Good morning!
Here is the overriding thought I had watching the Astros march through baseball royalty — the Red Sox, Yankees and Dodgers — on the way to the franchise's first World Series title: Can the Sox be a little bit more like the Astros, please?
The Astros rose to the top of baseball because of their young core: Jose Altuve, Carlos Correa, George Springer, Alex Bregman and Yuli Gurriel (ok, so he's 33 but still a rookie). What I saw from those players was not only spectacular talent but an unbridled enthusiasm for the game — like they were playing in some abandoned neighborhood lot — and that they were completely unafraid of anything. They were bold and went out and tried to take every game.
They reminded me of a younger version of the 2004 Red Sox. The Idiots Jr.
The present-day Red Sox also have a talented young core as well: Mookie Betts, Andrew Benintendi, Xander Bogaerts, Jackie Bradley Jr. and Rafael Devers. You can certainly argue against this, but aside from Betts and their played-out, contrived post-win dance, what I see is a group that lacks the Astros' natural passion for the game. It feels like it's a job for them, and they seem to be timid at times — like they're waiting for someone else to get the big hit, instead of taking the game to the other team. When you throw in the cranky veterans on this team, you get the feeling that this is a disjointed group — a new version of the individualistic Sox teams of the past: The 25 guys, 25 Ubers Sox. This all plays into the narrative that this Sox team isn't all that likable.
The Astros? Not so much.
Is all of this fair? Probably not. Does some of this probably have to do with the fact that the Astros got on a roll and were feeling it? Probably. Will a lot change for the Astros once they go from a losing franchise to the defending champs? You bet.
But, I don't know, I watched these Astros and just wished the Sox could be a lot more fun to watch. Here's hoping that new Sox manager Alex Cora, the Astros' bench coach, knows the formula for the secret sauce (hopefully that includes taking the team away from the veterans and giving it to the kids) and can inject this Sox team with some of it.
Bring the fun back to Fenway.
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