Yankees vs. Red Sox: greatest rivalry in sports

Baseball Digest, July, 2004 by Larry Stone

* Yankees win ALCS, 1993. In this era of wed cards and expanded playoffs, it has to happen eventually, and here it was; the first post-season matchup between these teams Feverishly hyped, it was something of a letdown with the Yankees enlistee in five games. But the Red Sox's win, in Game 3 at Fenway, was a classic of temporary gloating rights--Martinez and the Red Sox thumping Roger Clemens and the Yankees 13-1, as the Rocket allowed five runs on six hits in two innings leaving amidst a cacophony of jeers.

* Joltin' Joe vs. Teddy Ballgame, 1941. Two of the epochal achievements in baseball history occurred in this season--DiMaggio's 56-game hitting streak and Williams .406 batting average. The debate raged ever who would win the Most Valuable Player award, and when the writers spoke, DiMaggio had prevailed Not surprising, since Williams feuded with the press, particularly in Boston. The Yankees also won the pennant and the World Series.

* Famous brawls. Last October's dust-up that started after Martinez buzzed Karim Garcia, and Clemens came tight (but not very) to Manny Ramirez, was just the latest in a long line of hostility. The other combatants who have become part of the Red Sox-Yankees lore: Joe Cronin and Jake Powell in 1938; Jimmy Piersall and Billy Martin in 1952; Carlton Fisk and Thurman Munson in 1973; Bill Lee and Graig Nettles in 1976; and Martinez and Zimmer in 2003, among other.

* Mantle death threat, 1953. The Red Box didn't offer much resistance to the Yankees juggernaut in the 1950s, as New York racked up five straight World Series championships from 1949 to 1953 and eight of the 10 pennants in the '50's. According to the Hartford Courant budding superstar Mickey Mantle received a letter from Boston promising "death by a .38" if he showed up at Fenway for a Yankees-Red Box series in '53. "It would be better if you didn't bring your damn team to Boston," the letter concluded.

* Boston prevails, 1904. The first great New York Boston pennant race. The two-year old Highlanders later to become the Yankees got 41 victories from Jack Chesbro, still a record, and fought defending World Series champion Boston o the last day for the pennant but lust on Chesbro's wild pitch. The Yankees wouldn't contend for another pennant until 1920--when a slugger named Ruth led the way.

* Off-season 2003/2004. The rivalry was stoked to new levels of passion where Boston took dead aim at the Yankees by trading for Curt Schilling, signing Keith Foulke and doggedly pursuing Alex Rodriguez, But, horror of horrors, not only did the Red Sox strike out on A-Rod when the union nixed an attempt to restructure his contract, but the Yankees snatched him away--to play third base, yet--when a vacancy was created by a basketball injury to none other than ... Aaron Boone. The latest wrinkle an escalating war of words between George Steinbrenner and the Red Sox ownership group.