It’s the first day of the Red Sox-Yankees wild card series, which means it’s as good a time as any to relive past great moments in Red Sox history. And other than the World Series victory of 2004, there was no greater moment than Carlton Fisk’s 12th-inning walkoff home run in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series against Cincinnati.
So here’s a treat from Kirk Carapezza of GBH Radio. Kirk recently talked New Yorker editor David Remnick into reading the late Roger Angell’s classic account of that homer. You can listen (and read) here. If you’re of my generation, it will bring that incredible night back.
It’s been called the finest game in baseball history, and it did a lot to revive the sport at a time when, as Carapezza points out, football was ascendant. Sadly, the Sox went on to lose Game 7. But we’ll always have that night — not to mention 2004, ’07, ’13 and ’18. Go Sox!
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For me, a transplant from the Bronx in 1977 to Cambridge (and in 2011 to Medford), the greatest moment in Red Sox history was the defeat of the Yankees in the 2004 American playoff series, not the four-game sweep of the Cardinals. Despite the fact that I could see people in the stands in the old Yankee Stadium from my 6th floor apartment window, I fiercely rooted against the pinstripes. While never a Boston fan — the Red Sox were the last team to integrate (Pumpsy Green), I longed for Steinbrenner’s team to be taken down. Coming back from a three-game deficit, and with two outs in the ninth in the seventh game no less, to humble the powerful Yankees, was an all-time sports high. The World Series victory, curse-busting as it was, was more like a cigarette after great sex, satisfying certainly, but not quite as spectacular as the orgasm.