Vandals strike at a Sox fan's heart

First, a Game 4 rout. Then, Yankees-themed vandalism

What could be worse for a Red Sox fan than sitting through a 13-4 playoff loss?

Coming home to a condominium spray-painted by a Yankees fan.

Sean Bunn, the Triangle's most prominent member of Red Sox Nation, got back Tuesday night from a fan get-together he organized at Hi5 in Raleigh to find Yankee pinstripes and the Yankees' "NY" logo all over his condo. It was bad enough that the Sox had lost Game 4 of the American League Championship Series to the Tampa Bay Rays, a 13-4 pasting. The real kick in the gut: Bunn's Boston memorabilia, anything with a Boston Red Sox logo, his television screens, an antique chair from his grandfather, other furniture, walls, carpeting, cabinets, shoes, his golf bag, all had been vandalized.

At the advice of the Red Sox, Bunn declined to speak on the record, concerned about potential future break-ins or retaliation by Red Sox fans.

The crime was a sad, local chapter in the long history of the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees, considered by many the most intense rivalry in American sports, one that goes back to the early 1900s and the sale of Babe Ruth by Boston to the Yankees.

In a destructive nod to history, the vandal or vandals painted "26-3" on one wall -- apparently a botched reference to the Yankees' number of World Series championships relative to those won by the Red Sox. (Any Red Sox fan would immediately protest the inaccuracy: Boston won not only in 1918, 2004 and 2007 but also in 1903, 1912, 1915 and 1916.)

Whoever broke into Bunn's place -- Raleigh police are investigating -- even painted uniform numbers, the 13 worn by Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter's No. 2, on the backs of Bunn's dress shirts. (He is considering auctioning the shirts to raise money for the Jimmy Fund, the charitable arm of the Red Sox Foundation.)

Thousands in damage

Police spokesman Jim Sughrue estimated the damage at "several thousands of dollars," and police consider it a burglary case. Nothing was missing. Sughrue said police aren't certain how Bunn was identified as a Red Sox fan or how his address was discovered.

But Bunn, 39, a software trainer for the N.C. Court System, has been so devoted to bringing Sox fans together that he was recently chosen as "governor" of Red Sox Nation in North Carolina, and his name and picture are posted on the Red Sox Web site. The dates and times of "meetups" of Triangle Red Sox fans are posted online, too.

Bryan Richardson, 33, a friend of Bunn's who helps organize Triangle Red Sox Nation events, believes the clues point to someone who isn't a lifelong Yankees fan.

"I don't think it's a typical fan at all, because they know how to spell 'Yankees,' " Richardson said in a telephone interview, referring to the "Yankes" painted on one wall. "It's probably somebody who was not brought up a Yankee fan, maybe a young kid in high school or college who doesn't understand the whole history."

One lifelong Yankee fan suggested it may not have been a Yankee fan at all.

"It has to be a Red Sox fan trying to make us look bad," said Hart Seely, who has a Yankee blog and edited the book "O Holy Cow! The Selected Verse of Phil Rizzuto."

Countered Richardson: "There's less than a half-a-percent chance of a Red Sox fan doing something like that."

At the end of the day, Bunn was left with a condominium that was a disaster area on top of the night's playoff loss.

Worse than the ball through Bill Buckner's legs that cost the Red Sox the 1986 World Series?

"No way," Richardson said. "Nothing was worse than that. Then again, it wasn't my house."