Over the past few seasons, the Indians have been cursed by the backstop bounce. The backstop bounce involves an Indians runner at third, a wild pitch that goes all the way to the backstop and then ricochets back to a very surprised but happy catcher, who quicktosses to the pitcher and a usually very surprised Indians runner is out at home. It just happened to Andy Marte during the last week of the regular season, and it has happened to other Indian runners as well over the past few seasons.
How many Indians runners have been thrown out at home because of the Backstop bounce over the past couple of years? I dare say many more Indians baserunners have been thrown out at home because of the backstop bounce than we our opponents. Throw in the infamous Ronnie Belliard take down by Angels closer KROD at home plate in which KROD tagged Ronnie out like he was branding a steer, and that's just one more notch in our opponents belt.
And then there's Grady Sizemore. When Grady scored the tying run in the 8th inning Friday night against the yankees Grady broke the Backstop Bounce hex.
You see the wild pitch that Grady scored on also hit the backstop and rebounded right back to Jorge Posada. Suddenly what should have been a walk in the park home for Grady was a race with Destiny, and that danged backstop bounce. Only this time Grady was SAFE, BARELY SAFE.
The play at the plate was oh so close and the television announcers aptly pointed out that probably only Grady Sizemore would have been safe at the plate. Is it safe to proclaim any curse is over, or does that just antagonize the curse and make it come back even stronger?
Dare I say that Grady broke the curse of the Backstop Bounce at Jacobs field? Andy Marte and a slew of over Indians base runners would like to think so.
