Between The Stitches: Under the ladder with a black cat and playoff beard

This might come as a surprise to some, but it appears that my beard has had no effect on the outcome of any playoff games this season. You see, ever since I was able to grow facial hair, I would groom the infamous ‘playoff beard.’

It is a fairly common superstition. This is how it works: your team loses, and the beard comes off. If your team manages to pull out a playoff victory, the beard lives to see another day.

This year, for the sake of you, dear readers, I conducted a little experiment where gasp! I did not shave my beard after a playoff loss. The results have been quite telling.

This week, for the American League Championship Series, I have let it grow to creepy-guy-in-the-class proportions. The Red Sox-Yankees series, which ended late last night in dramatic fashion with a Yankee win, was a seesaw battle. My beard witnessed seven close games, and I can say that the effect of my beard on the outcome of baseball games is not statistically significant.

This whole experiment might sound ludicrous, but it reflects a stranger norm in our society. As a whole, we rely as much on silly superstitions as we do on our own skills, if not more. Even the elite athletes among us cannot escape the crutch of superstition.

Former Red Sox and Yankees third basemen Wade Boggs gained the moniker ‘Chicken Man’ because he devoured some poultry before every game. He also began his wind sprints at exactly 16 minutes before every game. Pitcher Turk Wendell brushes his teeth and chews licorice between every inning that he pitches. Nomah makes sure to step on each dugout step with both of his feet whenever he comes out to the on-deck circle.

Does this really help? Honestly, does a fan wearing his lucky hat in Los Angeles, Calif. determine whether his team scores runs in a game being played 3,000 miles away? Probably not. Did Wade Boggs’ unusual pre-game ‘routine’ make him a Hall of Famer? I sure hope not. We should then ask ourselves an important question. Why do we believe in superstitions when they obviously have no impact on the actual games?

As far as athletes go, there is a fairly obvious answer. Richard Lustberg, a sports psychologist from New York, told the Orlando Sentinel that he believes that superstitions among athletes serve as a ‘coping mechanism.’ Human nature states that we cannot internalize our failures. We only take credit for our successes. Lustberg explained, ‘Athletes begin to believe, and want to believe, that their particular routine is enhancing their performance. In reality, it’s probably just practice and confidence that’s making them perform.’ In turn, athletes also want to believe that their failures can be attributed to their routines.

Frank Viola, a pitcher for the Mets in the 1990s, had a superstition that he would kick the dirt around the mound four times before each inning. He explained, in the same Sentinel story, however, ‘If something bad should happen, I couldn’t do it four times anymore. I would kick up dirt three times, or five times, because four wasn’t working.’

What about us? What is our excuse for these absurd superstitions? And believe me, there are far zanier rituals than the ‘playoff beard.’

Sports Illustrated’s Steve Rushin documents some unusual fan superstitions in his most recent column. One Philadelphia 76ers fan is forced by friends to watch all games in the basement of his dorm, away from everyone else, because he has bad victory karma. The fan notes, ‘If that fails, I must leave the building until the game is over.’ Bill Simmons, writer for Jimmy Kimmel Live and columnist on ESPN.com’s Page2, has a smellier take on the ‘playoff beard’ superstition: during the Division Series, Simmons refused to change his underwear.

And you thought it was clutch pitching from the Red Sox that got them into the ALCS.

Bill Simmons was not trying to be nasty (although he inadvertently succeeded). He was just trying to do what we all do. As baseball fans, we like to think we are the 26th man. I don’t refer to the Yankees in the third person, but rather that collective ‘we’ form, even though I haven’t swung a bat since Intramural Softball ended. Our cheering leads the home team to victory. We are so emotionally attached to these teams that we would like to feel we have some control over their destinies.

The reality of the situation, however, is that we have absolutely no effect on the outcomes of games (with the following exceptions: Jeffrey Maier and Steve Bartman).

So wear your lucky socks. Sit in your lucky chair. Go to your lucky bar. I will choose to heed the words of the venerable Zarathushtra. ‘Superstition is born of ignorance and fear, and thrives the most when reason is asleep.’

As for the beard, I shaved it off before I flew to New York for Game 7. I didn’t want to be responsible if the Yankees were to lose.

Josh Stern, a senior in the School of Management, is a weekly sports columnist for The Daily Free Press.