Bambino's Curse

And the Band Played On …

So Notre Dame de Fenway is getting another nip and tuck, a little Botox to cover her wrinkles from a life lived long and heartfelt.

This year's creation is 240 seats atop the roof in straight-away right field, a new seating area which also includes a bar, a concession area and picnic tables (Browne, MLB.com).

Again the work is being done under the artistic vision of Janet Marie Smith and after her success with the Monster Seats it's easy to have faith that this latest addition will please everyone.

Remember Updike's famous (and now rather hackneyed) description of Fenway as "a lyric little bandbox of a ballpark"?

While I've always loved the alliteration and poetic meter of that line (it's three iambic feet, no?), the trope has never worked for me. I always wondered if Fenway was more bandbox like in 1960 when Updike wrote his classic homage to Ted Williams. It's certainly didn't strike me as comparable to a bandbox in 1972 when my dad took me on my first pilgrimage to the hallowed park, at least not the bandboxes I was familiar with on the commons and greens of the rural New Hampshire towns of my boyhood.

Now Updike's second line is a different story,

Everything is painted green and seems in curiously sharp focus, like the inside of an old-fashioned peeping-type Easter egg.

Yes. That's it exactly. I'm still stunned by the "curiously sharp focus" each and every time I come out of the pedestrian tunnel and behold the field.

But bandbox? I dunno. The physical construction, yes, but atmospherically, no. The energy level in Fenway would splinter and explode any bandbox I've ever seen.

What about you? Is the bandbox description apt now? What about in 1960 or 1950? And do you younger fans even know what a bandbox is? It's really as anachronistic as a bread box or ice box, no?

NYC Smack Down

Well, there's a reason they call George Steinbrenner the Boss. Let's give credit where credit is due. His response to John Henry's earlier derision of the Yankees' move to acquire A-Rod has to be one of the best retorts I've heard in a long time.

First George leads with the faux compassion and understanding:

"We understand that John Henry must be embarrassed, frustrated and disappointed by his failure in this transaction …"

That sets up perfectly the hammer blow that follows:

"Unlike the Yankees, he chose not to go the extra distance for his fans in Boston" (ESPN).

Classic! Making it seem as if Henry is letting down the Red Sox faithful is shrewd.

The preseason round of verbal sparring is scored firmly in favor of the Yankees.

And that did John Henry expect? Say what you want about Steinbrenner, but he's old school. He's been in the baseball ownership biz for a while now. Henry et all are upstarts, veritable interlopers, wet behind the ears rookies in comparison to the Boss.

I admire Henry for wanting to take a jab, but he better learn to come up with something than what sounds to many ears like whining. As Pinto puts it:

Oh boo-hoo. Cowboy up the money, John. Or stop whining and use your sabermetric brilliance to beat this team with a cheaper payroll (Baseball Musings).

Yes, either that or stick to the party line that the Red Sox aren't going to beat the Yankees by acting like the Yankees but by being smarter than the Yankees.

Let Epstein do the talking so we can hear less reactionary outbursts about Yankees moves and more of this:

"We're going to turn this thing into a scouting and player-development machine." — Theo Epstein, 11.26.02

We can start seeing if the Red Sox philosophy is the better one come April 16th.

Indie Documentary on Bill Lee

This sounds like a cool project, so I'm helping to spread the word.

Dear Red Sox Faithful:

I am producing an independent film about Bill Lee, The Spaceman. Last year we spent a week together filming in Cuba and now the challenge is to build off that footage and give it additional context.

Basically, I'm looking for rare or unusual stories and artifacts such as:

1. Passionate fans who were pissed/glad he was traded and might be interested in being interviewed
2. Artifacts: For example, the pin issued in protest of his trade to Montreal for Stan Papi in 1978, photos, etc.
3. The radio or TV news broadcast from the day Bill was traded (12/7/78.)

This is a grassroots effort and am interested in finding out what resources the great fans of Boston may have to offer. Also to start building a mailing list so I can keep you informed of the status of the project and future screenings. It is best to contact me by email at the following address.

Thanks,

Brett Rapkin
Rapture Productions
Brettrapkin@hotmail.com

For whatever reason, my own memories of Bill Lee are foggy at best. My 70s Red Sox recollections are totally dominated by Yaz, Fisk, Petrocelli, and Tiant. It's perplexing because everything I read suggests that Bill Lee should holding several sectors of my brain RAM.

Doctor Robert

I'm acting like a smarmy politician today. I'm going to reverse a previous position on a subject for purely self-serving means. Remember when I recently publicly stated "that I don't care about the steroids issue"?

Well, after several of you have pointed out that both Sheffield and Giambi of the Yankees are clients of BALCO, the group under Federal indictment for distributing illegal steroids to players, I'm starting to take a keen interest in the matter.

And last evening, Dave Pinto noted that "[i]t looks like federal agents know the names of some players who have taken steroids."

You don't think … ? Heh heh. Could we get so lucky?

Update: Will Carroll links to this Smoking Gun scanned affidavit that names Gary Sheffield!

We the People

In the comments to the post yesterday, a reader laments,

We? Our?
I don't understand the use of personal pronouns on any of these posts. Are any of you members of the Red Sox or the Yankees.

Fair question and one deserving a response.

