By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist

A show of hands, please, from all those who back in March had the Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs meeting in the World Series next month?

Proof of prediction required, naturally.

That's why the mere possibility that one or — and how is this for runaway optimism — both of them could actually get to the World Series is what gives this year's postseason field its considerable attraction going in.

For the first time since 1998 both the Red Sox and Cubs are in the postseason picture again. Curses and all.

The New York Yankees are back, of course. And, as with the Atlanta Braves, that hardly qualifies as news. It is as if they have annual reservations at Bud Selig's table and Fox and ESPN couldn't start the playoffs without them.

Even the Oakland A's, Minnesota Twins, who thrive in the memory of Selig's attempt at contraction, and the San Francisco Giants are back. The 1997 champion Florida Marlins, too. And the odds favor one of the six winning it all.

But the Red Sox and Cubs, no matter how long the odds, each bring history, however tortured, to this party. With the Red Sox not having won it all since 1918 and the Cubs not since 1908, the hearts and minds of fans in cities not blessed with a representative are undoubtedly with them.

There's nothing a human audience loves more or the networks eat up more than an inspiring story of overcoming woe and adversity. Here are a couple of lifetimes worth, real-life tales that TV doesn't even have to hype like the tear-jerker NBC Olympic pieces. For when it comes to sports franchises, nowhere are there more long-suffering teams or more pained constituencies than those of baseball fans in Boston and Chicago.

If it seemed like it took the reigning world champion Anaheim Angels the longest time to win a World Series, their 42 year wait was nothing compared to the generation upon generation struggles of the Red Sox and Cubs.

The World Series has given us a few Subway Series. And, even a Bay Bridge Series. So, why not a Red Sox-Cubs Exorcism Series?

One that would guarantee one of the two long-tormented groups finally being able to get on with life. One that might allow The Babe and Harry Frazee, the theater figure who sold him to the Yankees for $100,000 and a $300,000 loan, to finally rest in peace more than a half-century after their deaths. One that could lighten some of Bill Buckner's burden.

Having one of those teams guaranteed to get the monkey off their back would do a lot more for the psyches of Cubs or Red Sox fans everywhere than either a Wrigley Field or Fenway Park full of shrinks.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.