Baseball is fun as much for the trivia, stories and tidbits
of knowledge that accumulate as for the actual action that takes place on the
field. The Boston Red Sox are one of the most storied franchises in the sport,
and as such have a rich trove of factoids. Here is a sampling.
Much has been made this season about the “Red
Sox flu,” which sent a number of players, and even a broadcaster, to the
sidelines. Heading into the season, the
team has a troubling
trend of player sick days, racking up a total of 85 between 2011-16. This
represents $3.9 million in salaries during those days missed, and the most in
the majors since during that time.
In 1967, rookie southpaw Billy Rohr
began his career with two complete game victories (including a one-hitter in
his debut) against the New York Yankees. He went 0-3 with an 8.51 ERA in his next
eight games (six starts), and pitched his final major league games the next
year at the age of 22.
Although the Red Sox lost the 1986 World Series to the New
York Mets in heart-breaking fashion, it truly was a magical season for the
team. As a sign of the special things to come, Dwight Evans
hit the very first pitch of the season (for the Sox and all of MLB), off the
Detroit Tigers’ Jack Morris,
for a lead off home run on Opening
Day (The Tigers went on to win the game 6-5).
In 2009, Boston signed
promising 17-year-old pitching prospect Carlos Matias out of the Dominican
Republic for $140,000. However, Major League Baseball discovered that he was
born with a different last name and voided the contract on the grounds of
identity fraud. He went on to sign with the St. Louis Cardinals, adopted his
birth name of Carlos
Martinez and is now an annual Cy Young contender at the age of 25 for the
Red Birds.
Right-handed pitcher John Dopson
pitched parts of five perfectly average seasons with the Red Sox (1989-93),
going 26-30 with a 4.29 ERA. He does hold one interesting team record, as his
21 balks during that time are more than runner up Roger
Clemens’ 18 for the most in team history. 15 of Dopson’s balks came in
1989, which ironically was the year after “the
year of the balk,” when baseball had more balk calls than any other year in
history.
Entering, the 2017 season, All Star outfielder Mookie Betts
last struck out during a regular season game on September
12, 2016 against the Baltimore Orioles and Oliver Drake
before next whiffing against the Toronto Blue Jays’ Francisco
Liriano on April 17, 2017—a streak of 129 plate appearances. Given the age
of power pitching and free swinging hitters, this is a truly amazing feat.
Bobby
Sprowl was a highly touted pitching prospect in 1978. The left-hander was
the team’s second-round selection the year before and had posted a 2.10 ERA in
his first season in the minors. Unfortunately, during spring training he was accidentally
shot in the (right) arm while inside his Winter Haven, Florida apartment
after his neighbor’s gun accidentally discharged and a bullet went through the
wall. He recovered quickly and went on to win 16 minor league games that year
before appearing in three Boston games at the end of the season. Unfortunately,
that was his only season in Boston and he never recorded a major league win in
parts of four years as a big leaguer.
Jack Rothrock
played parts of eight seasons (1925-32) in a Red Sox uniform. Besides hitting
.300 in 1929, he is perhaps best known for playing
a different position for five consecutive Opening Days with the team. Between 1928 and 1932, he manned shortstop,
center field, right field, third base and left field on successive first games
of the year.
Current Boston closer Craig
Kimbrel has a fastball he consistently throws in the upper
90s. He credits
this ability in part to a broken foot he suffered at the age of 18 when a panel
of sheet-rock was accidentally dropped on his foot at a construction site he was
working with his father. He went off to Wallace Community College that and
performed a training regimen that included throwing from his knees while he was
forced to be off his feet. This added to his arm strength and helped make him
one of the most dominant pitchers in the game today.
The number worn most often on the Boston Red Sox has been 28
(worn by 56 different players). Most recently, reliever Robbie Ross
has had 28 on the back of his uniform.
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