Manny Ramirez - 24 - LF
Week 3 - 18-24 April 2005

Usually it doesn’t take long for Manny Ramirez to start lighting up the scoreboard, but it was a full eleven games into the season before he launched his first home run of the season. His average was also abysmal as he came dangerously close to hitting below the infamous Mendoza line of .200. All that changed a week ago Saturday when he launched two home runs against the Devil Rays at Fenway and drove all six runs to pace a 6-2 win for Boston.

This week, he continued to tear it up at the plate. On Monday morning against Toronto in Boston’s annual Patriots’ Day game, Manny stroked another two home runs and drove in five to pace another win for the Red Sox. The next night, he hit a true Monster shot that went over the light tower above the left field wall where the Coke bottles sit, across Lansdowne Street, and bounced on one hop onto the Massachusetts Turnpike. Sunday against the Rays in Tampa Bay, he hit yet another home run after getting a pitch thrown behind him by a Tampa reliever to give him six in just nine games.

In that same span, he also drove in 16 runs and raised his average from a paltry .211 to .269, though he had that as high as .294 on Wednesday following Boston’s 8-0 blanking of the Orioles in Baltimore. Ramirez now leads the team with 20 RBI and 15 runs scored and sits one behind on David Ortiz in the home run category.

When the legendary Ted Williams decided to hang up his cleats after the 1960 season, waiting in the wings was a young man who was born on Long Island and grew up in the shadow of the Yankees. The man they called “Yaz,” who nearly signed a contract with New York before coming to Boston, made an immediate impact with the Red Sox; despite the fact that the club never finished above .500 during his first six seasons, he averaged .294 with 16 home runs and 77 RBI during that time. Many people believe that he was the future of this team and that he was destined to lead Boston to that elusive World Series title. 1967 appeared to be that breakout year for Yaz, leading his team to its first appearance in 21 years in the Fall Classic while winning the American League Triple Crown with a .326 average, 44 home runs, and 121 RBI. Boston lost to the National League pennant-winning St. Louis Cardinals in a seven-game series but new levels of expectations had been set for this team and their 28-year-old captain.

However, those opportunities never came as Boston found itself well out of first place over the next few seasons, despite winning records that became the norm after years of sitting in the American League basement. Yaz continued to prove his dominance at the plate, sitting among the league leaders in key batting categories during those years but as seasons came and went and Boston remained absent from the championship hunt, fans began to view him differently. No longer the future, as he reached his 30s, he instead became the scapegoat for the failures of the team.

By 1975, Yastrzemski had long been relocated from his normal left field position, where he had won Gold Glove awards six times between 1963 and 1971, to first base for younger, speedier ballplayers. He had also struggled at the plate over the past few seasons and 1975 started out no differently; at the end of April, he was batting just .213 with two home runs and four RBI. However, by mid-season, Yaz appeared to be coming around as he brought his average up, peaking at .313 on 13 July and finishing that month with 12 home runs and 45 RBI to his credit. His numbers helped send him to his twelfth All-Star game that summer along with the red-hot rookie playing his old position, Fred Lynn.

However, the last two months went poorly for the 35 year-old veteran playing his fifteenth season in the majors. His average steadily declined as he finished at .269, well below his career average of .293 to that point. He had also managed only two home runs, both coming in late August, to finish with the season with 14 while collecting a meager 15 RBI to give him a season total of just 60, the lowest number he had ever amassed and well below his average of 84 per season. Putting it in perspective, in the final two weeks of the “Impossible Dream” season of 1967, Yaz had hit five home runs and driven in 16 RBI while batting .523.

When Rice went down for the season after getting hit by a pitch on 21 September, manager Darrell Johnson decided to move Yastrzemski back to his old position but asked him if he still felt able enough to play that position. Yaz, who had made just five errors at first that season while managing a fielding percentage of .996, assured him that he could do it in his sleep. Thus awoke the giant that had been asleep since 1967.

For just once, the little guy won, and I’m not speaking to last year’s amazing run to a World Series title by the Red Sox. I refer instead of those fans of Fenway Park, Boston’s majestic old ballpark, who launched a campaign that opposed the former owners’ plans to tear her down in favor of an exact replica but with all the amenities of the modern sports facility. Save Fenway Park!, a grassroots campaign, was launched in 1998 soon after these plans were announced and most individuals familiar with Fenway, including yours truly, viewed them as another far-reaching group just looking to stir emotions when it seemed obvious that a new facility was the answer to the park’s shortcomings. I was most interested in losing those cramped seats and obstructed views in the grandstands where I have sat on many evenings hoping that this would be the year.

