It’s been a busy year and I haven’t been able to catch as many Red Sox games as I would have liked. Granted, the urgency has been diminished by two championships in the last four years after a near century of long-suffering from close calls and dramatic second-place denouements. The championship in 2004, which broke the slump, was highly cathartic and wonderfully expressed by this surprisingly sympathetic and understanding Nike (NKE) commercial. I cry every time I watch it. Since that 2004 campaign, I’ve watched the franchise grow in sophistication. …

As a Boston Red Sox fan (a long-suffering, loyal fan I might add), I’ve watched nervously Gary Sheffield‘s at-bats against my favorite team. Ever since moving over from the National League, he’s been a threatening presence at the plate against my boys from Boston, especially when he played for the hated New York Yankees. Only after John Henry, a wealthy hedge fund manager, bought the Red Sox and instilled a philosophy of scientific management based on sabermetrics did the Fenway Faithful enjoy the team’s recent dominance over the …