A significant changing of the guard will occur in Boston today: the reins of the Red Sox organization will be handed over from the Yawkey Trust to former Florida Marlins owner John Henry. This may look like no more than a shady business deal to many, but to the diehard Sox fan, it has the potential to mean the world. Like Thomas Yawkey did 70 years ago, Henry is taking over what many believe to be a beleaguered franchise. It will take strong leadership and several major changes to keep the Sox from sinking like the Titanic - which coincidentally happened in the first week that Fenway opened.
The sale - which at $660 million is the highest-priced sale in Major League history -represents the first time since 1933 that the Yawkey family name hasn't been associated with the Red Sox. When Tom Yawkey took over the Sox in 1933, he invested his heart, soul, and wallet into improving what was then a last-place team. Boston baseball nearly died when Babe Ruth left town, and Yawkey transformed the Sox into a competitive team.
Now John Henry is facing similar circumstances. Boston has been a decent team for the last five years, but we in Red Sox nation are thirstier for a championship than ever. Last summer, we paid exorbitant ticket prices to watch our beloved Sox self-destruct. We cried when Pedro went down, we cried when Nomar went down, we even cried when manager Jimy Williams went down. We had no tears left when the Sox went 22-33 in August and September and didn't make the playoffs despite having been in first place at the end of July. We are tired, fed up, and we want change.
The number one thing Henry needs to do to start this season off on the right foot is dump Dan Duquette. In eight years in Boston, Duquette has consistently gone on shopping sprees with fans' money and brought back a few superstars - but he doesn't seem to realize that the Sox can't win on the arm of Pedro or any one star alone.
Duquette may have been the one to sign Martinez, but he's been unable to assemble a rotation, or a lineup for that matter, beyond the ace. This is the same guy who brought us Heathcliff Slocumb, Mike Stanley twice as a player and now as a coach, Jose Offerman, Mike Lansing and Rico Brogna - and don't forget Izzy Alcantra.
Duquette's constant feuds with former manager Jimy Williams left fans with a worse taste in their mouth than that of the so-called Fenway beer. The two squabbled over roster moves for several summers until last August, when Duquette fired Williams and replaced him with a puppet manager that would do what the GM wanted with the line-up. At the end of last season, rumors flew that Pedro wanted out, Manny wanted out, Nomar wasn't happy - and we all knew Carl Everett wanted out. The Sox have some great players right now, but they will never win without team chemistry. And they will never have chemistry with Duquette running the show because he thinks it is his job to create tension in the clubhouse.
While he is at it, Henry might as well send manager Joe Kerrigan packing. Kerrigan is a great pitching coach, but showed last fall that he has the managerial sense of a kiwi. Kerrigan got his job because he was willing to be Duquette's ally, and players will continue to resent him even if Duquette is gone. Henry should get rid of these two now before Red Sox nation gets frustrated and dumps them in the Boston Harbor along with the overpriced Fenway food.
The other thing that Henry and his partners need to do to revive the Sox is build a new ballpark. Plans for a new Fenway got put on the shelf when current owner John Harrington decided to sell the Sox. Boston has the oldest ballpark in Major League baseball, and for the Sox to compete at the level of the other teams, they need to have a ballpark that will generate the same amount of revenue.
Right now, the Sox are to the Yankees what many say Tufts is to Harvard. Harvard's unlimited endowment provides the university with money to secure all the resources it needs, and Harvard continues to be the most prestigious school in the country because it can constantly pay for whatever advances it needs. Tufts, however, has a small endowment, and the administration simply does not have enough money to raise faculty salaries, build a new dorm, improve financial aid, and continue to fund structural improvements like exterminating the Wren bugs. The Sox similarly do not have the money to buy players for positions they are weak at each offseason, while the Yanks GM has carte blanche in the free agent market.
For both Tufts-Harvard and the Sox-Yankees, financial superiority causes an intense rivalry - though I doubt we will see students selling "Harvard sucks" t-shirts at baseball games this spring. Money also creates disparities in the team's records. Though it is tough for a Sox fan to admit, the Yankees have been a consistently dominant team, while Boston has (gulp) not won a championship in over 80 years. Likewise, Harvard dominates Tufts in the US News and World Report rankings each year. We can argue all we want that certain things are better here, but the national perception is that Harvard is a superior school.
The answer for how to raise Tufts' endowment is not clear, but for the Sox, it is: build a ballpark that will bring in the revenue that the team needs. Fenway may be beautiful and historic, but those words mean little to the fans sitting behind the poles who are watching a team that hasn't won a championship since their great-grandfathers sat behind those very same poles. Build the park where Fenway is now, build it in Southie, or build it on the waterfront - it doesn't really matter. Just build it, because if Henry does, more fans will come, and the Sox will get the revenue they need to operate a top-notch club.
And while Henry is evaluating changes to make, Sox games could do without that pointless post-third inning game where the fans scream loudly to choose between two songs and the announcer plays them later.
