Boston Red Sox: Biggest heartbreaks in franchise history
By Drew Athans
Red Sox lose 1975 World Series
After losing the 1967 World Series, the Red Sox spent most of the next several years finishing second or third in the American League East (divisions being added to Major League Baseball after the 1968 season). The closest they came to making the postseason was in 1972 when they finished a half game behind the Detroit Tigers.
That was due to the fact that the Red Sox played one fewer game than the Tigers caused by a players strike during the first two weeks of the season. None of the missed games were to be made up resulting in some team’s playing more games than others, hence the Red Sox coming out on the wrong end. In 1975, though, they left no doubt by going 95-65 and finishing 4.5 games ahead of second place Baltimore.
After sweeping the Oakland A’s, winners of the last three World Series in a row, in the ALCS, the Red Sox faced the Cincinnati Reds in the World Series. The Reds had already won two pennants in the 1970s but had yet to win a World Series in the decade. They won 108 games in 1975 and looked to be a formidable opponent standing in Boston’s way.
This World Series ended up being one for the ages and is still often called one of the greatest ever played. It was tied at two games apiece after the first four games and the Red Sox had one of the greatest moments in their history when Carlton Fisk‘s twelfth inning home run won Game Six and forced a deciding seventh game.
In a way only the Red Sox can manage, they lost Game Seven after having a 3-0 lead after five innings. The Reds came back to score two in the sixth, one in the seventh to tie the game, and one in the ninth to take the lead. Carl Yastrzemski, who hit .310 in the series, popped up to make the final out.
Making this one even more excruciating, the Red Sox had at least a one run lead in each of the four games they lost. That’s how close this series was and how close the Sox came to ending their then-57 year drought. It would be eleven years before they’d win another pennant and twenty-nine years before they’d finally win the World Series.