Fast-forward seven years later; suddenly, with several changes made to the park over the past few years by a new Red Sox ownership, there is renewed commitment to the oldest active park in the majors. With a championship team playing to a packed house every night, the organization announced in late March that the club would remain at Fenway for generations to come. As John Henry, Tom Werner, and Larry Lucchino stood before the media publicizing a foregone conclusion, you could almost hear the soul of the park breathe a collective sigh of relief.

Fenway Park may be the most aesthetically-pleasing park in major league baseball today, although I admit that I may be slightly biased in that opinion. True, it still has shortcomings that will never be solved even with extensive renovations, but perhaps that is part of the attraction. Enter the gates, circle underneath the grandstand to find your section, and then climb the concourse to emerge to perhaps the most inviting site: the clay infield, the fresh-cut grass, and that left field wall that arises high above the playing field, beckoning batters to try and scale its heights with a perfectly-executed swing of the bat. Foul lines hug the walls as the park wraps itself right around the action on the field, with the attention of nearly 35,000 pairs of eyes on every delivery to home plate and the outcome that follows.

Less than two weeks ago, we were witness to an ugly incident in which a fan not only interfered with play in the right field corner near Pesky’s Pole but, on camera, appeared to take a swing at an opposing player. That fan was subsequently ejected from the ballpark and ultimately lost his season ticket privileges, a move made by the organization to make an example of that individual for trying to smear the spirit of the game. While some might see the punishment as harsh or extreme, the purpose was to save the intimacy of the park. While the owners want to keep fan interaction as a part of Fenway’s attraction, they don’t want fan interference to detract from its beauty.

Witness one hundred years ago when the Red Sox, then commonly referred to as the Americans, played at the old Huntington Avenue Grounds just across the tracks from the South End Grounds that the old Boston Braves called home. It was not uncommon for fans to stand along the foul lines and wrap themselves around the infield dirt. How often do you suppose that fan interference played a role in deciding the outcome of those games? Even after moving into Fenway Park in 1912, fans use to sit on what was known as “Duffy’s Cliff” in left field, the slight incline in front of the left field wall as the action took place.

These days, at many other ballparks around the majors, the average ticket holder sits far away from the action, so much so that you need binoculars just to recognize who’s playing where. Even those who get front-row seats usually find themselves with generous amounts of foul territory that buffer them from the action. That’s part of what makes Fenway such a unique place to watch a ball game; that intimate feeling, even with the addition of several thousand seats before all is said and done, has not vanished. The place where we watch today’s players like Curt Schilling, David Ortiz, Jason Varitek, and Manny Ramirez is not much different from the time that saw such greats like Tris Speaker, Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Bobby Doerr, and Carl Yastrzemski cover the field. While the names have changed, the aura of Fenway is still there.

Over the years, baseball stadiums have come and gone, like Ebbets Field, Sportsman’s Park, the Polo Grounds, and Tiger Stadium; some day, they may be joined by other storied stadiums like Wrigley Field, Yankee Stadium, and our beloved Fenway Park. For now, the Red Sox have realized that while Fenway, like a classic car, may not have the attractions of these modern stadiums, but it’s the simple beauty of the old girl that continues to bring fans through the turnstiles.

Tim Wakefield - 49 - RHP
Week 2 - 11-17 April 2005

Other than Trot Nixon, who was drafted by Boston in 1993 but didn’t make his first appearance until getting called up late in 1996, Tim Wakefield owns the distinction of being the longest active player with the Red Sox since he joined the roster in the spring of 1995. Perhaps he doesn’t get the same respect as more high-profile pitchers like Pedro Martinez or Curt Schilling, but he has been an invaluable part of the team for many years, a thorn in the side of such teams as the Yankees and the Devil Rays, as he proved this past week.

The 38-year-old knuckleball pitcher had the honor and good fortune to get the start on Opening Day at Fenway against New York this past Monday when, before the game, each member of last year’s team received a championship ring and then had the honor of raising the World Series pennant high above the Green Monster. Perhaps feuled by the emotions of the day, Wakefield then went out and shut down the Yankees over seven innings of work, yielding just a single unearned run on five hits while striking out five. It wasn’t until the fourth inning that the Bombers eeked out a hit against him and, of his five strikeouts, he managed to get Derek Jeter twice.

