It was literally written in the stars.
Twenty years ago tonight, on Oct. 27, 2004, the Red Sox took the field at the old Busch Stadium in St. Louis with a chance to end one of the longest title droughts in American professional sports history. That night a full moon shone across the country, and midway through Game 4 a total lunar eclipse bathed its surface in a blood red glow.
After 86 years, this would finally be Boston’s night.
The Red Sox’s 2004 championship was a seismic event. Generations of Bostonians had gone their entire lives wondering if they’d ever live to see the day. Every time the club had come close something always went wrong, so for this group to somehow turn the tables on the hated New York Yankees — becoming the first and still only team in MLB history to overcome a 3-0 series deficit — it felt like more than just victory.
It felt like deliverance.
The magnitude of that team’s accomplishment hasn’t dimmed with time, even as the city has enjoyed an unprecedented run of success. Tom Brady and Bill Belichick led the Patriots to six Super Bowl championships. The Red Sox proved their historic breakthrough wasn’t a fluke, winning four titles total over 15 seasons. The Bruins and Celtics each won a title, and this past June the C’s finally broke through again to bring Banner 18 home.
All of that success has left a mark, and looking back, the fall of 2004 is when things truly shifted.
Those Red Sox didn’t just pull off an epic comeback and win a championship, they changed the culture of a city. When I was growing up, the experience of Red Sox fandom was defined by pain and disappointment. For people of my parents’ generation, those who lived through the near misses in 1975, 1978 and 1986, that’s all they knew.
As a child of the 90s I was raised on those stories. I’m old enough to remember what it was like before “The Curse” was broken. Yet I was also young enough where that history hadn’t been ingrained, so even after experiencing the pain of falling short in 2003, I was convinced 2004 would finally be the year.
I must have seemed hopelessly naive to the older people in my life, but among my peers I was hardly alone. Even after the Yankees handed the Red Sox a 19-8 butt-kicking in Game 3 of the ALCS, the prevailing sentiment the next day at school was hopeful optimism. This team, this journey, couldn’t really end like this. Could it?
Decades of Red Sox history suggested it would. But this time the story finally had a happy ending.
Fast forward 20 years, there is now an entire generation of younger Bostonians who don’t know anything but success. Our faith has been rewarded time and time again, and where we once expected disappointment, we now demand excellence.
That’s the world the Red Sox live in now, which helps explain why the past five years have been so difficult for many to stomach. It’s only been six years since the Red Sox last won a title, yet that glorious night feels like a lifetime ago after a prolonged rebuild and the unceremonious trade that sent face of the franchise Mookie Betts to the Dodgers, where he’s already won one championship and may soon capture another.
There was once a time where this all would have seemed part of the natural order, but not anymore. Boston has changed, and where the Red Sox were once haunted by their past failures, they’re now haunted by their past success.
It’s difficult to imagine any future championship leaving such a lasting mark, but 20 years later it’s clear that 2004 has stood the test of time as an epochal moment in Boston sports history.
Breslow talks title
Though Craig Breslow wouldn’t join the Red Sox family for another year, the 2004 championship still left an impression on the club’s future chief baseball officer. Speaking to the Herald in a recent interview, the Red Sox boss described his memory of the 2004 World Series and how watching the club’s triumph changed the way he viewed the game.
“I was in the minor leagues in ’04,” Breslow said. “I’d actually been released by the Brewers when I was playing independent ball prior to making my debut in ’05. I can remember being in New England and following any Red Sox-Yankees series and rivalry at that time, it was the highest intensity and got a ton of attention.
“I can remember following the series, I can remember, like everyone, casting a ton of doubt on this team, and at that time I had no loyalty. I was actually a Mets fan growing up, so I was kind of the third wheel that never got to partake in much fun,” he continued. “But that was the team for me that really crystalized the importance of chemistry and culture and camaraderie, because at the time it didn’t seem like there was any other explanation for their success.
