Here’s the thing. I grew up in Western Massachusetts bleeding Red Sox. I remember where I was during the Bucky Dent playoff game. I went to some random clothing store buying jeans because I was so insanely nervous that I had to get out of the house and do something other than bite my nails. I know it’s strange for a teenager to go clothes shopping when his heart and soul is on the line. But Red Sox love is that way. Same with Fisk’s home run, the ball between Bill Buckner’s legs, the Tim Wakefield pitch that cost the first Yankee series and the come from behind miracle which eventually resulted in the first championship. I can name whole rosters of odd-ball players who have populated our team with character and fun with whom I fell deeply and passionately in love. My first game at Fenway? Bill Lee agains Jim Palmer. The spaceman won in a 2-1 contest. My son Seamus learned to read, I am convinced, by studying box scores every morning over his cheerios.
I’ve sat in the owners box, I’ve had the trophies at my house because of some random YMCA raffle that my wife and I won, I’ve sat next to Stephen King during a World Series game trying to figure out what to say to him, I’ve hung around David Ortiz in street clothes enough to know the guy isn’t fat he is just huge.
But something horrible, sad, and tragic happened over the last year. All the guys I used to love–the insane characters like Manny losing his mind under the Green Monster–have left. The game itself has been spoiled by the Money Ball attempt to wear out pitchers with the unintended consequence of slowing the game down for fans to make it basically unwatchable (I took my son and his friends to a Yankees game and left with the score tied in the 7th inning because we had been sitting there for 4 hours and just didn’t care anymore). And then there was last year’s infamous collapse during which I was actively rooting for my own team to lose because I had come to the conclusion that they deserved it.
I probably could have lived with all that but two further factors have caused me to have absolutely no interest in a team I used to live and die by.
My wife and I were in a waterfront restaurant last fall late in the regular season on a night which happened to be a Sox night off. At a table not far from us the supposedly heart and soul of the pitching staff piled in with their girlfriends and wives–Lester, Bard, and the rest of the young studs. My first reaction was to be simply shocked by how young they all looked. Seriously, they could have been in high school. Most of them didn’t look like they should be drinking. But drink they did. And laugh and carry on. It was my own private look inside the fried chicken and Heidi Watney driven club house. I honestly felt sorry for a guy like Lester who had battled back from cancer for what? For this?
Then there was the relatively amazing appearance of John Henry on my friend Mike Felger’s radio program. Now, I have been around Henry enough to be utterly confused and at times repulsed by the guy. His handshake is like one of those Halloween tricks where you stick your hand in a bowl of apple sauce. Watching a game with him is just about the most boring thing imaginable. The guy can’t speak. And when he does it’s in a whisper. He may be a genius at commodity futures but when it comes to human beings, not so much. I read one time that he was in a punk band in which he shaved off his left eyebrow. Every time I see him I try to focus on that–the David Byrne personality perhaps–rather than the fact he looks like a corpse.
Anyhow, Henry’s performance on Felger’s show was great theater in the sense that not many owners are being driven around town and decide to go confront their most ardent critics at the sports radio station that doesn’t even carry the team’s games, making instant news for the competition. I give him points for that, I suppose. But everything that came out of his mouth made me want to vomit. It was the nail in the coffin in terms of my ability to relate to this team, to love this franchise, to care about the future of a group of guys playing a game that I used to live and die by.
And then there is this little Larry Lucchino kick-in-the-ass. Terry Francona was one of us. He lived around the corner from me. I used to see him buying milk on a regular basis. He was our manager for eight years and won two world series championships. After last season’s collapse he was told to leave for no good reason other than the need to deflect attention from ownership. But not just that, his character was dragged through the mud with stories about drug abuse and marital problems (hmmmm, I seem to remember a front page Boston Magazine piece celebrating JH’s true love for his much younger 3rd wife, as hard as that is to believe).
Larry then called Terry to ask him to come back for the 100th anniversary celebration of Fenway. Terry told him to pound sand.
