A CITIZEN'S BLOG

Congratulations to the Boston Red Sox, the 2004 World Series champions.

I spent a lot of time over the last few weeks watching and blogging about the baseball playoffs. I typically don't: I didn't really bother to watch the 2002 playoffs, and my interest in the 2003 playoffs ended when the Red Sox and Cubs fell short in their respective LCS. But I was glued to the tube in the ALDS, the ALCS and the World Series because something deep down told me that this was history in the making. Something was different about the 2004 Boston Red Sox. No more curse, no more Yankee dominance, no more wandering through the forests of defeat for Red Sox Nation. The playoffs were exciting, interesting and utterly unpredictable in a way that they hadn't been since 2001 ... or 1993. It made for great television, great baseball, and I was hooked. MLB's marketing department should be thrilled, but a little saddened this morning: unless the Cubs make a run at the Series in 2005, there won't be any compelling stories left in baseball.

So how did the Red Sox do it?

1. Chalk up a victory for Moneyball: the Sox were one of four teams whose management openly embraced sabremetrics. (The Sox even had Bill James on staff.) This team was built around walks and slugging, the station-to-station baseball that the purists derride, but has been so successful by the teams that employ it. The Sox bled opposing pitching, working the counts over and over again. (A reason why the playoffs games drug on for hours and hours.) The Red Sox also focused on defense, the latest area Moneyball teams have been focusing on, making the mid-season deal for Cabrera and Mienkiewicz [sic] that sparked the team to their August run that propelled them into the playoffs. Moneyball baseball (for lack of a more appropriate phrase) propelled the Red Sox to the top.

The Cardinals were the ultimate small-ball team: they run, they bunt base-runners over, etc. It got them a humiliating four game sweep.

2. Chalk it up as a victory for fate: after they came so close in 2003, you'd figure that the Red Sox would eventually win it. Hard to believe that a team with players like Yaz, Jim Rice, Ted Williams, Roger Clemens and Nomar wouldn't have won it all.

3. Chalk it up as a victory for smart management: most of us probably raised our eyebrows when we heard that a guy in his twenties had been hired to be the Red Sox GM ("What are these guys thinking?"), but Theo Epstein rescued the Red Sox. True, he had the second-largest payroll in baseball after the Yankees, but he was working against eighty-six years of history, the Yankee mystique, an angry media and fan base, and many brusied egos. This was a team uniquely designed to win the World Series. Epstein deserves a lot of the credit for this.

So celebrate Red Sox fans. Live it up, because 2004 was your year. Let's hope you guys don't have to wait until 2090 to win it again.

Read all about it ... Aaron Gleeman has some thoughts at Hardball Times. Ben Jacobs, Sox fan, muses about history here ... Peter Gammons credits the Red Sox rotation of Lowe, Pedro and Schilling for the Red Sox triumph. Johnny Pesky, who may or may not have cost the Red Sox the 1946 World Series when he failed to throw home on Enos Slaughter, has some closure. I think it speaks highly of the Red Sox organization that they made a special point of including Pesky in their celebration. Poor guy. Imagine carrying around that burden for 58 years ... Bill Simmons has some thoughts for Red Sox Nation.