Bartz's misery is mine too

GENE JENSEN/For the Frontiersman

When I picked up last Sunday's edition of the Frontiersman, I could only sit back and chuckle at someone else's sports-fan misery as I read Jeremiah Bartz's editorial titled, "Say it isn't Sosa." I fully understand his pain, but he will have to wait another season for hope until I finish gloating.

For decades, my friends have laughed at my anguish as the Boston Red Sox traded away its future and while I watched years of cellar-dwelling New England Patriot teams get hammered by every division rival.

It sounds as if the loss of just one future Hall of Famer was tough to digest for Bartz (weak stomach) and his beloved Chicago Cubs. I wonder how he would react if Kerry Wood drifted over to the St. Louis Cardinals?

As a team I have claimed since the 1970s, the Red Sox have endured some of the most damaging player trades in sports history, the most notable being Babe Ruth, who not only left the Red Sox for its rival New York Yankees, but also left behind a rancid present in his Fenway Park locker.

Like Bartz and his Cubs, my team has also suffered from awful trades. Try recovering from the loss of Hall of Famers, Carlton Fisk and Wade Boggs, plus Fred Lynn, and more recently, Nomar Garciaparra, not to mention future Hall of Famers, Roger Clemens and Pedro Martinez.

At least power-hitting Sammy Sosa didn't hit the road to St. Louis. His new team is half a continent away in one of those tiny-market towns. Bartz will probably never suffer Sosa-induced divisional nightmares like I have endured with former Red Sox players.

It seems every Boston star eventually gets gobbled by baseball patriarch, national nemesis and Yankee owner George Steinbrenner. An ESPN Sports Network survey last week just deemed the Red Sox-Yankee rivalry No. 1, in any sport. This is no doubt caused by the fact that Fenway Park has been a training ground for the Yankees.

Granted, the Red Sox walked away (literally) with a 2004 World Series Championship (Here is where I gloat). A Red Sox championship only means there is light at the end of the tunnel for Bartz, who I am sure will be comforted knowing that a Cubs championship is just around the perennial corner after they absorb the shock of losing a single, one-dimensional star. It just won't be next season.

Bartz may not be aware of this, but I wanted to point out that my two teams have nearly completed a double-double by winning back-to-back championships in both baseball and football in consecutive years.

After the Red Sox win the last baseball game next October, then Bartz can revel in the possibility of the Cubs winning in 2006. But for now, he will have to wait until I finish gloating. On second thought, maybe I will be shooting for a triple-triple by then.

Gene Jansen, a former Frontiersman sports editor, is filling in for the current sports editor, who is taking some time off. Good luck with your newborn, Jeremiah!