Did This Florida Man Predict Game 7 In 2014?

By Stephen Gossett in News on Nov 3, 2016 4:10PM

The sports world loves nothing more than making ridiculous, “bold” predictions, so the sheer glut of them means something’s bound to stick, no matter how outlandish. That said, the prescience of this one stand out.

@RaysFanGio dropped the following Tweet in 2014 and, as you know, the events went eerily according to script.

It didn’t take long for Gio’s prediction to hit peak virality on Wednesday night, and no wonder, considering how many details he seemed to nail. When the Indians rallied to force extra innings—and then the rain started pouring down—it seemed as if even the #apocalypse promise would come true.

Luckily, the end of days didn’t arrive—although some small pockets of Wrigleyville might disagree—and Cubs fans were able to celebrate their loooong-awaited championship without ushering forth the final judgment.

“I Tweeted it the day Maddon signed with [the] Cubs,” Gio told BuzzFeed News. “And I knew the Indians had a great young staff.” In hindsight it seems so obvious!

As Snopes pointed out, there was reason enough to not simply toss if off as another Twitter hoax:

"Many users insisted the tweet must have been faked, but it wasn't so far-fetched to think that someone might have made a joke about the two Major League franchises that had gone the longest without a World Series championship (the Indians had last won it all in 1948, and the Cubs not since 1908) meeting in a drawn-out, extra-inning seventh game battle whose ending mankind didn't survive to witness."

(Not everyone is convinced, though. Vox made a compelling case that this was a classic flood-and-delete move, in which the trickster piles up countless scenarios but then gets rid of all but the randomly correct one. Buzzfeed acknowledged the possibility, too, referencing this post about an apparent FIFA hoax.)

Gio on Thursday was spotted with fellow rando sage of sages Michael Lee—who called it way back in 1993—purchasing every lottery ticket within their vicinity and lining up bets with Vegas.

The two might also want to invite along Michael Schur, creator of Parks and Recreation. It was Schur, a rabid baseball fan, who argued for this bizarrely on-the-money throwaway sequence, from the second episode of the series' final season. Three characters are strolling along in Chicago in 2017. "And obviously everyone's in a really good mood now because of the Cubs winning the series," Natalie Morales' character.

[H/T Buzzfeed and New York Daily News]

This post has been updated.