By Mitch Holt, Staff Writer
Don’t Believe the Hype
When the Red Sox won the World Series in 2004, it was like a breath of fresh air.
I spent the first 18 years of my life in a Fenway frenzy, hoping for a winning season year after year – a World Series victory the last possibility in my mind.
Between the fourth and 11th years of my life, I watched countless Sox games in the famous ballpark and from the confines of my family’s small Connecticut home, witnessing the Buckner tragedy as an infant, a 1991 pennant win, the league-wide strike of 1994, and greats like Clemens, Boggs, Canseco, Burks, Eckersley and Evans.
One might say my early years were the real deal. I consider myself lucky to have grown up watching and adoring a team with so much history and character, despite all of the heartbreak it might have brought upon its fans before the curse-breaking 2004 season.
This week Florida’s Grapefruit League spring training begins for Major League Baseball teams, and fans expect very little from the Sox.
After all, losing former “Jesus look-alike” Johnny Damon to the loathed Yankees was a blow to the team’s morale – right? Damon was so quick to shave his face and head to become another pawn in the Yankees’ organization – a very rich organization – that Red Sox fans didn’t even have a chance to egg his car before he snuck out of town.
Along with Damon’s arrogant, slap-in-the-face departure, the Sox lost two starters and a back-up catcher, who was the only player on the team that could catch for knuckleballer Tim Wakefield.
Sports buffs say this will be a quiet season for the Red Sox.
I guess this should be the part in which I assure you that the Sox will prove critics wrong and earn themselves another World Series win, leaving Damon wishing he had never sold out.
But the truth is, it doesn’t really matter.
My team is the Red Sox. Your team is the Rangers or the Astros or the Yankees. All have come together to form a priceless tradition in America that has a larger meaning than who wins the World Series.
The fact that baseball, in the midst of war, death, divorce and scandal, for years has provided a desired career path for children and a means for adults to become kids again, and the opportunity for thousands of opposing fans to sing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” proves the game’s undeniable consistency.
As the new season begins, take baseball for what it is: friendly competition, America’s past-time and a tradition-filled spectacle.
And watch the Sox obliterate the Yankees’ billion dollar ball club.
