Losing to the Rays just doesn’t sting like losing to the Evil Empire. There is a lot to like about the Rays from the local connections (Rocco Baldelli and Carlos Pena) to the quirky manager to the worst to first angle.
The Red Sox were a gritty, fun team to watch, filled with players who played hard and did the right things. I was happy to root for a Manny-free team. Granted, I was not as happy as Terry Francona was to manage a Manny-free team. Did you catch Francona’s post game comment?
“We didn’t get as far as we wanted. We got beat by a very good team,” Red Sox manager Terry Francona said after Sunday’s contest. “But this is probably the funnest couple months maybe I’ve ever had. I know our guys will be down for a little while, but they have no reason to hang their head.”
Here’s Theo,
“I’m extremely proud,” he said. “This team went through a lot. A lot of these guys are on fumes with the effort that was expended to get to this point. There are no losers in here tonight. We got beat by a team that’s playing great. We congratulate them, but I feel this was a championship effort this year, one for the whole organization to be proud of. It’s baseball and you don’t win all the time. The effort was incredible. Every guy here left it all on the field.
Good riddence to “that guy“. Overall, a very enjoyable season for the Red Sox. Looking forward to next season.