With the Red Sox nowhere to be found this postseason, all we’ve got left to cling to is the players front yesteryear who once wore the Boston uniform.
There were plenty of them throughout baseball’s playoffs this year, and a handful are still standings and playing on the game’s biggest stage in the World Series.
On one side, you’ve got Mookie Betts, Kike Hernandez, Ryan Brasier and Michael Kopech (a former top Sox prospect). On the other, Alex Verdugo (and you could make a case for Anthony Rizzo, being another former Sox top prospect and all…).
One group of players will be adding “World Series champion” next to their names — and some not for the first time. What impact would winning a ring in 2024 have on each of their respective legacies?
For Betts, you could pull the plug on his career today and he’s probably already a Hall of Famer. Betts would be in line for — not his first, not his second — his third World Series title should the Dodgers finish off what they started after taking a 2-0 series lead over the Yanks on Freddie Freeman’s iconic grand slam in Game 1 and a three-homer attack in Game 2.
About 150 players in the history of the game have won three World Series rings. That sounds like a lot, until you consider that over 20,000 players have played in the majors. That equates to roughly .0075 percent. Elite company, to say the least…
For all his talent, Betts’ postseason track record hasn’t been the greatest. But once the World Series titles start piling up like the are, it becomes harder and harder to diminish that accomplishment.
A World Series title for Verdugo would be more salt in the wound to Red Sox fans than a legacy-defining moment for him. Sure, he’s part of the group that got the Yankees back to their first World Series in 15 years, but he’s been far from a driving force in their success, unlike the aforementioned man he was traded for.
Frankly, Brasier might stand to gain the most of the bunch. No, a title this year wouldn’t suddenly send him into Cooperstown. But his bounce back with the Dodgers over the last two seasons — he posted a 7.29 ERA over 20 appearances in his last season with the Sox in 2023 — and decent play this postseason has been entirely commendable. Two-time World Series-winning reliever Ryan Brasier sounds pretty good to me…
For Kike, who mostly had a cup of coffee in Boston, another win for him would further certify his status as a Dodgers legend, not so much as one of baseball’s greats. It would be his second title with L.A., and as he’s made quite clear, his biggest gain would be experiencing the World Series parade he didn’t have when they won it all in 2020.
Kopech, once thought to be baseball’s next great ace, has seen his value tumble since the Sox dealt him to the White Sox in the Chris Sale trade. The now 28-year-old reliever has been sharp since being acquired by L.A. at the trade deadline.
In eight playoff appearances thus far, Kopech has allowed just one run and three hits with eight strikeouts across seven innings. Adding “World Series champ” to his resume will certainly benefit a player like Kopech who is in line to be a free agent in 2026.
And then, there’s Rizzo. The key piece in the Adrian Gonzalez trade back in 2010 has gone on to make quite the name and career for himself — perhaps a Hall of Fame one when it’s all said and done. He has work to do yet, but a second championship — his first coming as a member of the curse-breaking Cubs in 2016 — would be a nice feather in his cap.
Giolito goes Hollywood
Actually, there is one current Red Sox pitcher who made it to the World Series...
Lucas Giolito.
Last we heard from ol’ Lucas, he was openly campaigning for former Harvard-Westlake teammate and soon-to-be free agent Max Fried to join him in Boston next season. His latest cameo also features Fried, with the duo sitting front and center at the World Series in L.A.
Harvard-Westlake in the building to support high school teammate Jack Flaherty! #WorldSeries https://t.co/d8PR93Z0Qz pic.twitter.com/8q3h6xPmnH
— MLB (@MLB) October 26, 2024
I never had Giolito’s biggest positive impact as a Red Sox coming off the field on my bingo card, but here we are. As I’ve written before, money ultimately talks if the Sox actually want to make Gio’s dream of teaming up with Max (and maybe Jack Flaherty, too) a reality.
If this were a decade ago, there might be a real possibility that Gio, Fried and Flaherty could team up to form a Josh Beckett-Jon Lester-John Lackey “Big 3” (ideally with less fried chicken and beer and better results). But the prospect of the Sox spending big on free agents just isn’t the reality we live in anymore…
Those cheatin’ Yanks?
“SpyGate, The Baseball Edition” is also not something I had on my bingo card…
Nonetheless, Pedro Martinez made quite the interesting claim to lead off the finale of the three-part Netflix documentary on the ’04 Sox.
“I remember before the game just getting up to the ceiling of the clubhouse and pulling a microphone. I guess a little device that was relaying our conversations,” Pedro said, referring to his Game 2 start in the ALCS at Yankee Stadium.
Curt Schilling even backed up the claim, saying “I know the difference between a microphone and not a microphone, and this was a lapel mic.”
Schill lasted just three innings and gave up six runs in Game 1. Pedro faired better, going six innings and giving up three runs in Game 2, but all to the same result: a loss.
Is it entirely inconceivable that a baseball team would push the line to gain an advantage? Such a suggestion would be… trash.
Baseball has a long history of teams trying to gain an edge, so I can’t say I would be surprised if this were true. And for the first three games of the series, the Yankees certainly had the advantage.
But once the alleged microphones went away, everything came up Red Sox…
“(Expletive). I say it didn’t happen,” then Yankees manager Joe Torre is quoted as saying in response. “And if it did happen, we didn’t get the benefit of a microphone, someone else did.”
Maybe it was the Yankees who green lit Netflix to do a behind-the-scenes documentary of the 2024 Red Sox…
That must be why the Sox were so inconsistent and missed the playoffs. Yeah, that’s definitely it…