A Nation caught behind enemy lines
Ryan Menezes
Issue date: 5/3/07 Section: News
NEW YORK -- It's not easy being a Red Sox fan in the city, says longtime fan Joe Cosgriff -- New York City, that is.
"[Being] a Sox fan here?" he asked. "I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I didn't choose it. It's just something that happens."
Every April, Cosgriff and the other 500 members of the Benevolent and Loyal Order of Honorable and Ancient Red Sox Diehard Sufferers of New York pile into a Boston-bound bus to catch the Red Sox home opener. The group of fans are willing to track the passing of decades by the rising price of a cocktail at the Howard Johnson's on Boylston Street in Boston.
The BLOHARDS began unexpectedly, like many Sox victories, when Massachusetts native Jim Powers rode a train back from a Boston loss at Yankee Stadium in 1967. As he began to sing "Better than his brother Joe, Dominic Dimaggio," a 1950s anthem referring to the former Sox center fielder, fellow fan Henry Berry recognized the tune, and the pair began a conversation.
That season, the Red Sox won the American League pennant.
"You want to be with people like you," said member Peter Collery. "I've never watched a game in some bar with Yankees fans. It wouldn't be much fun."
The group's website lists other Bostonian-friendly features, including "Boston-Friendly Watering Holes" and a link to home delivery of the Boston Sunday Globe.
BLOHARDS also gets together twice a year for lunches featuring Red Sox VIPs, who have included pitchers Roger Clemens and Calvin Schiraldi and managers Johnny Pesky and Jimy Williams -- and even one guest from the "other side," when a man dressed as Babe Ruth stopped by in September 2004.
The Bambino incarnate was WOR Radio's Joey Reynolds, outfitted with chains and dirt to assume the role of Ruth's ghost, but the BLOHARDS' official minutes say it was the Babe himself. At the lunch, "Babe Ruth" declared his famous curse a myth and said the Red Sox would win the World Series that year.
"[Being] a Sox fan here?" he asked. "I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. I didn't choose it. It's just something that happens."
Every April, Cosgriff and the other 500 members of the Benevolent and Loyal Order of Honorable and Ancient Red Sox Diehard Sufferers of New York pile into a Boston-bound bus to catch the Red Sox home opener. The group of fans are willing to track the passing of decades by the rising price of a cocktail at the Howard Johnson's on Boylston Street in Boston.
The BLOHARDS began unexpectedly, like many Sox victories, when Massachusetts native Jim Powers rode a train back from a Boston loss at Yankee Stadium in 1967. As he began to sing "Better than his brother Joe, Dominic Dimaggio," a 1950s anthem referring to the former Sox center fielder, fellow fan Henry Berry recognized the tune, and the pair began a conversation.
That season, the Red Sox won the American League pennant.
"You want to be with people like you," said member Peter Collery. "I've never watched a game in some bar with Yankees fans. It wouldn't be much fun."
The group's website lists other Bostonian-friendly features, including "Boston-Friendly Watering Holes" and a link to home delivery of the Boston Sunday Globe.
BLOHARDS also gets together twice a year for lunches featuring Red Sox VIPs, who have included pitchers Roger Clemens and Calvin Schiraldi and managers Johnny Pesky and Jimy Williams -- and even one guest from the "other side," when a man dressed as Babe Ruth stopped by in September 2004.
The Bambino incarnate was WOR Radio's Joey Reynolds, outfitted with chains and dirt to assume the role of Ruth's ghost, but the BLOHARDS' official minutes say it was the Babe himself. At the lunch, "Babe Ruth" declared his famous curse a myth and said the Red Sox would win the World Series that year.