This topic is generating some thoughtful responses:

David,
First off, Im a long time reader and admirer of your blog. Just so you know, I am an avid Atlanta Braves fan. My roommate, lives and dies for Boston Red Sox baseball. All year I hear Jaron lament about how the Yankees, “are buying another World Series”, etc.. Im not going to insult your intelligence by discussing the fact that a majority of the Yankees payroll is comprised of home-grown talent or talent obtained through a trade. However, I do have a problem with the Boston president pouting about the Yankees. In my mind, the Red Sox are no worse than the Yankees. IN FACT, at least the majority of the Yankees “super-star” talent came from their own system (Posada, Jeter, Petite, Rivera, Soriano, Williams). Granted, Varitek and Garciaparra are “theirs”. However: Pedro, Manny and Damon are all players which were the result of free agency.
Maybe a team like Pittsburgh has the right to complain about the Yankees. But not an organization whose payroll was well over 100 million last year.
Furthermore, the owners are the ones who are allowing foreign players to go to the highest bidder. From what I understand, a worldwide draft was something the players association was not all that opposed to.
Alas, I think the Red Sox organization is just already making excuses for another season of falling short.
Just my opinion.
Thanks,
Doug Childers

I’d just point out that Varitek was the result of a trade. I believe it was Slocumb for Varitek and Lowe, maybe the greatest trade the Red Sox have made in my lifetime. I think Doug’s point about making excuses is correct, however.
I’d suggest there’s something else at work here also. When I was an undergraduate at Harvard, I would sometimes meet people who had an association with Yale, but were experiencing Harvard for first time. I heard more than one of them say, “All Yale people talk about is Harvard, but no one at Harvard seems to talk about Yale.” In my experience, that seems to be the telling the difference between the best and the 2nd best; a measure of confidence. Harvard doesn’t talk about Yale, because they don’t have to worry about being #1. Yale tries hard to show they are just as good by making comparisons. If you have to compare yourself to someone, you immediately make people think about the other group or person. If Yale really wanted to be #1, they’d change
“Our history department is as good as Harvard’s.”
to
“We have the best history department in the country.”
My point, of course, is that the Red Sox are the Yale of the AL. They’re really good. Most cities would love to have a team that good year after year. But instead of talking about how good the team is, they just keep comparing themselves to the Yankees. It’s time for them to stop worrying about the Yankees and start thinking about how to put the best team they can find on the field.
Correction: Fixed my to by.