8 of the most hated Red Sox players of all-time
There have been plenty of players over the course of Red Sox history that fans have hated for one reason or another. Lets take a look at the worst offenders.
When anyone talks about players that Red Sox fans hate the most, generally the list starts with a bunch of New York Yankees. There are also some that either did something to crush Boston fans' dreams or disrespected the Red Sox in some form or fashion. Every team's fans has a list of guys that they hate for one reason or another...it is a tale as old as time.
However, there are rare cases where fans' ire turns to their own players. Generally speaking, most of the time this is due to a player making a lot of money and playing poorly. The smart money is usually to bet on that one. Other times it is because the player leaves in free agency in search of more money/out of spite.
There are also guys that are just jerks. In rare instances, guys can fit into more than one category and they have a special place of honor in such debates.
Here are 8 of the most hated Red Sox players of all-time
For the sake of clarity, there are going to be different types of hated players on this list. For some guys, it is going to be about the peak hatred they received even if time has begun to heal certain wounds. Not every player on this list is a universally terrible human being beyond redemption and not all of the hate directed towards them is rational. This is just pointing out guys who Boston fans for one reason or another hated (and in many cases continue to hate) a lot. Nothing more, nothing less.
Let's take a look at some of the most hated Red Sox players of all-time in no particular order.
Carl Everett
Carl Everett only played in Boston for a couple of seasons and his first season in 2000 actually went really well. He made the All-Star team and posted a .959 OPS in 561 plate appearances. He did struggle more the following season partially due to an injury, but he still put up a reasonable .761 OPS in 2001. He also very firmly did not believe in dinosaurs, but that is more funny than a reason to hate the guy.
So why is Everett on the list? Well, to be blunt, Everett wasn't well-liked by many people at all. He got a suspension for bumping an umpire which is a big no-no, had a very adversarial relationship with the Boston media, and is generally regarded as one of the biggest clubhouse cancers of all-time. A quick look at his Baseball-Reference page show that he never played more than three years with any organization and given his reputation as kind of a jerk, it is not hard to see why.
Babe Ruth
This one is rooted in the annals of baseball history. Very famously, Babe Ruth started his career with the Red Sox and when Boston's owner ran into financial trouble and Babe wanted to make more money, the Red Sox sold him to the Yankees. The rest of the story everyone knows. Ruth would go on to be arguably the best baseball player to ever live while Boston had the Curse of the Bambino placed upon them and had to wait many decades to find championship glory again.
This one does feel a bit unfair as Ruth certainly deserved to be well-compensated even back then and it was ultimately ownership's decision to ship him off to the Yankees. However, the sting of Babe being the centerpiece in probably the worst transaction of all-time is still too much for many Red Sox fans to ignore especially when they suffered so long afterwards.
Bill Buckner
This is a really tough one because Bill Buckner played pretty well for the Red Sox in the mid-1980's. However, he famously made an error in extra innings of Game Six of the 1986 World Series that allowed the Mets to score the winning run and force a Game Seven which they also won. The moment went down as one of the most memorable moments in World Series history and cemented Buckner as the face of Boston's failure.
What followed was pretty wild as the Boston media tore into Buckner and he received many personal death threats and threats against his family. His entire baseball career boiled down to that one botched grounder. Fortunately, this story did end up having a somewhat happy ending as Buckner was invited to throw out the first pitch when Boston put up their 2007 World Series banner and he received a lengthy ovation from the home crowd.
Hanley Ramirez
When the Boston Red Sox signed Hanley Ramirez to a four year, $88 million deal after the 2014 season, it was supposed to be a homecoming of sorts to where Hanley started his career. It was also hailed as a signing that could put Boston over the top as Hanley had played well with the Dodgers the previous two years when he was on the field.
Unfortunately, Hanley never really lived up to the billing of his contract as he slashed .260/.327/.450 line in 429 games after he was signed. He was a shadow of his former self defensively, his speed was gone, and he ended up getting released part way through the 2018 season. $22 million a season was a lot of money in 2014 and fans were not thrilled that it was going to a guy who struggled to be a league average hitter.
Roger Clemens
One surefire way to not endear oneself to Boston fans is to look like you are phoning it in and essentially try to wait out the end of a contract and that was what Roger Clemens did. The last two years Clemens was in Boston, he did not look to be in as good a shape and Clemens famously did not like that Boston viewed his next contract as playing out the "twilight of his career". Clemens refused to sign with the Red Sox again after the 1996 season and ended up going to the Blue Jays.
However, it doesn't end there. Not only did Clemens spurn the Red Sox, but he eventually would join the hated New York Yankees which is pretty much a black mark forever for Red Sox fans. Clemens also had a reputation for being an incredibly surly person to deal with and also has the cloud of rumored PED usage hanging over him. In short, he doesn't have a lot of fans in Boston at the moment.
Wil Cordero
Wil Cordero isn't a name that many Boston fans would immediately call out, but he deserves some special recognition. Cordero only played two seasons in Boston with one of those seasons getting shortened significantly due to a couple injuries. Not exactly what you want to see out of a former All-Star, but playing a couple meh season in Boston isn't what gets him on the list.
What gets him there is multiple domestic violence arrests including him pleading guilty to assault and battery of his wife in 1997. The rules for dealing with player misconduct were different back then and it is safe to say that given Cordero was arrested multiple times in his career, it is likely he would have been bounced from the league much more quickly if he played nowadays.
Johnny Damon
Johnny Damon was one of THE faces of Boston's return to glory in the early 2000's. Damon was a key cog in the Boston offense that finally ended the Red Sox's championship drought in 2004. Damon played well during his entire tenure with the Red Sox with a .295/.362/.441 slash line in almost 600 games in Boston.
However, Boston fans have never forgiven him for leaving Boston in free agency and going to the Yankees. It is one thing to make such a heel turn, it is another to do so after saying "There's no way I can go play for the Yankees, but I know they're going to come after me hard." Many Red Sox fans thought there was no way Damon would ever leave and even if he did, he wouldn't go back on his word. Well, apparently $52 million was enough for him to forget all of that and put on pinstripes and Boston fans haven't forgiven him for it.
Pablo Sandoval
Finally, we come to yet another case where a guy got paid well and did not play well in Pablo Sandoval. Sandoval was at one point one of the more beloved players in the league thats to his, um, relatable physique and style of play. The Red Sox signed Sandoval to a five year, $95 million contract with the hope that he could continue to be the sort of consistently strong and well-rounded player he was with the Giants.
Well, that very much did not happen. Sandoval showed up to camp out of shape and proceeded to put up the worst season of his career. After that, he dealt with shoulder surgery in 2016 that cost him most of the season and Boston eventually DFAed him in 2017 after he struggled at the plate yet again upon his return. Again, if you ever want to guess why a team's fan base hates a former player, the best bet is to guess that the team paid him a lot and he didn't do a lot.
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