Erik Sherman - Two Sides of Glory: The 1986 Boston Red Sox in Their Own Words

I thought I knew everything there was to know about the 1986 Red Sox. I lived with them all season, on the buses and in the hotels. I wrote a book on them. But all these years later Erik Sherman has taken a deeper dive, and the result is enlightening. Two Sides of Glory is the final word on Bostons most star-crossed team.

Dan Shaughnessy, author of One Strike Away and The Curse of the Bambino

In many ways 1986 defined Red Sox history from 1918 to 2004. After Game Six, I took the elevator down, and when the door opened, there was Mike Torrez, who shouted, Im off the hook! It was the year Roger Clemens exploded, Bruce Hurst was a ballast, Bill Buckner limped bravely, and David Henderson took the region. I have always believed they would have won had Tom Seaver not gotten hurt. But he did, and Erik Sherman has captured the voices from an unforgettable season.

Peter Gammons, J. G. Taylor Spink Award recipient and author of Beyond the Sixth Game

In baseball as in life, theres a compelling poignancy to the near miss. Does it haunt you? Does the hurt fade away? How does it shape the rest of your life? In Two Sides of Glory Erik Sherman lets the 1986 Boston Red Sox give us those answers, visiting the stars of that unforgettable seasonWade Boggs, Roger Clemens, Dwight Evans, Jim Rice, and morefor a fascinating series of intimate portraits of the men who came within one strike of World Series glory.

Tyler Kepner, baseball writer for the New York Times and author of K: A History of Baseball in Ten Pitches

Erik Shermans interviews with the players are invariably intimate and always interesting, making Two Sides of Glory an absorbing read even for a baseball fan like me who has no sympathy for the Red Sox as an institution.

David Maraniss, Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist and author of Clemente

In a captivating collection of character sketches about the players from the almost-legendary 1986 Red Sox, Erik Sherman unearths the human side of these men in a way no one has ever done before.... It seems like every page has details that have never been reported.

Ian Browne, Red Sox beat reporter for MLB.com and author of Idiots Revisited

Erik Sherman

Foreword by Joe Castiglione

University of Nebraska Press | Lincoln

2021 by Erik Sherman

Foreword 2021 by the Board of Regents of the University of Nebraska

Cover designed by University of Nebraska Press; cover images: (top) Red Sox celebrating pennant victory Getty Images/Bettman; (bottom) 1986 World Series, Game 6: Boston Red Sox v New York Mets Getty Images/Boston Globe.

All rights reserved.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Sherman, Erik, author.

Title: Two sides of glory: the 1986 Boston Red Sox in their own words / Erik Sherman; foreword by Joe Castiglione.

Description: Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, [2021]

Identifiers: LCCN 2020018145

ISBN 9781496219329 (hardback)

ISBN 9781496225337 (epub)

ISBN 9781496225351 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH : Boston Red Sox (Baseball team)History.

Classification: LCC GV 875. B 62 S 54 2021 | DDC 796.357/640974461dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020018145

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

Dedicated to

Habiba, Alex, and Sabrina

and the memory of

my friend the great Bill Buckner;

long-time Red Sox public relations director Dick Bresciani;

and a young Red Sox fan, Arthur Remy, who left us too soon

Sometimes the greatest achievements in life arent what you accomplish; its what youve overcome.

Bruce Hurst

Joe Castiglione

When youve been broadcasting Red Sox baseball on the radio for thirty-eight years like I have, trying to rank the best or my favorite team over that time is as difficult as choosing among ones children. But I will say that the 1986 Red Sox, with Hall of Famers and should-be Hall of Famers, were right up there talent-wise with the magnificent 2018 World Series champions. And, at least up to Game Six of the 86 World Series, they had the same kind of magic as the 2013 championship team. But when it comes to a cast of characters with the grit, courage, and dignity of the 86 Red Sox, few could compare.

Nowabout that magic.

It all started on a cool April evening at Fenway before a sparse crowd when Roger Clemens stunned the baseball world with his complete dominance over the Seattle Mariners by striking out a Major Leaguerecord twenty batters. What was so amazing about that Tuesday night game was that Clemens was not pitching on his regular turn. He was supposed to pitch on that Sunday in Kansas City, but the game was rained out. Monday was an off day, so he had two extra days rest. Plus he was just coming off shoulder surgery from the year before, so he was a question mark to even pitch that game in at least a couple of different ways. But I had the sense early on that something amazing was happening.

Around the third inning of that game I said to my broadcasting partner, Ken Coleman, that Clemenss performance looked differentthat it could be a special night. After all, the Mariners werent even hitting foul balls; they were swinging and missing or taking strikes. Still, the Red Sox were losing in the seventh, 10. But Dwight Dewey Evans quickly changed all of that, hitting a three-run homer into the center-field bleachers off of Mike Moorethe difference in the game.

Quite honestly I thought Clemens would end up with twenty-one strikeouts after he struck out Phil Bradley, but Ken Phelps, the last batter of the game, grounded out to short. I remember Roger coming on the postgame show, and the first thing he did was look for his wife, Debbiethey were newlyweds at the time. Then he came on the air with Ken and me, and he couldnt have been more excited. Of all the things that had happened that year, Clemenss record-setting night was the biggest highlight of them all, and it set the tone for the rest of the season. But there were so many other things that happened that showed this team had some magic working for it.

Perhaps the craziest of them all took place in an extra-inning game in July against the Angels, when California led by three runs going into the bottom of the twelfth. With two outs sure-handed third baseman Rick Burleson dropped a pop-up that would have ended the game, allowing Donnie Baylor to reach first base. Baylor would eventually come around to score on a Rich Gedman single to tie the game. Then, later in that same inning, Dwight Evans would incredibly score the winning run on a balk.

Other examples that come to mind were when Marc Sullivan was hit in the butt with the bases loaded to win a game and when Mike Stenhouse walked to end anotherhis lone RBI of the season.

But the one that gets the most attention, of course, occurred that October. Ive never gotten such chills at a ball game as I did when Dave Henderson hit that home run in the American League Championship Series ( ALCS ) against the Angels. Ill just never forget the visual of the state troopers on horseback and the police dogs surrounding the field as sixty-four thousand screaming fans were about to go crazy. But Henderson hit the home run to give us the lead; then, after almost losing it in the bottom of the ninth, after the Angels had tied it and loaded the bases, we pulled it out in extra innings. Incredibly it was Steve Crawford, who was 0-2 during the regular season, who came in and got the win. Shag would also get credit for the victory in Game Two of the World Series in that marquee match-up between Clemens and Dwight Doc Gooden.