The 2004 Red Sox Weren't Even Close

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Posted By: Tbob

When it comes to pulling off the miraculous and coming from behind to conquer seemingly insurmountable odds, no one compares to the other Beaneater team, the 1914 Boston Braves. The Braves finished 52 games out of first in 1912 and started off 1914 by LOSING 40 of their first 66 games. They ended up WINNING 52 of their last 66 games. With a 3 man pitching rotation all year they caught Johnny Mac's Giants and swept the mighty A's in 4 games in the series, beating Bender, Plank, Bush and the "$100,000" infield. It was a team of castoffs, hasbeens and never was' with two notable exceptions, rookie Rabbit Maranville and second baseman Johnny "The Crab" Evers. Evers had managed the Cubs in 1913 to a 2nd place finish but made the mistake of losing to the White Sox in a post season exhibition series and was fired. He was the spark in the miracle run. I was looking at the names of the players and if not for the T207 set, a lot of them, like Tyler would be totally unfamiliar. You'll find Hank Gowdy in there as well as vets on their last legs like Devore and Schmidt. Has there ever been a better 3 some of pitchers for a season than Tyler, James and Rudolph?
The Red Sox pulled a minor miracle this year. The 1914 miracle Braves pulled THE miracle of all time in baseball...

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Posted By: john/z28jd

Dont forget the best player no ones ever heard of from that team,Jack Martin who lived most of his life in the town i grew up in and theres a street named after him which ends right at the building i currently work at.

Dolph Luque also made his ML debut for that team.

I also just noticed something interesting which im sure some people knew already but it explains the Braves futility in the postseason despite 13 straight pennants.They have won 1 world series in each town theyve called home[Boston,Milwaukee and Atlanta] so they wont win another w.s. till they switch towns again.Sorry Scott

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Posted By: Pat

I don't think the "Miraculous" way the 2004 Red Sox won relates to the 1914 Red Sox. Having a terrible year in 1912 and then starting off poorly in 1914 (What happened in 1913?) can compare to the way the 2004 Red Sox won. Three outs away from a sweep, facing the Best closer in BB on the mound, blah, blah,.......

Not to mention the book-end sweeps including the Cardinals.

"No way the Sox beat the Cardinals. St. Louis has a true murderer's row and it overcomes its mediocre pitching. The Sox CAN beat Minnesota and New York, but not St. Louis. If by some fluke the Braves or Astros make it to the series, though, it will be a different story. The Redbirds have a stacked hand along with the most underrated manager in baseball, Tony LaRusso."

Maybe it was miraculous given the above statement.

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Posted By: warshawlaw

but nothing pulled off by one of the top 3 payrolls in baseball on a team that was jiggered last off-season expressly to beat the Yankees is miraculous. Even the pinkie ring crowd in Vegas had the Sox as favorites, so don't talk about miracles...

Baseball is played one game at a time. There have been a ton of teams that have won games in the 9th inning. The fact that the Yankees could not win another game after blowing the 4th game is not miraculous, either. They were simply outplayed. Had Jason Giambi been healthy and playing instead of John Olerud, the outcome would likely have been quite different. Take away Ortiz or Ramirez and put in Olerud and do the Sox still win?

As far as the Cardinals go, let's be honest: division by division, the AL has better teams and tougher intradivisional fights. The NL Central is the second weakest division in baseball (behind the AL Central), while the AL East is the toughest one. The Cards fattened up on mediocre teams in their division and generated their best in baseball record, while the Yankees and Sox beat the crap out of each other. Whoever makes it through the AL East buzzsaw is the favorite to take the AL pennant (as has been the case for nine of the last ten years), and the AL pennant winner is the favorite to mow down the NL champion (as has been the case seven of the last ten years).

What would have been miraculous would have been for the Twins or Astros to win the series...

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Posted By: Pat

it was no miracle. Come to think of it, I don't really know who's been calling it a miracle to begin with. It's nice as a Sox fan to see them win but as you said, it's money ball when you get down to it. I don't think you can start doing "what if this guy wasn't on the team," etc. as long as you're comparing a $ team to a $ team which both are. Yes, if a team like the Twins won, it would be more of a "miracle" and in the past it has been nice to see them win on smaller $$. I just think it's funny how the Cards were "unbeatable" except in the WS.

