Patrick Berry, The Levison Group
A few weeks ago, on Saint Patrick’s Day, I left work at around 5 p.m. and headed to meet a few friends in a nearby bar. St. Paddy’s Day happened to fall on a Friday this year, which is great for local drinking establishments, but generally bad for those concerned with maintaining a peaceful, civilized society. It seems that my namesake’s holiday becomes significantly more debaucherous when revelers don’t need to choose between a more timid night or being hungover at work the next day.
Aside from the green beer and religious celebrations that mark the day (the latter seems to take a back seat to the former for most celebrants), another element of March 17 that intrigues me is our society’s collective embrace and celebration of the concept of “luck” — what Americans refer to as the “luck of the Irish.” Considering 33 million Americans claim Irish heritage (for perspective, the entire population of Ireland is about 4.5 million), there’s a lot of luck to go around on this day.
The idea of “luck” has always interested me. I think we would have a more generous, peaceful society if all of those who had achieved some semblance of relative success — myself included — made more of an effort to recognize the role that luck played in helping us achieve, as well as the role that misfortune plays in keeping others from reaching their highest potential. For sure, hard work and preparation are essential elements of success, but serendipity and fortuitousness have key roles to play as well.
The world of law, for example, is filled with luck and randomness. Juries decide cases in ways that baffle lawyers and judges. Judges, for their part, sometimes issue rulings that seem to belie precedent and even sound reasoning. Cases can be won or lost based on the purely random assignment of the judge or judges hearing the trial. Maybe, then, lawyers would do better to recognize the affect that luck has on the outcomes of cases.
When I arrived at the bar, the TVs were all turned to a pivotal game in the World Baseball Classic: the United States was playing Puerto Rico, a land known for its baseball prowess. Baseball, which is about as American as claiming Irish heritage on St. Patrick's Day, has always been a prime example of the role of luck, in all its mysterious forms. In a game in which even the best hitters only succeed about 30 percent of the time, the very best teams win just 60 percent of the time, and games are often decided by a skip of the ball or a bad call from the umpire, it’s no surprise that players and fans alike often chalk up the results — good or bad — to invisible higher powers, including the mystical and elusive elements of luck and superstition.
Consider, for example, the “Curse of the Bambino.” Many otherwise rational people — including some very intelligent friends of mine from New England — genuinely believe that the Boston Red Sox had failed to win the World Series for 86 years
because, following the 1919-1920 season, the team sold their star player, Babe Ruth, to the rival New York Yankees. During the Red Sox’s drought, the Yankees won a total of 26 World Series championships, far more than any other club. The “Curse of the Bambino” was to blame for each of the Yankees’ wins, and every single one of the Red Sox’s miserable seasons.
The “Curse of the Billy Goat” similarly afflicted the Chicago Cubs for decades. Up until 1945, the Cubs were a powerhouse, having made 16 pennant and World Series appearances. That all changed in October of 1945: During game four of the World Series, William “Billy Goat” Sianis, owner of the Billy Goat Tavern, hoped to bring the Cubs a little good luck by bringing his pet goat with him to the game. Billy Goat was denied entry at the gates and, when he appealed to the Cubs’ owner, he was told that the goat could not enter because “the goat stinks.” Enraged, Billy Goat allegedly exclaimed, “The Cubs ain’t gonna win no more. The Cubs will never win a World Series so long as the goat is not allowed in Wrigley Field.” While today there seems nothing unreasonable about a policy forbidding smelly goats from public sporting events, Cubs fans swear that they went the next 71 years without a World Series victory because of this unthinkable slight.
It’s not all droughts and bad juju though. The modern game is awash with individual player superstitions and rituals (maybe as a way of keeping said evil spirits away). For example, Nationals pitcher Sean Burnett can’t pitch without a poker chip in his back pocket. Elliot Johnson of the Dodgers chews grape-flavored gum when on defense and watermelon-flavored gum when batting because, as he explains, “the hits are in the watermelon gum” (of course). Wade Boggs, one of the best hitters in baseball history, would eat the same meal before every game, take batting practice at precisely 5:17 p.m. before each night game, and would take exactly 150 grounders during pre-game warmups. When former Oakland A’s slugger, Jason Giambi, felt like he was entering a slump, he’d don a golden thong. Gives a new meaning to baseball’s “golden glove” award, I suppose.
Who am I to question the likes of Wade Boggs, Jason Giambi and The Babe? Therefore, to reduce the chances of becoming victim to my own bout of bad luck or, even worse, experiencing a Red Sox- or Cubs-like drought in my legal career, beginning with my next case I think I’ll adopt some superstitions of my own.
First, I’ll file exactly eleven pre-trial motions, which was the jersey number I always wore growing up (I even refused to transfer teams once when the prospective club didn’t have my number available). Second, I’ll always wear the same underwear I wore when I aced my constitutional law final in law school. Although I can’t quite remember which pair I wore, I think I’ve narrowed it down to two possibilities. If I lose my next case, I’ll know I chose the wrong pair, and switch for the next one. Next, in honor of my favorite player, Ozzie Smith, I’ll perform a gymnastic feat for the crowd as I enter the courtroom. For Ozzie, that meant an acrobatic backflip as he ran to his position at shortstop. I’m not quite as athletic as the Wizard, however, and I think doing a backflip in the aisle of the courtroom might irritate the judge and opposing counsel (though it may endear me to the jury). Instead, I’ll have to adopt a somewhat more subdued and inconspicuous ritual — maybe a simulated game of hopscotch or an enthusiastic jumping heel click on the courthouse steps. Finally, when everything goes as planned and my new superstitions help me win my case, I will head down to my favorite Irish pub down the street, grab a green beer no matter what time of year it may be, and raise my glass and toast to the “Luck of the lawyer!”
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