The Steve Bartman incident will forever be one of baseball's most controversial moments. That's never going away.
But at this point, 18 years later, the Cubs starter who dealt with the consequences of the unfortunate incident maintains that he holds no grudge against Bartman, nor does he think any Chicago fans should continue to blame him for their loss in Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS.
"Yeah, okay, maybe he catches it, maybe he doesn't, you know. That happens a fair amount in baseball games when we have fans — less, now that we have nets down the line," Prior said on the "Major League Beginnings" podcast, hosted by former big leaguer Mark Sweeney. "We had our opportunities."
Prior thinks that the 0-2 curveball he threw to Ivan Rodriguez, resulting in an RBI single, was one of those missed opportunities.
"The pitch you alluded to was the one, 0-2... curveball to Pudge where I hung it and he was able to put it in left field," Prior said. "We had a chance, a ground ball (to Alex) Gonzalez, who makes that play 99.9 percent of the time — the guy was so sure-handed — he didn't make that play. Derrek Lee decides to cheat for a ball on the inside — that's what I tell him all the time — he decided he wanted to cheat on the line so...
"I mean, honestly we gave up eight runs in a matter of 11 pitches. It's actually incredible how fast it happened when you actually go back and watch it."
We'll save you the trouble (via Baseball Reference):
— Ivan Rodriguez singled on an 0-2 pitch, driving in a run.
— Miguel Cabrera reached on the aforementioned Alex Gonzalez error on the first pitch of his at-bat.
— Derrek Lee lined a two-run double on the first pitch of his at-bat, and Prior was replaced with Kyle Farnsworth.
— Mike Lowell was intentionally walked to load the bases.
— Jeff Conine hit a sacrifice fly on the first pitch of his at-bat.
— Todd Hollandsworth was intentionally walked to load the bases again.
— Mike Mordecai cleared the bases with a double on a 2-1 count.
— Pierre drove in Mordecai on the first pitch of his at-bat.
Not counting the intentional walks, that's eleven pitches, starting right after the walk that may have occurred as a result of the Bartman incident. Eight runs in 11 pitches. Good memory, Mark.
"It was a great run and we were close," Prior, now a pitching coach with the Los Angeles Dodgers, recalled. "Ill tell you, last year when we got [within] five outs of winning some of those, whether it was against the Padres, whether it was against the Braves... every time I hit that five-out mark, I'm like, we're not even close to this thing being done.
"So, yeah, the wound is still healthy from that standpoint, but, you know, it's closed when it comes to blaming it (on Bartman)... I think everybody by now sort of has at least moved on, or I would hope they've moved on."
The Cubs, as an organization, definitely seem to have moved on, presenting Bartman with an honorary World Series ring.
But while some fans have moved on, the Cubs' and MLB fan base will always remember the Bartman incident — and we were all reminded of it thanks to cardboard cutouts in the wild 2020 season.
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