A little about me

If you're reading this first post, I'm guessing you probably already know me. But if not, I'll tell you a little about me. My name is Miles, and I am a freshman broadcast journalism major at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut. Well, I will be in 3 days. Writing a blog had always been something I considered starting in high school, but never had the time. I hope to find the time to do it in college.

As the title says, this blog is about the "Sox, Mets, and More." I was raised a Red Sox fan in Rhode Island, suffering through years of frustration and heartbreak with the generations of my family who had followed the Red Sox ever since my great-grandfather spent a September afternoon at Fenway Park for Game 6 of the 1918 World Series.

The Andersens, Herzogs, and eventually a McQuiggan, suffered through 86 years of a championship drought. My great-grandfather stated in his later years that he would "live to see the Red Sox win another World Series." He passed away in 1992, his guarantee not fulfilled.

But, while many Red Sox fans remember the game where Jason Varitek beat the crap out of Alex Rodriguez, or Dave Roberts clutch steal in Game 4 of the ALCS as the turning point in the Red Sox' run as lovable losers, it is a different moment in that 2004 season for me. On May 8th, 2004, the Red Sox played a Saturday matinee against the pitiful Kansas City Royals. I watched the game, not from Fenway Park, but from a room in Kent County Hospital with my two uncles, aunt, mom, and brother. My grandmother, by far the biggest Red Sox fan in our entire family, was lying in the hospital bed, hours before she passed away at the far-too-early age of 75.

In the 5th inning, Pokey Reese, the light-hitting shortstop, ripped a ball down the right-field line. It was at that point when the quirky dimensions of Fenway Park, coupled with possibly a little help from above, turned what normally would have been a double at best into some Fenway magic. Pokey hit second. Then he kept going. Hit third, and headed for home, in there with an inside-the-park home run.

The rest of that 2004 season is unforgettable not only to Sox fans, but to anyone who follows the game of baseball. As Doug Mientkiewicz closed his glove and leaped into the air, I fell right out of my chair. And I cried. My grandmother, the reason I was a Red Sox fan, had missed a Red Sox world championship by 5 months. Or maybe she hadn't.