The Boston Bounce Back

Boston Red Sox hit rock bottom in 2012. It is tough to talk about a team hitting rock bottom when they had two World Series titles in the last eight years, but the fact of the matter remained, they were irrelevant in the Boston sports scene, a city who had a Super Bowl participant and a Stanley Cup winner from the year prior. Sure, the diehards were there, but the Red Sox had to begrudgingly give up their sellout streak as well as go one and done with manager Bobby Valentine.

General manager Ben Cherington made sure it would not happen again. He hired John Farrell away from Toronto who Boston had general interest in before hiring Valentine. He also admitted faults of the former management by dealing away Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez and began to rebuild a team full of role players and clubhouse guys basically what brought the first title to Boston in 2004. Cherington drew it up perfectly and delivered this team a World Series crown. 

One of those signings played a large part in the clinching win was Shane Victorino. Some people questioned Cherington for giving the Flying Hawaiian 34 million dollars over three years. He justified the contract in one postseason. He did not have the most consistent October yet Victornio seemed to be the man of the big moment.  In the American League Championship Series, Victornio hits a grand slam to send this team to the World Series and saw the bases full again Wednesday night in Game 6. This time it was not a homer rather a three-run double giving them a 3-0 lead against the golden child Michael Wacha. Victorino did not stop there as he drove in another run as Boston put up three more runs in the following inning.

Even though Cherington made some big moves, sometimes as a general manager you need to trust veteran players will return to form. John Lackey did just that for Boston. He had a good regular season, but his moments happened in October. He outdueled Justin Verlander in Detroit and did not get any credit which almost fueled the fire of the starting pitching.  Lackey came into relief in Game 4 to help bridge the gap to Koji Uehara. This situation could have blown up in Farrell's face, but it did not with Lackey having a scoreless inning.  Lackey took care of business in another World Series close-out win for Lackey going 6.2 innings with nine hits, one run, one walk and five strikeouts. Only Sandy Koufax and Lackey as MLB pitchers with multiple wins in clinching games. So much for chicken and beer worries.  

'This is our fucking city.'  

David Ortiz uttered these words on a beautiful Saturday afternoon as Boston took the field at Fenway for the first time since the horrific Boston Bombings. It seemed to be a theme of the season moving forward with this Boston team. They kept a 'Boston Strong' jersey in the dugout with the numbers 617 showing the team never forgot what happens and it honestly tied them closer to Boston, the city than ever before. When a tragedy happens in life, sports are sometimes the healing cure.  

Ortiz finished his great year with one of the best World Series performances of all-time. Every time Ortiz stepped up to the plate he made an impact at the plate. He finished the series with a .688 batting average with two home runs and he scored a run in four of the six World Series games. Ortiz is the catalyst of this team and has been for quite some time. He picks up this team when they are down, and Ortiz also provides emotional support to this squad when they needed to picked up. There is no doubt in my mind amid the steroid allegations from mid-2000s that Ortiz will be a Hall of Famer with his postseason performance putting him over the top.

Baseball ends another great year.  Hope will spring eternal in 107 days when pitchers and catchers report to all 30 MLB teams and all will believe they have a chance to have at the World Series crown.  On a personal note, Milwaukee had a horrible year, but I enjoyed writing more and more about baseball. Hope it continues next year.

Charlie.