“I think now that I’m in this role and 20 years later it’s really important I don’t lose sight of the humans that are engaged in playing these games and the way that emotions can have an impact ultimately on performance.”
Among most significant ever
There have been 119 World Series champions crowned since the dawn of the 20th century, and while the 2004 Red Sox’s four-game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals was hardly the most riveting in terms of on-field action, the end of Boston’s 86-year title drought made it among the most significant Fall Classics ever played.
In the annals of baseball history, only a small handful truly compare.
Trying to rank every World Series would be a daunting and pointlessly subjective exercise, but there are clearly some that stand above the rest. Some, like the Red Sox in 2004, matter because of the historical ramifications at play. Others featured unforgettable endings. Some had both.
Which World Series belong in the pantheon?
In terms of historical significance, the first and maybe best comparison to Boston in 2004 is the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1955. The Dodgers had never won a World Series despite winning the National League pennant seven times previously, and each of their previous five losses had come against the Yankees. But this time the Dodgers finally finished the job, rallying from a 2-0 series deficit to win in Game 7 to clinch the franchise’s first World Series title just two years before the club’s relocation to Los Angeles.
You also have the Philadelphia Phillies in 1980, who won the first championship in the club’s 97-year history to become the last original MLB franchise to win a World Series, and obviously the 2016 Chicago Cubs, whose story as a historic team playing in a historic ballpark enduring a generations-spanning drought paralleled the Red Sox.
Game 7 of the 2016 World Series is also on the short list of the greatest games in MLB history, featuring a dramatic game-tying home run by Rajai Davis in the eighth, a 17-minute rain delay heading into extra innings and Ben Zobrist’s go-ahead RBI double in the 10th to help the Cubs put Cleveland away and finally end the Windy City’s 108-year wait.
There have been 40 World Series that went to a decisive winner-take-all Game 7 (or Game 8, as happened thanks to a tie in 1912.) That list includes some of the most exciting in baseball history, including Jack Morris’ 10-inning complete-game shutout to lead the Twins past the Braves in 1991, Marlins shortstop Edgar Renteria’s walk-off single to beat Cleveland in 1997 and Luis Gonzalez’s walk-off knock against Mariano Rivera to help the Diamondbacks stun the Yankees in 2001.
There have also been two World Series that ended on a walk-off home run. Pittsburgh Pirates second baseman Bill Mazeroski, generally more of a contributor on defense throughout his Hall of Fame career, delivered what was then the biggest hit in MLB history with his walk-off home run to beat the Yankees in Game 7 of the 1960 World Series. Joe Carter hit one for the Blue Jays to beat the Phillies in 1993, giving Toronto back-to-back titles in dramatic fashion.
A future classic?
Time will tell if this year’s World Series measures up to some of the all-time greats, but in terms of sheer star power it already stands among the best.
Between Aaron Judge, Juan Soto, Gerrit Cole and Giancarlo Stanton with the Yankees and Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman with the Dodgers, the sides boast seven active players who have a realistic shot at making the Hall of Fame and who own seven MVP and Cy Young Awards between them.
That doesn’t even include the two new MVPs that Judge and Ohtani will probably take home next month, nor does it include the MVP and three Cy Young Awards earned by the injured future Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw.
This year’s World Series is probably the highest profile we’ve seen in the 21st century, but if you go back throughout history you’ll find no shortage of stellar matchups.
Ted Williams vs. Stan Musial in 1946, Hank Aaron vs. Mickey Mantle in 1957, Carl Yastrzemski and Co. vs. The Big Red Machine in 1975, and George Brett vs. Mike Schmidt in 1980 all immediately come to mind. The 1932 World Series between the Yankees and Cardinals featured 13 future Hall of Famers, the most ever, and the 1996 Fall Classic between the Yankees and Braves had nine, with Andruw Jones lingering as a possible future 10th.
Not every World Series winds up being must-see TV, but every once in a while fans are treated to something truly special. Hopefully this year’s Fall Classic lives up to the bill.
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