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Bill Buckner was a terrific baseball player.
He played 20 years in the Major Leagues, collected 2,715 hits, hit for an average of .289 and won a batting title.
TAnd, by all accounts, Buckner was a good man.
Yet, when Buckner died this week at the age of 69, after battling Lewy body dementia, you couldn't read or watch a story that didn't focus on the single mistake by which many have tried to define him.
Buckner did not cost the Boston Red Sox the World Series in 1986. Yes, a grounder rolled through his legs ito allow the New York Mets to score the winning run. There was still a Game Seven, but the Red Sox couldn't pull themselves out of the fallout from the previous night's meltdown, most of which had nothing to do with Buckner. And most of which no one outside of Boston remembers.
"I'll have to live with this," Buckner said after the game. "I was having a lot of fun until that."
Had Boston rallied and won the following day, no one would have remembered Buckner's gaffe. Instead, the play dogged Buckner.
To a certain extent, this is what professional athletes and entertainers sign up for. Failure and scrutiny are part of the job. That's fair.
What wasn't fair was accusing Bucker of single-handedly losing the World Series and worse, making him a symbol of ineptitude for the next three decades.
While the media haranguing bothered him, Buckner never ran from his error. In fact, he even found a way to laugh about it and to make others laugh with him.
Buckner appeared in an episode of Larry David's "Curb Your Enthusiasm" in 2011. In the episode, Buckner comforts David, who let a ball go through his legs during a championship softball game. Later, Buckner makes a diving catch of a baby tossed out of the window of a burning building.
We all have our bad moments. The difference between Buckner and the rest of us is that we don't have to watch our worst moment over and over again.
What we do have in common with Buckner, however, is the same choice. What do we do with our worst moments? Do they make us angry? Or, do they make us better?
"I had to forgive the media for what they put me and my family through," Buckner said in 2008. "I've done that. I'm over that. I just try to think of the positives, the happy things, the friendships."
Buckner made his peace with the media and the fans. He threw out the first pitch for the Red Sox season opener in 2008 and received a two-minute standing ovation.
Buckner refused to let one play define his life or measure his worth. He suffered unjustly for his error. But in its aftermath came his greatest victory.