Then, at home again on Sunday against Tampa Bay, Wakefield again summoned the aura of the knuckleball and pitched six complete, allowing just one run on four hits while striking out five Devil Rays. When he struck out Aubrey Huff in the third, he moved into third place in club history for most strikeouts, one better than Cy Young (1,341) and trailing just Roger Clemens (2,590) and Pedro Martinez (1,596) in the team’s record book. The win also gave him 116 in his Red Sox career, one better than Bob Stanley to put him in seventh place on the all-time list. To top it all off, he beat Tampa for the eleventh time in his career and has not lost to the Rays since April of 1999.

“Tony C,” as he was often referred to by Red Sox fans, realized the dream of playing for his hometown team when the East Boston native and graduate of St. Mary’s High in Lynn signed with the club in September of 1962. The following year, Conigliaro tore up the minor leagues, hitting .363 with 24 home runs and 74 RBI in only 83 games playing Single A ball for the Sox. Invited to spring training in 1964, Conigliaro made it difficult for then-manager Johnny Pesky not to promote him to the major league level and earned a starting position with Boston at the tender young age of 19. When he lofted a pitch in his first at-bat onto Lansdowne Street behind the Green Monster, a legend was born.

Conigliaro continued to prove his worth over his first few seasons. Although his batting average was never higher than .290, which he hit in his rookie season, the tall, lanky outfielder stroked 24 home runs in his first season and 84 through his first three seasons, winning the home run crown in 1965 with 32 long balls. When he became the youngest player to reach 100 home runs in 1967, despite more than a few stints on the disabled list due from getting hit by pitches, fans felt that Conigliaro was eventually going to be the catalyst to lead the club to a pennant.

Those dreams were shattered in an instant when, on 18 August 1967, as he faced California Angels pitcher Jack Hamilton, Conigliaro was struck by a pitch below his left eye, causing his cheekbone to get crushed and his eye ball to implode. Conigliaro immediately dropped to the ground as coaches and players raced to his aid and the Fenway crowd sat in stunned silence. Conigliaro not only missed the rest of the “Impossible Dream” season but the 1968 campaign as well as he recovered from the devastating injury.

He returned in 1969 and belted 20 home runs while driving in 82 runs in 141 games, earning Comeback Player of the Year honors, and followed that with career-highs of 36 home runs and 116 RBI in 1970. To the surprise of everyone outside the organization, Boston traded the beloved Conigliaro that October to California, citing a drop in attendance and split loyalties in the clubhouse. However, he played just 74 games with the Angels in 1972 before announcing his retirement at age 26 due to lingering problems with his eyesight.

Not willing to hang up the cleats for good, Conigliaro made one last comeback attempt. With the designated hitter added to the lineup, Tony C figured he might be able to make an impact with the club at the plate and told Boston in November of 1974 that his depth perception was back 100%. The following April, on Opening Day against Milwaukee, the now-30-year-old native made his triumphant return to the Boston lineup and received four standing ovations from the fans at Fenway, bringing them to their feet in his first at-bat and responding with a single.

However, the good times were short-lived as he appeared in only 21 games, batting just .123 with two home runs, before playing his last game on 12 June, grounding out to second in his last at-bat. Seven years later, as Conigliaro was being driven by his brother to an interview for a position as a baseball announcer, he suffered a heart attack that left him severely incapacitated; tragically, he died in 1990 at just 45 years of age.

Opening Day at Fenway Park in 2005 is when I became a fan of the New York Yankees. Now, before anyone threatens to strip me of the privileges of being a card-carrying member of Red Sox Nation, my loyalty to the home team has not changed. My favorite T-shirt still reads: I’m a fan of two teams, the Red Sox and whoever is playing the Yankees. I still have tickets in hand to see them play at Fenway Park a half-dozen times this season. David Ortiz is still my papi. Above all, I will always root for the Red Sox regardless of whether I have to wait another 86 more years to see them bring home a World Series title (and if I’m still alive at the age of 116, it will be worth it).

No, I became a fan of the Yankees that day because the organization proved that they are a class act. As Boston players, coaches, trainers, and even the team masseuse came out of the dugout one by one to collect their World Series rings and then raise a championship pennant for the first time since the start of the 1919 season, New York players, coaches, and even general manager Brian Cashman, Theo Epstein’s counterpart and George Steinbrenner’s whipping boy, either sat on the bench or stood on the top step in the opposing team’s dugout and respectfully watched the entire ceremony.

