This note, tantamount to a concession speech, was drafted by Red Sox co-owner Larry Lucchino in the eighth inning of Game 4 of the 2004 American League Championship Series. Everyone in Fenway Park and in front of a Fox TV screen at that point figured the Sox were going to collapse under an ego-bruising sweep by the Yankees. Next year. It's always next year. Only Lucchino didn't have to deliver his speech to legions of bitter and depressed Sox fans, 'cause we all know now that a stolen base and a crisis of Yankee confidence let the Red Sox go on to win the game, and the next three in a row. Then there was a World Series or something.
Moments like Lucchino's assumed capitulation are what makes Seth Mnookin's Feeding the Monster: How Money, Smarts, and Nerve Took a Team to the Top better than your average Red Sox book from your average native New England writer. Mnookin had an incredible level of access to team executives and players, and uses it to give a candid glimpse into the giant ball of dysfunction that is the Sox.The book is definitely at its best when it covers the period between 2001 (when the current ownership team took over in a Boston-cum-Wonderland bidding process) and 2005 (when the team started devolving again into its usual self and almost sacrificed Theo Epstein in the process). The early-going parts, which describe the entire history of the team and the unrelenting bitterness tasted by the great players who never got to wear the ring, are nothing very special. The historical anecdotes about old owners and laughably bad Sox managers are entertaining, but they don't feel fresh at all. We get it--Boston's a crucible, the fans are crazy, and the players are usually misfits. Not new stuff. But all of it is necessary, if a bit long, because the book tries for reportorialism over easy partiality. Mnookin is mostly successful here; I can see a non-Sox fan enjoying the book. Nobody but people affiliated with the team takes much criticism, and there's no rubbing of faces in, say, total annihilation in the ALCS. (Seth Mnookin is a far better person than I.) But yeah...he explains a lot of the team's history, and bogs down the first half in the process.
Things don't really come alive until the last few days of the team sale in 2001, when a small cadre of low-level baseball owners are thrown together in a bid at the last minute and beat out the politically favored local investors to buy the team. There are even a few random Katie Couric cameos! Anyway, the new guys' bid wins, the Boston press grumbles, they hire the youngest General Manager in MLB history, the Boston press grumbles, the team starts winning consistently, the press grumbles less, the team trades Nomar, everybody grumbles more, and then they beat the Yankees and finally everyone's cool with everyone else. For about five minutes. Oh, well.
Mnookin is best at the sharp player profiles anyway. Many Sox players in the past five years get the burnish scraped off of them (except Ortiz, though that shouldn't be much of a surprise). Schilling, Manny, Millar, and especially Nomar take the biggest hits. I mean, I knew Nomar was pretty much a crying baby in his last few months with the team, but I didn't know how deep it ran. For example, before he was traded at the 2004 waiver deadline, a poll of Sox players revealed that nobody actually wanted him to stay. Perhaps this is because his agent is the devil, but I digress. The players are easily the most entertaining part of the book. Some of my favorite passages:
"One of this former managers nicknamed Schilling 'Red Light Curt' because of how he gravitated toward television cameras, and Phillies general manager Ed Wade, referring to a starting pitcher's workload of one game out of every five, once said that Schilling was 'a horse every fifth day and a horse's ass the other four.'"
"Early in the 2005 season, the following hand-written sign was tacked on a bulletin board in the Red Sox clubhouse: '1918 + 24 Manny + 34 Ortiz + 33 Varitek - 5 Nomar = 2004."
"In 2001, the Herald's Jeff Horrigan was doing an interview with Pedro Martinez for Sports Illustrated for Kids. Horrigan asked Martinez his favorite color. 'Green.' Favorite book? 'Whatever.' Favorite actress? 'Sandra Bullock.' Secret ambition? 'I would like to fuck Sandra Bullock,' Martinez replied with a grin. Horrigan explained that likely wasn't an appropriate response for a children's magazine and asked the question again. Martinez dutifully amended his answer: 'I would like to sleep with Sandra Bullock.'"
And some of the appeal of the book is just the simple baseball writing: "Of the four major North American professional sports leagues, Major League Baseball gives its fans the greatest illusion of intimacy with its players. Baseball's 162-game regular season is almost twice as long as basketball's and hockey's 82-game seasons, while football players suit up for a mere 16 non-playoff games a year. The rhythms of the game and the all-encompassing nature of its coverage help foster this sense of closeness between fans and players. When a pitcher steps off the mound with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth, you can watch as he takes a deep breath, screws up his courage, and enters back into the fray. Every player on the diamond spends much of every game standing on the field waiting for something to happen. These are the times in which he can be observed, times in which small quirks of his personality come through."
And finally, I learned some really important things:
* Larry Lucchino could disappear, and Boston would probably be better off.
* Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy is an even bigger tool, on an even bigger power trip, than I thought. I have an idea for his next book: a treatise on what it's like to be banned from Fenway Park. Ideally the Sox will help him out by kicking him to the curb. Before spring training. Or next week. Whichever comes first.
* Theo Epstein is amazing even when he's cranky. It's too bad this job will kill him before he's forty.
* There is no cure for being a member of Red Sox Nation. Antibiotics might help when there's a flareup of irrationality, but the disease will never completely go away. Always practice safe baseball when interacting with other fans--relations with Yankee fans could be especially combustible, so be sure to refrain from (too much) trash talking.
So yeah. I laughed, I sniffled a little, I bought a copy for my dad. Good times all around.
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