#HOMEGROWN @REDSOX #FeatsofMookie #FeatsofAlexSpeier How the Red Sox Built a Champion from the Ground Up by @alexspeier Highly Recommended by @ManhattanPeachy #PeachyDeegan #WhomYouKnow
DAD this post is for you! xo
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It is unamerican not to love baseball.
And, it is unamerican to not love excellence.
If you are here, you love excellence! Whom You Know is really just Ever to Excel in other words and we are most obviously AMERICAN. Homegrown is an absolutely spectacular read for anyone that appreciates hard work, talent used strategically, and a well-written story. We rarely read other sports writers because we're not looking for direction, but Homegrown is essential reading if you are a sports fan at all. Once upon a time one of the classes Peachy took at Boston College was The History of Sports by the late professor Andrew Buni. He would have loved this book.
We write in green to honor the GREEN MONSTER. (Once Peachy wrote an article on the drink named after it at the Cask and Flagon.) We definitely aspire to meet that mascot someday.
If you have a pulse and have been following Peachy on Twitter for awhile, you will know that last year's World Series prompted beaucoup de tweets (especially with the totally awesome Mover and Shaker Gerry Brooks-read about him here) from her and her loyalty to the Red Sox is a real security risk in New York where she does wear all of her Red Sox hats, and has lived long enough to tell about it to read Homegrown. If you think we are kidding, there is Instagram evidence. If you also watched it all, you experienced total lack of sleep some nights that turned into early mornings, thorough appreciation of quality baseball, and, if you are also a Red Sox enthusiast, complete exultation at the result.
Don't you want to relive it? You will, through Homegrown. And, if you missed it, Alex gives you a unique opportunity to experience the wonder! How did it happen? They accurately identified potential (p.188). They took bites more bites of the young, ripening apple (p. 13) as opposed to the older, rotting one. But, that's oversimplification and just Peachy trying to draw you in. Homegrown is evocative of the high level of writing by the masterful Michael Lewis in Moneyball.
In addition to quality writing, Alex bases it upon quality research. An incredible amount of work went into getting all the little details right, and we love that it is in chronological order and tells a story backed up by facts. The overnight success achieved both in the book publishing and the championship winning most obviously do not happen overnight, and if you are human, you will find Homegrown inspirational.
Thorough is the name of the game and no aspect of building blocks or geography is overlooked. As you should know, Fort Myers is the homebase of Red Sox spring training, and if you are a Peachy you know that the Boston College baseball team always went there and trained with the Red Sox during BC spring break (do they still do that?) a la David T. Burns, Greg Fulginite, David Bingham and many more stars from our era under Coach Moe Maloney and his doggie Seamus. Peachy even went there in person to check this out once.
Speier also excels in word choice and we like his Hail Mary/Hail Mookie reference (p.102)...of course everyone knows the Hail Mary originated from Legend Doug Flutie...remember, we are still trying to educate all of the New Yorkers. He is a great storyteller and we liked hearing about Mookie and his uncle, and how the Red Sox installed a sleep room for naps. We are pro-nap and pro-sleep.
The photography in the center of the book adds depth and obviously color, and is just as worthy as the text. There is one grammatical mistake on p. 152.
Above all, this book capitalizes on the fact that success is about personal relationships and how people interact well: it's not who you know, it's WHOM YOU KNOW.
In the interest of full disclosure, you should know that way before Peachy was a resident of New York, she was: an intern at WEEI in sports promotion and happily regularly attended Red Sox games with them, an intern at WBZ CBS in Boston, a sportswriter for college sports at theAP in Boston, and is the only girl ever to write for Boston Baseball to our knowledge (thank you Mover and Shaker Mike Rutstein.)
Homegrown is Highly Recommended by Whom You Know.
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In one of the year’s most anticipated baseball books, the culmination of nearly decade of reporting, Boston Globe reporter Alex Speier reveals how the 2018 Red Sox, a historically successful team, were built. HOMEGROWN: How the Red Sox Built a Champion from the Ground Up (William Morrow Hardcover; On Sale 8/13/2019) tells the dramatic inside story of the assembly and ascendancy of the Sox’ remarkable young core. Speier, one of the most respected baseball reporters in the country, gives a captivating look at the challenging and sometimes painful transition over several years from a title won in 2013 on the strength of talented veterans to a different roster-building model, built around young, homegrown stars.
2018 was a coronation for the Boston Red Sox. They were the best team in baseball, and one of the best ever, tallying 119 total victories on their way to a World Series win. As Speier reveals, the team’s success was the result of years of patient planning and shrewd decision-making that allowed Boston to develop a golden generation of prospects, then build upon that talented core to assemble a juggernaut.
