November 2013 Editor's Note
Why the Red Sox are in the playoffs
Some people are tone deaf. Others are color blind. I suffer from a more serious malady. I’m congenitally sports dumb. as long as I can remember i’ve been forced to smile and nod while sports enthusiasts carry on about victory, defeat and blood rivalry — without a clue in my mind as to why they care so much.
That being said as editor of New Hampshire Magazine I am more than happy to take credit for the recent historic turnaround of the Boston Red Sox. After all, it was under my watch (smiling and nodding all along) that we published our April issue cover story on Red Sox NHation, “Believe Again?" (April 2013). From what I’ve been made to understand about the sensitive balances in the sports universe (and particularly in the mystic realm of baseball) it is just such subtle actions (like rubbing a lucky but otherwise worthless NH highway toll token) that can sway the fates in your favor.
When we explored the deep and abiding roots of Red Sox fandom and the high branches of Red Sox management that exist in the Granite State, the fates swayed and apparently fell like a ninth-inning, high-fly ball bouncing off the Green Monster into the waiting glove of Carl Yastrzemski (who I just learned from Wikipedia is considered to be the most beloved Sox left-fielder of all time, but don’t hold me to that).
As this issue goes to press, the Sox, operating once again in their full-blown idiot mode (now accented by hillbilly beards), are in the playoffs. By now they might be wrapping up their turn-around season in the World Series. There is no non-supernatual explanation for this, so before all the credit is sucked up by lucky-token rubbers, I’m staking a claim.
Of course, you could say that victories like this are simply proof that the Red Sox (and New Englanders in general) thrive on being underestimated. That’s true and it may help explain why sports dynasties, like the one held by the New England Patriots for a few seasons, seem to crumble the minute you take them for granted.
Having already confessed to my sport-related know-nothingness, I won’t embarrass myself with any predictions on the football season, but with 20/20 hindsight I declare the rise of the Red Sox forever bound to this magazine.
Naturally I share the glory with some of my more sports-alert colleagues here: Assistant Editor Erica Thoits, former Art Director J Porter and writer Darren Garnick who originally pitched that story to us. I’m sure that their giddy spirits during the Sox upward swing helped, but there’s little doubt that it was the involvement of me, a complete muggle in the Fenway Hogwarts, that truly turned the tide in favor of our Bostonian Band of Brothers.
You’re welcome.
