Red Sox Nation is wallowing in a dream season and BoSox followers in The Villages hope it won’t end in a nightmare.
The Sox are enjoying a record-breaking season and should win more than 100 games for the first time since 1946, when Ted Williams played in Fenway Park.
Things are looking good, but no Boston fan can forget the scary ghosts of seasons past, like Billy Buckner and Bucky Dent – or the curse of Babe Ruth.
“When you come from Boston, the Sox are a part of you,” said Villager Ron Abell. “They’re having a great year, but when you follow the Red Sox, you always worry.”
Villager Tony George – one of about 1,300 members of the Red Sox Nation in The Villages – agrees.
“This season has been a fun ride, but you know how sports are: You’re happy when you win but sooner or later you’re going to lose.
“But I like this team and the manager – Alex Cora. They’ve got good chemistry and nothing seems to stop them. We’ll see what happens in the playoffs.”
“I love the Red Sox and this year has been wonderful,” said Marion Abell, Ron’s wife. “But I’m still nervous.”
The Sawx – as they are called in New England – won 90 out of the team’s first 130 games. They are nearly 10 games ahead of the hated New York Yankees in the American League East – with the month of September still to play.
These Red Sox have sluggers like MVP candidate J.D. Martinez, hitting .335 with 38 homers and 115 RBI. Mookie Betts has 27 homers and is hitting .338. The pitching staff is led by Rick Porcello, 15-6; Chris Sale, 12-4 and David Price, 14-6.
“This just might be the best Red Sox team ever,” headlined a column by ESPN’s David Schoenfield, who also offered a cautionary note. He wrote how a World Series Championship defines great teams, like the 2004 Red Sox, who finished the regular season 98-64.
“Ultimately, no matter how many more games the 2018 Red Sox win than the 2004 Red Sox, this year’s team will be measured by one target: winning the final game of the season,” Schoenfield wrote.
And, judging by past heartbreaks of the Red Sox, that is quite a challenge.
Like 1978, when the Yankees’ Bucky Dent hit a home run off Boston’s Mike Torrez to knock the Sox out of a playoff. Or like 1986, when Billy Buckner’s error at first base helped the New York Mets win that World Series and brought back “The Curse of the Bambino.”
That was Babe Ruth, who helped the Sox win three World Series until he was sold to the Yankees in 1919. That was nearly 100 years ago and it’s all part of the history that makes the Red Sox so special.
“There’s nothing like Fenway Park; it has such a great atmosphere,” Ron Abell said. “You go there to watch a ball game and it’s special. When I was growing up, I remember watching Ted Williams and Johnny Pesky at Fenway. I’ll never forget those times.”
Len Hathaway, of The Villages Red Sox Club, wrote on their website about being a fifth-generation Red Sox fan: “I’m the third of five family generations of Red Sox fans spanning over 100 years …. Ted Williams was my boyhood idol, and like so many New England youngsters, I wanted to emulate him and play for the Red Sox.
“I felt blessed because I batted left and threw right, just as Ted did. But anyone who has seen me play softball at The Villages softball complexes knows that is where the comparison begins and ends.”
Hathaway described how his family’s Red Sox roots are timeless: “The fifth generation of family Red Sox fans was ushered in by the birth of my two grandsons, Andrew (3) and Will (1), who are card-carrying Red Sox Kid Nation members. My son, Steve, has made a family purchase of a brick commemorating the 100th anniversary of Fenway Park.
“In 2010, my daughter, Christine, who lives in the Chicago suburbs, took my granddaughter, Cate, who was 6 at that time, to her first Red Sox game against the White Sox at U.S. Cellular Field. While surrounded by White Sox fans, she cheered loudly for the Red Sox. When she was asked why she was a Red Sox fan, she hit a home run with her answer – ‘because I was born that way.’”
The Red Sox are more than a Boston team.
“I’m from Maine, and in New England everybody is part of the Red Sox,” said Pete Galipeau, who lives near The Villages. “We are die-hard fans.”
Galipeau remembers the dramatic and heartfelt game at Fenway Park after the Boston bombing in April 2013.
“I think the Red Sox helped the whole city come together after that bombing,” Galipeau said. “Everybody said the whole city was ‘Boston Strong.’”
And so it goes for the Red Sox, a team that year-in, year-out inspires passion, joy, heartbreak and a sense of community.
“Things change every season,” Galipeau said. “I have just about forgiven Bill Buckner. Sure, Bucky Dent hit that homerun, but so what? The Curse of the Bambino ended in 2004 when Big Papi (David Ortiz) and the Sox beat the Yankees in the playoffs and won the World Series.”
And what about the thus-far magical season of 2018?
“So far, so good,” Galipeau said, “but wait until October.”
It’s the final test for these Red Sox and their nation.