Family members say the grudge has outlasted two marriages and one heart procedure
THE BRONX – A lifelong Yankees fan who placed an informal curse on a division rival following a disputed call during a 1996 playoff game says the curse remains firmly in effect nearly three decades later, despite what he acknowledges is a complete absence of any actual supernatural mechanism behind it.
Anthony Colangelo, 68, says he first declared the curse aloud in his living room the night of the disputed call, informing his late father, his two young children, and, according to family lore, the family dog, that the rival franchise would “never again win a meaningful game against us as long as I’m breathing.” Nearly thirty years, two marriages, and one minor heart procedure later, Colangelo says he has not once reconsidered the declaration, regardless of standings.
A Grudge That Has Outlasted Everything Else
“People change jobs, people move, people get remarried,” said Colangelo’s daughter, Gina, now 34. “My father has changed almost everything about his life since 1996 except this one specific belief. He brought it up at my wedding. Both weddings, actually, since he officiated my brother’s ceremony and worked it into his toast somehow.” Gina says the curse has become such a fixture of family gatherings that guests unfamiliar with Colangelo now assume it’s a running joke, only to realize, usually within the first ten minutes of conversation, that he is entirely serious.
Colangelo, for his part, insists the curse has been statistically validated over the decades, citing a string of rival team disappointments in what he calls “big moments,” while conceding under gentle questioning that he does not track outcomes when the rival team wins, describing those instances instead as “the exception that proves the pattern, not the pattern itself,” a piece of logic his son has given up trying to argue with.
How It All Started
Colangelo’s wife, Denise, who married him nine years after the original curse was declared, said she received a full oral history of the grudge on their third date, delivered, she recalls, “with the same intensity most people reserve for actual trauma.” She says she initially assumed it was an exaggerated bit meant to charm her, only to realize over subsequent years that he genuinely tracks the rival franchise’s fortunes with what she calls “borderline professional dedication.”
“I’ve accepted it the way you accept a relative’s odd habit,” Denise said. “It doesn’t hurt anyone. He’s not out there sabotaging anything. He just believes, very sincerely, that his living room declaration in 1996 altered the fabric of a professional sports rivalry, and honestly, after thirty years together, arguing about it stopped being worth the energy.” She added that she has, despite herself, started attending the annual spring re-declaration ceremony each year, initially out of obligation and now, she admits, “out of something closer to genuine curiosity about what new wrinkle he’ll add to the speech this time.” This year’s version, delivered over Easter dinner, reportedly included a new clause extending the curse’s authority to a recently signed player on the rival roster, a addition Denise said prompted their youngest grandchild to ask, with total sincerity, whether Grandpa was “some kind of baseball wizard.”
The Family’s Uneasy Truce
Colangelo’s son, Michael, said the family made peace with the curse years ago rather than continue fighting it directly. “You can’t out-argue him,” Michael said. “We tried for probably a decade. Now we just nod. Every October, without fail, he brings it up again, usually unprompted, usually at dinner, usually right as someone’s trying to eat.” Michael added that his father has, on at least two occasions, refused to attend family events scheduled during a game against the rival franchise, treating the curse’s continued vigilance as “basically a second job he takes very seriously.”
Colangelo’s doctor, informed secondhand of the curse’s role in his patient’s stress levels during rival matchups, reportedly suggested he “consider watching fewer of these specific games,” advice Colangelo says he has chosen to interpret as “medically confirming how seriously I need to take this.”
A Ritual With Rules
Over the years, the curse has accumulated its own set of informal rules and rituals, including a specific chair Colangelo insists on sitting in during rival matchups, a ban on anyone saying the rival team’s name aloud in his house during the ninth inning, and an annual re-declaration of the curse each spring training, delivered, according to family members, “with the same seriousness as a wedding vow.”
Sports culture historians note that superstitious rituals like Colangelo’s are a long and well-documented tradition among devoted fans citywide, a phenomenon covered periodically by outlets including The New York Post, which has profiled similar fan traditions across multiple boroughs over the years.
No Plans to Retire the Curse
Colangelo says he has already informed his grandchildren of their eventual responsibility to maintain the curse once he’s gone, a succession plan his daughter finds simultaneously absurd and, in its own strange way, touching. “It’s not really about baseball anymore,” Gina said. “It’s about him. This is how he expresses passion. I’ve stopped trying to separate the two.”
Continuing coverage of Colangelo’s curse, and its ongoing statistical record according to him, is tracked at bohiney.com.
Further dispatches from the humor desk: Reductress.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com