It’s sad to say but I am right there with you Terry. I live walking distance to the old park. I have a photograph of when it was first constructed on my office wall. But I will be taking a pass.
About Tom Matlack
Tom,
As a fan of this team who still has t-shirts from 2004 with salt-marks on the collars, it kills me to agree with everything you wrote. I will follow the team out of habit (regional-reflex), but it will be a joyless endeavor because I refuse to care more than the team does about the results.
Then again, as an advertising and marketing professional, I’m also amazed and disappointed. Henry, Warner and Lucchino spent the past decade waiting breathlessly for this season… Fenway’s 100th, making marketing plans years in a advance. NOTHING would get in their way.
So when last Fall’s debacle took place, they scapegoated and spun when they should have done everything, and I mean EVERYTHING (in the Steinbrennerian sense) to make sure the 2012 team was better, more likable and more relatable. Josh Beckett should have been “encouraged” by the guys who pay his salary to take some public responsibility. The pitching depth issue should have been addressed in free agency, even a shot a short-term expense. Winning in a big way, and right away, should have been their top priority, because we know no one buys a used car with busted headlights.
But they didn’t do that. They put bandaids on gaping wounds, smeared the name of a good guy, and let Theo run away from the multi-million-dollar messes he made. Then they tried to cow Tito into returning for an organizational rub-and-tug after letting the wolves have him on the way out of town. They traded for the most injury-prone closer in the majors and then acted surprised when he didn’t make it out of spring training. And all the while, hours and millions were spent on making the park prettier, with plaques and events and fanfares.
Now, they’re holding two opening days (today and a week from now to celebrate the Fenway Centennial) and while they’ll have packed houses for both, that just means more boos if the team doesn’t play well. Because they forgot that this isn’t Miami… or San Diego… or Los Angeles.
It’s Boston, where the best marketing approach… is winning. Know your audience.
I’m rocking my Yastrzemski tee shirt today…like I have pretty much every opening day for the last 10 years. He was my first and most enduring Red Sox hero and I don’t even remember what he looked like anymore. My uncle, who was a sports writer for the BU student newspaper at the time, took me to watch him during batting practice and then we stayed for a game.
Nostalgia is a funny thing, but I share your disappointment with the ownership right now. The only thing the ridiculously wealthy owner of a Baseball team should be doing is signing checks and shutting his fucking mouth, unless he was previously a World Series Winning coach or manager.
I agree with almost everything you said Tom. Except for there being no reason to get rid of Francona. He lost control of that team last year and did an awful job managing. However, he’s still MUCH better than Bobby V.
This current crop of Red Sox is largely unlikable. I’ve been a Sox fan since I was a zygote. I love April because of Opening Day. But this year? Screw em. I’m not buying tickets (and apparently neither is anyone else since the sell-out streak is in jeopardy), shirts or anything else. I’ll still watch the games because I love baseball and the Red Sox will always be my team, but this is the least excited I’ve ever been for opening day. There’s been no accountability (save for Lester) for last year, we downgraded in GM, manager and half our guys are injured. Even the guys we traded for whose injuries weren’t caught by our crack medical staff.
Blah.
I am taking my kids to their first Red Sox game on Sunday. Not for the players, but for the love I have for the Park. There is a chill I get when walking up into the stands and seeing Fenway welcome me back and sit in uncomfortable seats, and look around at her glory. It’s amazing. Wish I could say the same for the team and management the past several years.
Three generations of the MacAuley clan have seen the Red Sox win the world series twice. My Grandmother passed away in 2005 after completing her life’s goals – seing the Red Sox win twice in her lifetime and kissing her last great grandchild (my daughter). She was gone two days after the kiss. She loved baseball and taught me how to watch it. The players were people to watch to play a game that was more involved than pitching and catching.
