RIP Bill Buckner

Red(s)HawksFan

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PeteAbe just re-tweeted Valentine's tweet, but he doesn't seem to be confirming it. Uncool if Valentine is still the only source.

 

vtred

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As a die hard Mets fan...I easily realize that that one play was just a blip in an otherwise really good career
 

Anthologos

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I lost my dad to LBD, concurrent with Parkinson's. It is a terrifying and horrible disease of the mind to witness, even more terrifying to live with.
 

Nuf Ced

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Life isn't fair. The poor guy was roasted for one bad moment in '86 after a stellar career. You win as a team and lose as one. He took the heat when McNamara should have for not putting in a defensive replacement for Buckner who was hobbled. Buckner also had teammates who also didn't get the job done that night. Let him rest in peace.
 

dhappy42

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Life isn't fair. The poor guy was roasted for one bad moment in '86 after a stellar career. You win as a team and lose as one. He took the heat when McNamara should have for not putting in a defensive replacement for Buckner who was hobbled. Buckner also had teammates who also didn't get the job done that night. Let him rest in peace.
Not to mention it was Game 6.
 

section15

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Very sad - the passing of Jerry Moses, last year, and Bill Buckner today reminds us (me) of our own mortality , even at a relatively young age.

My family lived near him in Andover, saw him, never talked with him but everyone blamed him for the loss of the 1986 WS, yet the Sox wouldn't have been there if it hadn't been for him, and serious fans know that game 6 was already blown when they couldn't get that third out. And they lost a game 7 that they should have won.

That aside - the only personal recollection of Bill that I had, was in 1991. I worked at Kendall Square, and a radio station had their studio there with a window that you could look inside. I knew some of the DJs, one in particular, we always chatted - and would wave to anyone in the booth as I went by. Bill was host of a syndicated talk show - which did not air on the station (WRCA) but they used their studio and production facilities. I think it ran 10-11 and was an easy commute from his Andover home.

Of all the people who worked there, Buckner was the only one who wouldn't nod or wave. He always looked depressed...if I worked late after that I would always give the studio a glance to make sure that whoever was on the air was OK, but I gave up nodding to him.
 

bosockboy

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Life isn't fair. The poor guy was roasted for one bad moment in '86 after a stellar career. You win as a team and lose as one. He took the heat when McNamara should have for not putting in a defensive replacement for Buckner who was hobbled. Buckner also had teammates who also didn't get the job done that night. Let him rest in peace.
He also got on in front of Baylor in Game 5 in Anaheim. Wouldn’t have won the pennant without him.
 

Dollar

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RIP Bill. By all accounts he was an amazing human being.

One of my favorite Fenway moments ever:

 

BornToRun

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He was a good man who handled a difficult situation with nothing but grace and dignity. I’m glad that he had his moment at Fenway in 2008. Rest In Peace, Bill.
 

mauidano

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Life isn't fair. The poor guy was roasted for one bad moment in '86 after a stellar career. You win as a team and lose as one. He took the heat when McNamara should have for not putting in a defensive replacement for Buckner who was hobbled. Buckner also had teammates who also didn't get the job done that night. Let him rest in peace.
Calvin Schiraldi needs to be in that conversation. It was a long time ago and it just wasn't meant to be. But I recall recently Bill came back to Fenway and was loudly loved by the Fenway faithful.

Edit: Yes! See above video!!
 

shepard50

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Opening day in '08 was a good day. Felt like a lot of redemption on all sides.



“I really had to forgive,” he said after collecting himself, “not the fans of Boston per se, but I would have to say, in my heart, I had to forgive the media ...”

Another pause, this one for 10 seconds, before he continued, ”... for what they put me and my family through. So I’ve done that. I’m over that. And I’m just happy that I just try to think of the positive. The happy things.”

Buckner looks younger than his 58 years with the thick mustache he wore as a player. His expression was solemn and his words serious.

The ceremony was “tremendous,” Boston catcher Jason Varitek said. “Hopefully, it allows him to enjoy his life and people to enjoy the career that he did have.”
Link to Seacoast story from 2008
 

Ferm Sheller

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I remember attending the game before the All Star game in 1986. Buck could barely walk and hobbled painfully as he warmed up for at least an hour before the game. The Sox ended up winning, 3-2, with his HR being the difference. I never blamed him for the Game 6 loss, and that inside the park HR two years later is one of the most underrated and unlikeliest events in RS history.
 

soxhop411

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The Buckner/Eckersley trade date was May 25. And we'll always have that glorious inside-the-parker. RIP.

This was his last MLB HR
I remember attending the game before the All Star game in 1986. Buck could barely walk and hobbled painfully as he warmed up for at least an hour before the game. The Sox ended up winning, 3-2, with his HR being the difference. I never blamed him for the Game 6 loss, and that inside the park HR two years later is one of the most underrated and unlikeliest events in RS history.
@Spacemans Bong

Here you go!
 

