As the ’60s turned into the ’70s, nothing happened to refute this. We won it all again in ’71, beating an Orioles team with four 20-game winners, and made the playoffs nearly every year before succumbing to the Dodgers or the Big Red Machine. Roberto Clemente, tragically, was gone, but his spirit lingered over the Lumber Company, a colorful and monstrous offensive club that included hitters like Willie Stargell, Dave Parker, Al Oliver, Richie Zisk, Rennie Stennett and Manny Sanguillen. Earl Weaver’s O’s and Charlie Finley’s A’s ruled the AL. The bumbling Yankees, like the Brooklyn Dodgers or New York Giants, belonged to a flannel, white-bread past, hopelessly square.

About the time George Steinbrenner took them over, I traded my interest in baseball for cooler high school pursuits: music and cars, girls and cigarettes. I noticed with an offhand disgust that the Yankees had bought the heart of the A’s dynasty to “win” two cheapies, but it didn’t mean much to me. I was too busy messing around to bother with a kid’s game.

That probably wouldn’t have changed if the Pirates didn’t go and win it all again in ’79. I was going to school in Boston, lost in engineering problems and partying, but one of my best friends was an Orioles fan. Game 7 was excruciating for him. Just like in ’71, they were playing in Baltimore, and just like in ’71, the three-run homer the O’s were waiting for never showed up. Rather than rub it in, I did my best to console my friend. That’s just how it went with the Pirates in Game 7—like the Steelers in the Super Bowl.

By Opening Day of 1980, the glow from winning it all hadn’t worn off, and, living two blocks from Kenmore Square, I decided to take advantage of the neighborhood and visit Fenway Park for the first time. I didn’t expect much. AL ball back then seemed boring to me, a slow, low-scoring game like soccer (since then, the leagues have swapped styles, maybe due to the DH, or the AL teams’ new, smaller parks), but bleacher seats were only three dollars.