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Posted By: john/z28jd

Adam i totally disagree about your assessment of divisions toughness. AL East was not the toughest just because of the Yankees and Red Sox,they dont offset the fact that the Orioles had 0 pitching,and Blue Jays and Devil Rays were just bad teams. The weakest division was the al central[which you said] but was followed by the NL East. The NL central had 3 of the top 5 teams in baseball according to most power rankings and if the Cubs didnt make the playoffs with all that offense and pitching then it says something for the division.In fact the 2 divisions rank out very similar except for the fact central had 3 very good teams and 3 bad teams and al east had 2 very good teams and 3 bad teams.

The Giants were a 2 man team with 1 player being a pitcher who went every 5 days and they stayed in the race to the final day.Diamondbacks and Rockies were horrendous teams.Their division was not up to par with nl central and only the AL west with 3 very good teams and 1 team that shouldve been good but grew old fast and was dismantled so they can regroup for this upcoming season, would be on par with the central.

1. nl central
2t al east
2t al west
4 nl weat
5 nl east
6 al central

Its either a miraculous comeback or the worst choke ever and id rather go with the latter.Some say the best reliever ever,with the highest price team ever,in the biggest rivalry ever,and losing the last 2 games at a place like yankee stadium and after being up 3-0 with a lead in the 9th and its never been done before.With that many odds stacked in one teams favor i dont know how anyone can downplay it.I think this years diamondbacks couldve stepped in a closed that one out for the yankees and then had a better showing in the world series than the cardinals did vs the red sox

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Posted By: Julie

that what the Brooklyn Dodgers did in '55 was miraculous, in a different way (in some ways different): it was the ONLY WS they ever won...

I put my money, and my attire, where my mouth is...

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Posted By: warshawlaw

maybe the NL Central had three good teams, but the reality is not what was on paper. The Cubs had an aging slugger having a crap year (and who unfortunately seems to be on his way to LA for Shawn Green who, mark my words here, will hit 50-60 homers in the Friendly Confines next year if he is traded), and signed an old spot pitcher in the off-season. The Astros would have been good if their front line pitching signing hadn't gone down for the year. The Cardinals were best summed up by an article in SI, which said that their staff was a group of journeymen that relied on the big boppers in the lineup to win with big output. As we have seen time and time again, that formula may grind out wins over the long haul against teams with no pitching but can be death in a series if the other side's pitching shuts down the big hitters.

I also take issue with rating the NL Central above the AL East or the AL West on the raw number of decent teams alone. Three Mothras (NL Central) don't add up to two Godzillas (AL East). It takes a hell of a lot more to win the East than to win anywhere else. The AL West is at least as good as the NL Central; I watched Anaheim (Cardinals), Oakland (Astros) and Texas (Cubs) all year out here and they are the equivalents of the NL Central's top three. Anaheim in particular scared the crap out of all us AL East fans in '04.

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Posted By: john/z28jd

I respectfully disagree with SI then because the Cardinals have one of the best defensive teams in baseball[3 gold glovers this year and Renteria couldve won it again too] and their pitching staff finished 2nd in ERA in all of baseball by just 0.01
That doesnt sound like the stats of a team that solely relied on big boppers.The Yankees pitching staff wasnt even halfway decent and they still racked up 41 wins over the 3 bottom dwellers in their division.That sounds more like the team SI described

Head to head this year the best 3 teams in the NL central went 19-8 over the AL west and didnt lose any series,and in fact the lowly Reds split their series and Brewers won 4 of the 6 games vs AL West.

Thats why i ranked them ahead of the al west and al east 3 of the 5 teams were extremely bad,which is worse than 3 of 6 and i dont rank Yankees or Red Sox higher than the Cardinals and on paper the Cubs shouldve been better too,and without 2 top starters going down the Astros would be neck and neck too but i dont rank either far behind either AL west team