Though my family and friends would probably cast me on the high side of baseball and Red Sox lunacy, I am not an early-to-riser and had absolutely no intention of catching the first pitch at 6 a.m. But clearly the passion is hardwired, because my head simply popped up at 5:50 in the morning, in plenty of time to see Dustin Pedroia take up where he had left off in October, rifling a hard single up the middle.
The opener against Oakland was something of a thriller, with the Red Sox tying the game in the ninth and winning it in the 10th, spared an A’s comeback only by a baserunning gaffe that would have been unacceptable at the Little League level. Yet despite a host of dramatics, my body didn’t respond as it had in the past: with elevated heartbeat and other signs that the Red Sox were exacting a physical toll on me.
Winning does change everything-especially that second championship in four years, which should have convinced even the most tortured Red Sox souls that the team’s cursed past was as much a historical remnant as the Salem witch trials. Now, don’t mistake me for one of those who long for the poignant past of failure, insisting it was more distinctive and truer to our Puritan heritage of joylessness and suffering. I won’t even pretend that come October-and I sure hope it brings more than great foliage-I won’t feel an onset of rabidity. But my body doesn’t lie-among the many things it doesn’t do anymore-and on the occasion of this 2008 season opener there simply wasn’t that desperate sense of urgency that had infected me for so many seasons past.
The New York Yankees will arrive in town early this year, and Fenway Park will witness a few beery brawls and, of course, the familiar and tired “Yankees suck!” chants. But while the rivalry certainly endures and remains heartfelt, the honest fan would admit that the two teams, at least in their present incarnations, have become increasingly indistinguishable. The Red Sox are the new Yankees, on top now with a perennial championship contender fueled by an economic juggernaut. At the same time, the Yankees have begun to mimic Boston, eschewing high-priced and aging free agents while investing in young talent. On the mound Hughes, Kennedy and Chamberlain could be the mirror reflection of the Red Sox’s Buchholz, Lester and Papelbon.
Last season’s second-place finish in the A.L. East, after nine straight years atop the division, coupled with what by Yankee standards is a championship drought (seven years and counting) has liberated the Steinbrenner Generation Next to try another way. And is there a Yankee fan out there that wouldn’t prefer to ride these kids at the risk of missing the playoffs this season rather than take their shot at the ring with the next Carl Pavano, Kei Igawa, Jaret Wright or even Randy Johnson? (From this fan’s vantage point, it will be scary again if the Yankees become as smart as they are rich. And with a new stadium next year, they will be richer than ever.)
Still, it was a bit of a shock, after these two teams led the chase for every top pitcher available-from Mussina to Matsuzaka-throughout this millennium, to see Johan Santana, the best pitcher in all baseball, land in Queens rather than Boston or the Bronx. In fact, how long has it been since neither the Red Sox nor the Yankees signed a major free agent during the off-season? Both teams appeared to have eschewed the free-agent market, unless you consider journeyman setup man LaTroy Hawkins or fading first baseman Sean Casey major acquisitions. And both teams will field essentially the same lineup as last year. For Boston, remarkably, it is the first time the same double-play combination has started on two successive Opening Days since the ’80s combo of Marty Barrett and Jody Reed. (In recent seasons the biggest difference between the two teams may have been in the clubhouse, where the Red Sox have been loose and even, at times, giddy and the Yankees have been tense and, at times, somber. Even class clown Johnny Damon switching to pinstripes didn’t effect a major change there.)
It isn’t just the Red Sox and Yankees. Every smart franchise has moved onto the same page. The agents may call it collusion when virtually no pitchers land long-term contracts; the union may call it collusion when Barry Bonds is out of baseball rather than DHing. But I call it a confluence of common sense. On the pitching front there is a long-overdue recognition that ever since Wayne Garland, one of the first pitchers to score a megadeal as a free agent and flop, these investments have mostly turned sour. If you can’t remember back to Garland-28 wins, 48 losses after signing with Cleveland–think Carl Pavano or Mike Hampton or Adam Eaton or, almost certainly, Barry Zito. As for the other Barry, Mr. Bonds, does any team really need a gimpy 43-year-old who is facing a major criminal indictment and who is regarded by fans as the most successful cheater in the game and by his former teammates as a cancer in the clubhouse? If any team really covets a public relations disaster, they could probably hire Brian McNamee as a trainer much cheaper.
Common sense appears, finally, to be prevailing in Major League Baseball, though it could prove a fad. In the meantime the result could be one of the most competitive seasons in memory. I can see any of eight teams in the American League in the playoffs (and some folks have been touting Tampa Bay) and any of 11 reaching the postseason in the National League. After several years of my despairing about the competitiveness of the Senior Circuit while watching its top players migrate to the American League, there has finally been, with Santana and pitcher Danny Haren, at least some significant crossover back.
But for Red Sox fans like me, the success of my hometown team coupled with this new corporate homogeneity in the game exacts a price, if a small one. While I fully expect to engage this season and, eventually, to be enthralled by it, it’s gonna take a little time for me to work myself into a fever pitch. Six a.m. baseball from Tokyo may do wonders for MLB’s wallet, but-too soon on the calendar, too early in the day and too remote to buzz my town-it didn’t exactly do the trick for me.