For me after the 2007 World series, things started to get weird. Decisions, egos, behavior. The wheels were coming off the wagon. It was after I was on a flight to DC one spring that I bumped into – literally – Francona and Epstein who were on their way to try and get Texieria to sign. When they came back empty handed I felt then that the wagon had crested the hill and was on its downward run. I loved Francona – still do – because he was a guy who loved the game, who understood it. I hope he lands with a group who loves the game and wants to be a steward of it too.
The season is off to a rough start and my gut says that if my kids fall in love with baseball as I did, I hope I am able to teach them what I learned – it’s an awesome sport, and they have access to one of the most epic shrines to the GAME, and that in the grand scheme of things the players are just people to watch to learn the game is more than pitching and catching.
Shawn, Mark, Aaron, and Jake. Thanks for the awesome comments. First pitch right about now. Going to my kids’ school where they are serving Fenway franks. Will try not to be too much of a downer.
Remember the days of 20 players, 20 taxis? It’s that time again. In order to win in this game it must be a TEAM from the owner to the clubhouse. I have faith in the clubhouse guys, not so much, anyone else. Don’t expect another championship any time soon, because the Sox seem to have forgotten this. As long as we keep putting our butts in the seats and watching and listening to games, we will put money in their pockets. If we stop, they will listen.
Well, I’ve been a season ticketholder since 1987. 1987!
Think they were lining up to buy tickets after 1986?
I sat through those years in the 90s where, if they were lucky to make the playoffs, the result was already predetermined in the playoffs vs Oakland. Those were dark days filled with unlikable players.
I do not go to NY games. I refused. The stands are filled with a-holes and drunks, fans of both teams. That is nothing new. It’s been that way for years. I’m no fan of these 4 hr games but that’s been part of the Red Sox winning formula for YEARS. That’s why NY uses the same strategy. They wear down starting pitching. Price threw over 80 pitches today and didn’t get out of the 3rd? I liked Francona but the stuff that happened last year WAS ON HIS WATCH. Why shouldn’t he be blamed? This was happening in his clubhouse. He was a players manager and he let it go too far.
I’ve been going down to Ft. Myers for spring training for 20 years now so I have met some players over the years. Yeah, they’re young and here’s a shocker, they act like it. Good grief. I don’t care what they do off the field as long it doesn’t get them into trouble. Having a good time out with the boys doesn’t translate to what happened in that clubhouse. Boys go out and have a good time quite a bit.
I’m not that enamored with the previous GM either. HE skipped town when the going got rough. That was him making that decision, not the front office, leaving us with some of the worst contracts in club history, Crawford and Lackey specifically.
As for being likable, I’m not sure how you cannot like a guy like Pedroia or Youklis or Gonzalez, to name a few. I agree that the offseason wasn’t what we needed given the issues in the rotation. I’m not sure there was a fix for that problem out there. I do know that throwing STUPID money at Papelbon was NOT the answer.
One more thing, pining for Manny? Seriously? Talk about unlikable. If there there was a guy who didn’t give a crap about anyone but himself, it was the man child. But, it’s all just cute and funny when he’s slugging 40 homers.
I lost interest after the Lester cancer comment. This article would have had more impact a week ago. Theres a lot of “newness” and identity going on and you re growing too old to handle the change. So its a rough start, so what. Give the new club a chance, like say this years Cs. IM betting one of my nuts if the BoSox somehow find their way meandering into the finals, like say last years Pats, you ‘ll be right there with your son watching the games. I’ll try and ignore the name dropping too, champ.
I usually see eye to eye with Tom, but this is silly.
Why should Red Sox fans care how engaging the team owner is? Some people go a lifetime without sitting in the owner’s box.
Plenty of people have lost interest in baseball or have stopped paying attention because they have more important things happening in their lives. But it sounds like you’ve moved on just because there was a year where a couple players got drunk sometimes and you can’t stomach a Front Office that values plate discipline (and therefore longer games).
You’d never guess that this organization spends more money than 95% of MLB teams and won two World Series’s in the last decade. Give them a break!
Go Yanks.
Trolling is shameful.