Having already revised my previous piece on Game Seven several times, I awoke this morning and slapped my head for not working the phrase “The Big Book of Bitter Defeats” in there somewhere after spending a good part of Thursday afternoon spelling out the concept. Suffice it to say that for the Sox, that one’s in there near the top of the list. ESPN Page 2’s Jeff Merron places it at #1A on his Top 10 list of Most Painful Losses in Baseball History (meaning that it actualy goes to 11, like the knob on the rack of pain which the Sox are perpetually strapped to).

The Sox are represented three other times in addition to Thursday’s game: the Bill Buckner game is #1, the Bucky Dent is #6, and the Sox victory over the Angels in Game 5 of the ’86 ALCS (the Donnie Moore game) is #7. The list is very biased towards the recent past — the only game older than the Bucky Dent one is 1951’s NL showdown, Bobby Thomson’s Shot Heard ‘Round the World. Which means I saw most of these moments — the only ones I missed in my time are the Donnie Moore (RIP) and Leon Durham (’84 NLCS) games.

I have to think that the ’91 loss for the Braves in World Series Game Seven belongs up there somewhere, as does the 1960 Mazeroski homer (even if it was the Yanks on the wrong end for about the only time), the 1952 Dodgers loss to the Yanks in 7 (2-2 tie thru 5, final 4-2 with Martin making his famous catch of Jackie Robinson’s popup with the bases loaded and 2 outs in the 7th), the 1962 Giants loss to the Yanks (Bobby Richardson snaring Willie McCovey’s liner to end the Series while Willie Mays was on second, representing the tying run in a 1-0 game), and the 1993 World Series (Joe Carter homers off of Mitch Williams when the Phils were 2 outs from forcing Game Seven against the Blue Jays). And those are more or less just off the top of my head.

Suffice it to say, the Big Book of Bitter Defeats is a very, very big book.