News
ChopTalk: Why all the fuss?
Yanks, Sox to bring a lot of fans to Turner Field
By Gary Caruso / ChopTalk Magazine
06/23/09 5:09 PM ET
It may only be June, but there will be a buzz comparable to postseason excitement at Turner Field late this month when two bullies from the highly competitive American League East come calling. That would be the New York Yankees (June 23-25) and Boston Red Sox (June 26-28), of course, and hordes of their far-flung fan bases are sure to pack the ballpark.
 |
Why is this such a big deal? Well, there are plenty of reasons, not the least of which are all those fans, who will make a major contribution to the Braves' coffers. For the ninth straight year, the Yankees have the largest payroll in baseball. USA Today put it at $201.4 million to open the season. The Red Sox are fourth at $121.7 million. Forbes magazine values the worth of the Yankees' franchise at $1.5 billion, the highest in baseball, of course. The Red Sox check in third at $833 million in spite of playing in ancient -- and relatively small -- Fenway Park.
Money aside, the Yankees and the Red Sox are two of the most successful and historic franchises in all of professional sports. Both were charter members of the AL in 1901, though the Yankees were known as the Baltimore Orioles at the time, relocating to New York two years later as the Highlanders (the Yankees nickname originated in 1913).
The Yankees have won more World Series than any other franchise (26 out of 39 times in it). They won the Fall Classic four times in five years (1996, '98-2000) but have been dry since then.
The Red Sox won the first World Series in 1903 but went through one of the longest droughts in history from 1918 until 2004, then won again in '07 to give them two of the last five World Series championships. That success spawned unbridled devotion throughout the so-called Red Sox Nation, making a ticket to a game at Fenway the toughest to get in baseball. As this was written, the Red Sox were working on a Major League record string of 483 consecutive sellouts at Fenway, dating to May 15, 2003, and there's no end in sight. The Braves are no slouches when it comes to history. In fact, they pre-date the Yankees and Red Sox by more than a quarter century. In spite of playing in different leagues, there are quite a few threads that tie them together.
Here's a look at some of those:
The Beginning
The Braves are directly linked to the Red Sox because they shared the same hometown for 52 seasons. Though the Braves were there first, they eventually lost the popularity battle and escaped to Milwaukee in 1953.
As can now be seen on the outfield wall at Turner Field, the Braves are the "oldest continuously operating franchise in pro sports." A charter member of the National League in 1876 as the Boston Red Stockings, the club actually was born five years earlier when the National Association was formed in 1871.
Though the Braves have not called Boston home for more than half a century, there's still an active fan club there -- the Boston Braves Historical Association (BBHA) -- that holds an annual reunion/banquet. When the Braves played their first Interleague games in Boston in 1997, members of the BBHA and the Atlanta-based Braves 400 Club attended games together and held a "Braves Birthplace Reunion."
The Babe
Though it is impossible to accurately compare players from different eras, fans and the media love to do it, and it creates a great deal of interest in baseball. Furthermore, it is a harmless exercise, so let the arguments continue!
Regardless of whether or not Babe Ruth prevails in any particular discussion in which players are ranked, there can be no questioning his legend. He is an unrivaled No. 1 in that department. In spite of playing in a relative cave man era of communications, The Bambino was larger than the game when he played (1914-35) and remains so today.
Known primarily as a Yankee, Ruth actually played for three teams in his career. He played his first six seasons -- mainly as a great pitcher -- for the Red Sox before he was sold to the Yankees. There he became the game's mostfeared slugger. In 1935, however, Ruth played the last 28 games of his career and hit his final six home runs as a Brave.
The Ruth connection with the Braves was re-engaged in the 1970s, when Hank Aaron pursued and eventually broke The Babe's all-time career home run record of 714.
The Ballpark
The storied home of the Red Sox opened its gates in 1912, and Babe Ruth made his Major League debut there in 1914. The big news in Boston and around baseball in 1914, however, was the Braves -- the "Miracle Braves," as they were being called. On July 18, the Braves were dead last in the eight-team National League, but they were 51-16 (.761) in the second half to win the pennant and then swept the heavily favored Philadelphia Athletics in a four-game World Series.
With Bostonians clamoring to see the Braves in September, the team moved its home games to Fenway Park that had 33,871 seats, three times more than the 11,000-seat South End Grounds where they normally played. They also completed "the miracle" there, beating Philadelphia in the final two games of the Series.
Once the Braves moved into Braves Field, that seated 43,500, they returned the favor, allowing the Red Sox to play World Series games there in 1915 and 1916. As late as 1946, the Braves were back at Fenway. The seats at Braves Field were painted for the start of the season, but they weren't dry for the first game, so many fans left with paint on their clothes. The remainder of the series was moved to Fenway to make sure the paint dried!
The Series
Other than the 1914 World Series championship in Boston and the 1995 championship in Atlanta, the only other World Series championship in Braves history came in 1957 at the expense of the mighty Yankees of Mickey Mantle and Yogi Berra.
Lou Burdette, once Yankees property, pitched three complete game victories to the tune of an 0.67 ERA and earned Series MVP honors. Hank Aaron led all hitters on both teams with a .393 average, and when Berra told him at home plate that the trademark on his bat wasn't facing up, Aaron replied, "I didn't come up there to read."
The Braves applied the final and most-painful blow to the proud Yankees by winning Game 7 at Yankee Stadium, 5-0, behind Burdette's second shutout in 72 hours.
The Managers
Here are several interesting managerial connections between the Braves and Yankees, not the least of which is Bobby Cox, who originally signed as a player with the Yanks and played ad managed for them in the Minors, as well as played and coached for them in the Majors. In fact, the Braves originally hired him from the Yankees in 1978.
Hall of Famer Casey Stengel managed both the Braves and the Yankees, the latter with considerably more success than he had with the Braves (373-491, .432 from 1938-43). He won 10 pennants and seven World Series with the Yankees in a span of just 12 years.
Another man to manage both teams is current Dodgers manager Joe Torre. He followed Cox's first term as Braves manager, taking over in 1982 and immediately winning a division title. He brought Atlanta in second the next two seasons, but that wasn't good enough for owner Ted Turner, who dismissed him. From 1996-2007, Torre won six pennants and four World Series for the Yankees.
The Trades
The Yankees got the best of the Braves in the World Series three times -- 1958, 1996 and 1999. But the Braves can take some solace in the fact that they outfoxed the Yankees in two of the better trades in franchise history.
On Aug. 30, 1951, the Braves sent Johnny Sain, one of the best right-handers they ever employed to the Yankees in exchange for Lou Burdette. Sain was well past his prime, though he did give the Yankees a couple of years of good service, mainly as a reliever. Burdette, who had just 1 1/3 innings of Major League service at the time, became one of the finest right-handers in Braves history, not to mention the greatest World Series hero in franchise history.
Ten years before that deal, on Dec. 9, 1941, the Braves acquired outfielder Tommy Holmes, who had no big league experience, in exchange for first baseman Buddy Hassett and outfielder Gene Moore. Hassett and Moore were practically finished, but Holmes became a Braves Hall of Famer who held the NL record with a 37-game hitting streak until Pete Rose broke it in 1978.
This article appears in ChopTalk magazine. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