New York manager Joe Torre, for whom I’ve always held the highest regard, respectfully applauded his counterpart, Terry Francona, when the Boston skipper’s turn came to accept his ring, and Francona would later note that the simple gesture gave him a lump in his throat. Then, the loudest applause from the Yankees, and undoubtedly from the crowd on hand, came when 85-year-old Johnny Pesky, a fixture in the Boston organization for over sixty years, came out to be given his long-awaited piece of history. Torre was quick to tip his cap, having been a friend of “Mr. Red Sox” since he was a player with the St. Louis Cardinals and Pesky was managing the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Then later, as customary pre-game introductions were made for the home opener, the 33,702 Fenway fanatics in attendance, who had booed nearly every member of New York as usual, greeted closer Mariano Rivera with some of the loudest cheers ever given to an opposing player in a Yankees uniform. Of course, these cheers were in part because the usually-dependable Rivera, who has 336 career saves to his credit, had blown his last four save opportunities with the Red Sox, including two in the post-season series last fall that allowed Boston to climb all the way back from a 3-0 series deficit to win the American League pennant before moving on to the World Series. Rivera could have taken a page from recently-departed Sox pitcher Byung-Hyun Kim and given the crowd a one-fingered salute, but he instead broke into a huge grin, chuckled, and graciously acknowledged the crowd’s appreciation for his “services.”

It would have been simple enough for the Yankees to remain in the visitor’s clubhouse and pass the time as they waited until it was necessary to show up for the pre-game introductions. With 26 world championships to their credit, it would be easy to argue that Boston has a long way to go to match the success that New York has had for nearly a century of play. Still then to watch your biggest rival celebrate a championship that might have been theirs had Dave Roberts not stolen second base in the ninth inning of Game Four in the ALCS might not sit well with most teams. Just last season, baseball was replaced by base-brawl between these two clubs when Boston’s Jason Varitek and New York’s Alex Rodriguez, who came within a few million dollars of becoming a Red Sox player himself, exchanged words and then punches, turning an afternoon at the ballpark into a wild spectacle.

No one from the Red Sox organization instructed the Yankees to show up and no one would have expected them to make an appearance; from a Boston fan’s perspective, it would probably have been dismissed or, to the misguided delight of some, seen as a sign of petty jealousy. Instead, New York put aside any trivial differences from the past, checked their collective ego at the door, and demonstrated something is hard to find these days: sportsmanship. Winning championships is old hand for New York but, to be a true champion, it was only proper for them to recognize when someone else achieved that success.

My favorite T-shirt will be ready for all of those visits to Fenway and, when the Yankees are in town, I’ll still loudly boo each player’s name as it is read by the announcer because it’s part of the ritual that’s been handed down from generation to generation. I’ve been a fan of the Boston Red Sox through thick and thin and this loyalty will never die; most of all, I’d like to see them win a few more championships at the expense of those boys from the Bronx. However, with everything that we’ve experienced as we’ve soaked in that long-awaited title over the past six months, we should remember what the New York ball club did for us on Opening Day. That straightforward, thoughtful act by their bitter rivals did not go unnoticed by those wearing a Boston uniform and, with a bit of luck, it was not lost on the fans as well.

Jason Varitek - 33 - C
Week 1 - 03-10 April 2005

There was no question this off-season what the number-one priority for the Red Sox was: to sign long-time Boston player Jason Varitek to a new contract and not allow him to walk via free agency. To Fenway fanatics everywhere, the veteran catcher represents the dirt-dog attitude of several Red Sox players and is one of the hardest-working representatives of the club. For years, he has been the unofficial clubhouse leader and, after signing him to a new four-year contract just before Christmas, the Sox also rewarded his years of service by naming him team captain, the first Boston player to hold that position since Jim Rice in 1989.

Varitek, who is now the same age as his uniform number as of Opening Day at Fenway this season, responded by leading off with a 3-for-4 performance in an Opening Night loss to New York at Yankee Stadium, then followed with home runs in his next two starts to drive in three runs. Although Boston eventually lost Sunday’s game in Toronto in the bottom of the ninth, Varitek helped spark a comeback from a 3-1 deficit in the top of that frame by opening the inning with a single to left in Toronto, then crossing the plate ahead of Mark Bellhorn on Edgar Renteria’s two-out, two-run single to tie the score. He thus finished the week with a .368 average, going 7-for-19 in five games over that stretch.

“Tek” has many challenges ahead of him this season, including the task of getting familiar with at least two new starters for the ballclub in David Wells and Matt Clement. Although both pitchers struggled in the opening week, Varitek will certainly do everything that he can to get them focused on winning. Wear that “C” on your uniform proudly, Jason; you’ve earned it.

