston, a chance to be on the field for the postgame celebration.

Schiraldi, who twice failed to hold the lead in Game 6 and then gave up the winning run in Game 7, too. He was the losing pitcher in both games.

Or why not blame Buckner himself, the former batting champion who batted .188 in the Series - six hits, all singles - the worst average among the Red Sox regulars.

It is always ``The Buckner Game.''

``People always remember the last thing that happened. They don't remember the other parts of the game, that we left 14 men on base,'' Stanley said Thursday, citing the statistic as if it were yesterday instead of 10 years ago.

``I have sympathy for Buckner,'' Pesky said, ``because I've seen it happen to other guys.''

And, until Buckner took him off the hook, he was among them.

It may seem odd to those who look at Boston's major league record of 13 consecutive postseason losses, but 50 years ago the Red Sox were a postseason power. They had won it all in 1903, 1912, 1915, 1916, 1918 and had never lost.

Repeat: The Red Sox had never lost a World Series.

It has now been 78 years - since before the Red Sox sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees and the ``Curse of the Bambino'' descended upon Boston.

``Has it been that long? Oh, my God,'' Pesky said. ``Maybe there is an enigma about the team.''

The Red Sox lost the 1946 Series and it would be another 21 years before they made it back again, losing again to the Cardinals, again in seven games. In '75, it was Cincinnati taking it in seven games, after Carlton Fisk's epic home run to end Game 6.

That was simply known as ``Game 6'' in these parts.

Until 10 years ago.

``Red Sox teams from here on out, of course, are now saddled with a dual burden,'' author Dan Riley wrote in the introduction to an anthology called ``The Red Sox Reader.'' ``They either have to win it all, or they have to find a way to lose more dramatically, more tragically, more unbelievably than their predecessors.

``Frankly, . . . winning it all would be a whole lot easier.''

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Photo

Photo: It's been a decade since Bill Buckner's error cost t he Red Sox a chance at a World Series title, but Boston fans still can't forget it.

Associated Press