How the Yankees Became Baseball’s Most Improbable Underdogs
The Red Sox’s ALDS victory completes the archrivals’ role reversal.
Bucky Dent threw out the first pitch. Aaron Boone assumed his managerial perch in the home-team dugout. And in an agonizing ninth inning—as Craig Kimbrel hunched over the mound, the New York Yankees loaded the bases, and fans watched breathlessly—Babe Ruth seemed to wink at the Red Sox from his plaque in Monument Park.
But try as they might, the ghosts of Octobers past didn’t haunt the Red Sox on Tuesday.
It took four games for the Sox to put away the Yankees, and despite a less-than-dominant start in Games One and Two at home, Boston punched its ticket to the American League Championship Series in this year’s divisional title: the Bronx.