Red Sox manager Darrell Johnson, in his second year at the helm, had initiated a youth movement in the clubhouse soon after he was hired. In the off-season prior to 1975, he traded away outfielder Tommy Harper to make room for a young crop of outfielders, mostly notably 22-year-old Jim Rice and 23-year-old Fred Lynn. Rice had excelled at Triple-A Pawtucket the year before, collecting the Triple Crown, Rookie of the Year, and MVP honors from the International League. Lynn had been heavily pursued by major league clubs since 1970 and Boston had been fortunate enough to get him in the second round of the 1973 amateur draft; after turning heads during his call-up to Boston in September with a .419 average, two home runs, and 10 RBI, he seemed ready to play at the major league level.

Even with Johnson’s interest in youth, the Red Sox believed that they needed more experience in the pitching department. An opportunity arose to deal for Catfish Hunter, who had helped Oakland win three straight World Series, after he was declared a free agent; although Boston was the first to make an offer, a generous offer from George Steinbrenner lured him to New York. The Sox also tried to trade for Gaylord Perry, another future Hall-of-Fame pitcher, but they could not match the offer that Cleveland put on the table. Even with questions about the pitching staff, Boston still possessed veterans Luis Tiant, who had won 20 games in each of the last two seasons with the Red Sox, Rick Wise, and Bill “Spaceman” Lee.

As the club continued to prepare for the coming season, Boston suffered a bad break - literally. While still recovering from the knee injury he had suffered in June, catcher Carlton Fisk suffered a broken arm after he was hit by an errant pitch from Detroit pitcher Fred Holdsworth early in spring training. Bob Montgomery, who had spent the last five seasons as a backup catcher in Boston, would begin the season in Fisk’s place, backed up by second-year player Tim Blackwell and aging veteran Tim McCarver.

Opening Day at Fenway Park against division rival Milwaukee saw Boston win in front of a capacity crowd on 08 April. Tiant got his first win of the season and former Boston outfielder Tony Conigliaro, attempting to make a comeback as a designated hitter after sitting home for the past few seasons, singled in his first at-bat, bringing the home crowd alive. However, Boston struggled through the rest of the month and ended April on a four-game losing streak along with a 7-9 record, tied for last in the American League East with Baltimore. However, they also sat just three games behind Detroit, who led the division with a 10-6 record, giving the club plenty of hope to be a part of the race.

The 1975 Boston Red Sox season began with the memories of the 1974 campaign still fresh in the minds of the team and its fans. Early on, Boston had taken advantage of a weak American League East and jumped into first place despite playing just better than .500 baseball through the first few months of the season. Despite the loss of Carlton Fisk due to a home-plate collision that torn ligaments in his knee on 28 June in Cleveland, Boston managed to increase that lead through July and August.

On 30 August, the Red Sox sat five full games in front of the New York Yankees and eight games in front of the Baltimore Orioles. While Boston sportswriters were talking about Boston facing former manager Dick Williams’s Oakland Athletics in the team’s first ever league championship series, Boston flew to Minnesota for a three-game series against the Twins began. Three days later, the Red Sox found themselves at the short end of a three-game sweep while New York won all three of its games in a series with the Chicago White Sox; just like that, the lead in the AL East had been trimmed to two games.

Boston then flew to Baltimore to open a three-game series against the Orioles with a doubleheader. Boston not only lost both games but they were shut out by identical 1-0 scores. Meanwhile, the Yankees split its doubleheader with the Milwaukee Brewers as the lead was trimmed to just a single game. Two days later, Boston was shut out again, 6-0, while New York won the rubber match of its series to even its record with the Red Sox.

Riding a six-game losing streak, Boston finally returned home and hoped that a four-game series against Milwaukee would help the team rebound. Unfortunately, the Red Sox opened the series with consecutive loses to the Brewers while the Yankees won the opener of its series with the Detroit Tigers, then split a doubleheader the next day to take a 1-1/2 game lead over Boston. In just nine days, the Red Sox had lost eight straight games and dropped 6-1/2 games in the standings.

Winning the final two games of its series with Milwaukee brought Boston back within a half-game of the lead, but then New York paid a visit to Fenway and swept a short two-game series to essentially knock Boston out for good. The Red Sox would end the season seven games back of first place while Baltimore, which had been eight games behind Boston before the collapse, won twenty-eight of the team’s last thirty-four games and won the division by two games over the Yankees.

Despite a gloomy September for the organization, the Red Sox got a glimpse of the near future when Fred Lynn made his debut as a call-up from Pawtucket. In 15 games, Lynn batted .419 with two home runs and 10 RBI while also seeing time in the outfield. Even with those numbers, there was probably little thought put into just how much of an impact the young ballplayer would make the following season.