Spacemans Bong

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Buckner talks about the fans in Mike Sowell’s book on the 86 playoffs. People always forget he played for the team the next year and ended his career in Boston in 1990 (I hope someone finds video of that inside the park home run), and then settled in the Boston area after he retired.

He said what did it for him wasn’t that people were mean, it was that one in a thousand would be mean, and one day some snot-nosed teenager in the parking lot at McCoy Stadium said something really awful, and he blew his top. Between not wanting to go to jail for punching a fan (especially a minor) and having a lifelong desire to live on a ranch in the country, he knew it was time to get out.

But I don’t think he ever held it against the fans or the team, despite what the media (cough Shaugnessy cough) said. He wasn’t a hermit either, I think if you went to Idaho he was doing just fine.
 

InstaFace

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I’ve never seen that video before, wow!
Washington's fate there might've been Torii Hunter's fate, too, if Ortiz's shot in 2013 ALCS game 2 had been a foot lower. Laying there insensible, just outside the field of play, while a slow slugger motors around the bases.

I'd never seen that play before, and I love it. RIP Bill Buckner and your 22-year MLB career, few were so lucky as you.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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I hope that inside the park HR video gets more run over the next 24-48 hours than the Game 6 grounder, but I'm sure it won't.

My favorite bit of Buckner trivia is that he was the left fielder who watched Hank Aaron's 715th HR go over his head into the Braves' bullpen.
 

Tyrone Biggums

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Life isn't fair. The poor guy was roasted for one bad moment in '86 after a stellar career. You win as a team and lose as one. He took the heat when McNamara should have for not putting in a defensive replacement for Buckner who was hobbled. Buckner also had teammates who also didn't get the job done that night. Let him rest in peace.
I always felt bad for the way he was treated up to 2004. What did he need "forgiveness" for? Dude was a great hitter and didn't deserve the crap he got from the city for decades. RIP
 

AlNipper49

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For better or for worse Bill Buckner makes up a large part of DNA of both a baseball and a Sox fan. I absolutely would have it no other way. Not only was he a player to admire during my peak formative years but had 86 never happened then The Pedro Years, 04, the subsequent championships would have been less sweet. He’s an integral part of the story of the past 30 years
 

Adrian's Dome

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I always felt bad for the way he was treated up to 2004. What did he need "forgiveness" for? Dude was a great hitter and didn't deserve the crap he got from the city for decades. RIP
The city didn't give him crap, the media narrative did, and he basically said as much.
 

RIFan

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And that was the third time he was welcomed back by the crowd at Fenway. If not the fourth. Most folks knew pretty quickly that it wasn't his fault
Great hitter and one of the classiest players to play here. Everyone will hear that he was roasted and vilified by Boston fans for over 20 years, but the reality is outside of the ignorant minority, he was quickly "forgiven". Here is the article from his return in 1990.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/sports/redsox/1990/04/10/fenway-park-faithful-willingly-gave-bill-buckner-second-chance/4o6Ji8lG5vHLTjPtqzs3uN/story.html
 

E5 Yaz

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I hope that inside the park HR video gets more run over the next 24-48 hours than the Game 6 grounder, but I'm sure it won't.
I doubt I'll read any of the obits where want to stretch their "artistic" muscles by putting the grounder into perspective to the sum of the player and the person.
 

Blue Monkey

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If 86’ doesn’t happen is Buckner in the hall of fame? Looking at the numbers he seems fairly qualified. I was too young to see him play. Maybe a conversation for another thread.
 

OCST

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Lewy body dementia is terrible beyond words. This is what Robin Williams had. I’m so saddened to find this out about Buckner.
 

montoursvillefan

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For better or for worse Bill Buckner makes up a large part of DNA of both a baseball and a Sox fan. I absolutely would have it no other way. Not only was he a player to admire during my peak formative years but had 86 never happened then The Pedro Years, 04, the subsequent championships would have been less sweet. He’s an integral part of the story of the past 30 years
Well stated Al, RIP Billy Bucks indeed. Not to derail the thread, it was Clemens as much as any one player. Blister, right, the pussy.
 

ifmanis5

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For better or for worse Bill Buckner makes up a large part of DNA of both a baseball and a Sox fan. I absolutely would have it no other way. Not only was he a player to admire during my peak formative years but had 86 never happened then The Pedro Years, 04, the subsequent championships would have been less sweet. He’s an integral part of the story of the past 30 years
Totally. Even though he was an observer and not a direct participant, the redemption of '04 and beyond means a lot more with his story.
 

moondog80

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If 86’ doesn’t happen is Buckner in the hall of fame? Looking at the numbers he seems fairly qualified. I was too young to see him play. Maybe a conversation for another thread.
Not even close. Mike Trout had more WAR in 2017 and 2018 combined than Buckner in his career.
 

reggiecleveland

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Only a couple of times have I been 100% sure a manager was wrong before the play even happened. Mac not puttin gin Stapleton, and Grady leaving Pedro in were obvious to everyone. So unfair that Buckner got the blame, when the real bad stuff had already happened.