While I can't speak for everyone who comments on the site, in my own writing I have a fairly simple rule: when I refer to "we" I'm referring to Red Sox fans collectively, what we often call Red Sox Nation, the zeitgeist, if you will, of our fan relationship with the team.

So, for instance, I won't write, "We scored five runs in the bottom of the ninth to win the game." But, referring to the same game, I might write, "When Trot Nixon's walk off dropped into the bullpen, we felt the baseball gods were finally on our side."

Or to ground this in reality, in the quote from the NY Post story yesterday,

"My initial reaction was, 'Jesus, God, here we go again. New York always wins.'"

The we refers to Red Sox fans and not necessarily Theo Epstein et al in the ownership/management group of the Boston Red Sox.

And this makes sense because while John Henry owns the brand, the park, the all the materiel that is the Boston Red Sox, and while Theo Epstein makes the moves, builds the core, and Terry Francona manages and the players enact the nine inning ritual for at least 162 games a year, everything else is ours.

And without us, the fans, the Boston Red Sox are not The Boston Red Sox but just another ball club.

For Red Sox fans, the team and its history are inseparable from our own private memories of the past and dreams of the future. Neither of which can be bought or sold. My memories are mine. Your memories are yours. And collectively we conjoin and form the entity, the totality of Red Sox Nation.

So when I consider the Boston Red Sox, I'm not only conjuring up objective facts of the team, the wins and losses, the errors, the fantastic plays, the pine tar on Trot Nixon's batting helmet … I'm also twitching upon the thread of who I am, the trips to Fenway with my dad, the muddy corduroy pants of 6th grade recess when my friend Andy Audet reenacted Doyle's slide in Game 6 of the '75 World Series… Seeing the "B" logo on a cap invokes the sound of my friend John's soft, Maine accent reenacting a game over the phone … seeing the green expanse of Fenway on TV brings me back to a lazy summer Saturday afternoon when my dad brought home our first color set and how we couldn't wait to watch the Sox in color, with Curt Gowdy's voice like Gabriel carrying the word of God …

These are some of the things that are the I and the We and the Us and the Ours of the Boston Red Sox.

Site Down

As you may have noticed, the site was down from about 6am until about 1130am. I'm working on completing this morning's planned post during my lunch hour.

Ain't No Nevah Mind

New York fans have a rod for A-Rod: As ubber fan Alex Belth puts it, "my dick will be hard for two months." Guess it's really going to be sex and the city this summer.

And speaking of dicks, the Yankees fan trolls have reappeared, leaving their feebly comments on Red Sox fan blogs here and elsewhere. I say feeble because even if these cats had the insult ability of someone like Christopher Hitchens (the master of the erudite put down), which they don't, not even close … but even if they did, it wouldn't have the effect on me or any other Red Sox fan that I think they are hoping for.

So if you are a Yankee fan predisposed toward trollish behavior, consider this before you waste your time and energy:

1. We, Red Sox fans, are the biggest critics of our own team. So whatever invective you cast, rest assured we've already hashed it out in our own internal dialogue and/or with other Red Sox fans. Hell, there is most likely already an active, vituperative thread devoted to whatever put down you have to offer over at SoSH.
2. It's not like we are going to say, "Oh, damn, you're right! Red Sox suck, I'm going to become a Yankees fan just like you. Sign me up!" No, you see, we don't choose to become Red Sox fans; we are chosen. It's preordained. This fact should be obvious even to the mentally impaired, for if it was a simply a matter of choice, why would we choose eternal suffering?
3. By trolling, you cheapen the very notion of winning. That is, with all the Yankees World Championships, all the cash, all the pinstripe mystique, all the history you have at your Yankees fans fingertips it still isn't enough? You still aren't happy or otherwise amused with your condition, so you have to go try to kick sand on our beach blankets? Man, that's sad.
4. If I do want to read what a Yankees fan has to say, I'm going to read the words of those who can actually write well: Belth, Jaffe, Mahnken and, yes, even the bitch Catalano.

Got it?

So yesterday a reporter for the New York Post called to get my reaction to the trade. I haven't been able to find any mention of it in today's edition, but I haven't looked very hard. If one of you happens to find such a quote, please send me the link. It's good for my ego. And I think I speak for all of us when I say I could use a little pick me up after this weekend, even if it has to come from the bowels of Gotham. Update: here's the link. Not much but at least they got my name right this time.

For now, too, the columnists outside the Boston-NY region are kicking us in the nuts.¹ This from today's Washington Post:

Nice try, Red Sox.
Nice try, Larry Lucchino.
Nice try, Theo Epstein.
Better luck next year. Or the year after that. Or by 2018, 100 years after the last World Series you won.
The Curse of the Bambino Lives.
The Evil Empire triumphs again (Kornheiser).

It's going to be a long week.

¹If any readers are offended by the overtly sexist/phallic language in today's post, I apologize.

Awoke to Find World Didn't End!

Seems to be a pretty even split in Red Sox Nation among fans who are totally unhinged over the A-Rod to New York deal and those who, for various reasons, are taking it in stride.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised to be part of the latter camp, as I generally choose to reach for the rose colored lenses.

How bad can it be when our own off season pickup issues this rallying cry?

"… the best Boston Red Sox team in the last 100 years takes the field in 7 days …" (BDD excerpt, SoSH complete).

Remember, too, this is not the first or last punch to the gut from Steinbrenner's gang we are going to have to endure. Prepare yourself for the mother of all rivalries.