Out of the Ashes (Subtitled: How to earn a famous middle name)

On a very cold October night in 2003, Thursday the 16th to be exact, the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox were playing game 7 of the American League Championship Series. Third baseman Brett Boone stepped to the plate in the bottom of the 11th inning at Yankee Stadium, also known as "The hell-hole that Ruth built", and the same thing happened that had been happening for the better part of an entire century to the Red Sox and for the Yankees.

Before I go any further, let's step back an hour or so and examine the latest catastrophe.

Roger Clemens, perennial Red Sox pitcher and future Hall-of-Famer, had defected in the mid-90's, and after a stop in Toronto, had wiggled his way into a Yankee uniform. Clemens' leaving was traumatic enough for the long-suffering people who preferred to call their flock "Red Sox Nation", but a Yankee!!??! Good Lord in Heaven, a Yankee? Anything...any team...any time...anywhere.

But not that team.

That team had won 26 World Championships since the Red Sox traded Babe Ruth to them in 1920, and the Red Sox were sporting the big goose-egg. To make matters worse, in 11 of the Yankees appearances that resulted in a championship, the Red Sox were the team the Yankees nudged out of the chance to play in the World Series. In all those years, the Sox had only been a participant in 3 World Series, and they agonizingly lost them each in the 7th game, each final game finding the Sox ahead and finding some sort of bizarre way of losing. The Yankees, on the other hand, found 26 different ways to win.

Be that as it may, here he was and here they were, the Red Sox and the Yankees, vying for the chance to go to the World Series, and each team had won 3 games in the best of 7 series, and it was all coming down to this game right here. Naturally, the Sox struck first, getting to Clemens and knocking him out of the game with 4 early runs by the 3rd inning. By the 7th, the lead was 4-2, and then in the top of the 8th, David Ortiz of the Red Sox hit a bomb of a home run, a feat which was the beginning of a still on-going drama today. Time and time again, Ortiz stakes his claim to being the biggest Yankee-killer of all time, and this was the first major battle in the war on the Yankees.

But back to the game. Ortiz homers, the Sox take a 5-2 lead into the bottom of the 8th, and Red Sox Nation is holding its collective breath. Could it be true? Could we finally be going back to the Series, and doing so at the expense of the Yankees? Whooda thunk that?

In the bottom of the 8th, the Sox start pitcher - Pedro Martinez - was running out of gas, and the tens of millions watching on TV knew it as well. The Red Sox manager, Grady Little, went to the mound in what was surely the moment he would pull the star pitcher from the game, get a fresh pitcher to finish this game off, and then go on to the World Series.

But he didn't replace him.

He left Martinez in there because the pitcher said he still felt like he had something left. I walked outside my home in Orlando, and I swear I could hear the collective groan of 8 million Red Sox fans all over America. The rest is history. Two singles followed by two doubles consecutively, tied the score at 5. Now the manager pulled out Martinez, but it was 4 batters too late. Millions of Red Sox Nation heads nodded almost imperceptibly, their fate sealed long ago in some predestined celestial joke that the God's of suffering had inflicted upon us and our offspring for eternity. The score was still tied, but we all knew it was over.

In the 11th, the aforementioned Brett Boone stepped to the plate and forever changed his name. You see, the Red Sox never lose gracefully, oh no. It always has to be some unkind or atrocious happenstance that causes the defeat. A case in point is this particular batter. In the previous 6 games, Boone had 1 hit in 25 at bats, and that was a squibbling ground ball that died before it even got to the 3rd baseman, resulting in a little-league looking infield hit. Boone was so pathetic at the plate that he had been benched by Yankees manager, Joe Torre for game 7. Inserted as a pinch-hitter in the bottom of the 11th, he was the perfect anti-hero to another imperfect Red Sox calamity, and he promptly sent the first pitch off into the night, sending the Yankees to the World Series again, and the Red Sox, well...

The name change I mentioned? Oh yeah...from the moment that ball rocketed off of his bat, he forever became known as Brett #^%$#* Boone, or Brett F. Boone for short.

Shocked and dismayed once again, I didn't know what to do. It was nearing midnight, I had to go to work in the morning, but I couldn't sleep. I paced and I cursed, and I walked the dog as fast as he and I could move together, but nothing would relieve my anxiety.

Gotdamit, sonavabitching, stupid #%$#* Red Sox bastards ripped my heart out again. 47 years of the same old stuff, and that's not mentioning the previous 38 years before I was born that I wasn't a part of. I was a Sox fan, tried and true, and by that I mean I'm not greedy and whiny like Yankee fans are. I didn't need 26 World Series to justify my existence and be happy; I just wanted one. Hey God, if you're listening, can ya take your foot off of our necks long enough to give us just one?

Still despondent, I went upstairs to my 12 year old son's room. He was asleep, and I sat down on the bed next to him and brushed his hair away from his forehead. He stirred, looked up at me and said, "What's the matter, Dad?"

I told him about the Red Sox, and with a puzzled look on his face that just screamed out, you woke me up for this? looked at me and said, "Like you always tell me dad...it's not life, it's just a game". "Now go away and let me sleep".

As I went downstairs to my bedroom, the thought occurred to me that we all sometimes ask our children to do as we say, not as we do. The truth of the matter was when it came to the Yankees/Red Sox, it had never been just a game to me, and probably never would. The next day after I came home from work, I told my son the truth. I still wanted him to conduct himself with sportsmanship and aplomb, but I let him know that maybe a bit of fire and passion can actually add to the fun of it all, and that...yeah...I lied...sometimes it's a lot more than just a game.

Once a man, twice a child is true, I guess.

As a post script, in the World Series the Florida Marlins shocked the world, the Yankees, and more than likely themselves and beat the *&^%#$# in 6 games. Good.

During the winter months, both the Yankees and the Red Sox reloaded with more talent, and set the stage for 2004. Most notable was the addition of Curt Shilling to the Red Sox roster, a shoe-in hall of fame pitcher, former world series champion against the Yankees, and a very outspoken athlete. He hated the Yankees and their dynasty, and came to Boston to put a stop to it. He made public statements in the press like "Nothing would make me happier than to go into Yankee Stadium and make 55,000 people shut up". He wasn't alone, as Yankee players and Red Sox players threw verbal punches at each other all through the winter, and the newspapers and national media like ESPN were more than happy to enlighten the public to each and every quotable quote.

The century-long fierce competition had erupted into a heart-felt disdain for each other, and for the first time ever, the players on both sides were reflecting the sentiments that each fan base had for as long as they had been playing. This was going to be good drama, and I had a sneaking feeling the next season was going to be filled with a moment or two to remember.

I had noooooo idea.