Speier has covered the Red Sox’ key players—Mookie Betts, Andrew Benintendi, Xander Bogaerts, Rafael Devers, Jackie Bradley Jr., and many others—since the dawn of their professional careers, as they rose through the minor leagues to become to become the heart of this historic championship squad. He also offers a never-before-reported window into the inner workings of the Red Sox braintrust over the last decade, as personnel control passed from Theo Epstein to Ben Cherington to Dave Dombrowski.
The 2018 Red Sox’ story offers insights for baseball fans of all teams, as well as anyone seeking the secret to building a successful organization as a fascinating window into how player development works. Why do many highly touted prospects fail, while others rise out of obscurity to become transcendent? How can franchises help young players, in whom they’ve often invested tens of millions of dollars, reach their full potential? And how can management balance long-term aims with the constant pressure to win?
Illustrated with a 16-page color photo insert, featuring exclusive photos of the players during their minor league journeys, as well as classic shots from the 2018 season, HOMEGROWN is a captivating look into how to build a winner.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Alex Speier has covered the Red Sox for the Boston Globe since 2015. Prior to that, he covered the Sox for a variety of media outlets for more than a decade. He has also reported on the Red Sox minor league system for Baseball America since 2007.
Follow Alex Speier on Twitter: @alexspeier
HOMEGROWN: How the Red Sox Built a Champion from the Ground Up
By Alex Speier • William Morrow Hardcover
ISBN: 9780062943552; E-Book ISBN: 9780062943576
Highlights of Homegrown Include:
Red Sox’ seven-year process of building a champion. Speier covers how the Sox assembled a historically young and homegrown group that became one of the best baseball teams ever. We learn the inner workings of talent identification and scouting, how minor league prospects are successfully “developed,” and then how a front office adds the final personnel ingredients in the last stage. Unlike other homegrown teams (and subjects of successful books) like the Astros and Cubs, who could engage in long-term gut renovations, the Red Sox faced a tougher mandate: cultivate a winner built around a young core while remaining successful in the short-term, a uniquely challenging dual-track approach.
Extraordinary access and reporting. The book is the result of nearly a decade of original reporting, following our key characters from the very beginnings of their professional careers. Nobody else could write this book.
A never-before-reported look at the struggles and growing pains of the Sox’ future stars:
· Mookie Betts struggled so profoundly at the start of 2013 that he considered quitting baseball—just before he emerged as one of the best prospects in the game.
· Xander Bogaerts was so riddled with doubt about his ability to contribute in the 2013 playoffs that he actually didn't want to be in the lineup even when his performance had made clear that he belonged in it.
· Betts faced such an uncomfortable environment among his big-league teammates after being called up in 2014 that he was actually relieved to be sent back down to the minors.
· Jackie Bradley Jr. was so skeptical of his big-league role in 2014 that, all season long, he kept his residence near the team's Triple-A affiliate in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and commuted the 50 miles each way. During a season full of failures, he spent untold hours on the road contemplating his struggles.
A compelling insider window on the inner workings of the Sox front office as it made personnel decisions. Speier examines the decision-making process, and the financial/statistical models, that resulted in Yoan Moncada becoming the most expensive prospect in baseball history, enabled the Red Sox to sign David Price as a free agent, and helped them put together a competitive package to land Chris Sale, the final piece for the championship squad.
A story of talent discovery. Never before has a book on the Red Sox offered this sort of inside look at scouting and talent assessment. (Few baseball books have done this, period.) We get to know the area scouts, follow them as they crisscross the U.S. in search of the next Betts or Benintendi, watch in the draft war room as they fight for “their guys,” with their own professional reputations at stake. We follow as the Red Sox make tough decisions on draft day, and then scramble to actually sign their picks, in one frenzied countdown to the midnight deadline (the Sox would need every second). In Speier’s telling, the story of how the talent that eventually became the 2018 Red Sox was initially assembled is a thrilling, human saga.
A previously unknown reason for the team’s dysfunction in 2017. In early May of that year, strain between Red Sox president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski and manager John Farrell boiled over in an episode in which Farrell essentially challenged Dombrowski to fire him. The disagreement was overheard by numerous members of the team. From that point forward, with everyone viewing Farrell's firing as all but inevitable, enormous tension seeped into the Red Sox clubhouse, and affected on-field performance.
A near tragedy. In 2014, on a bus ride in Florida, several Red Sox minor leaguers—including players who ended up being key contributors either as Red Sox or trade chips to the 2018 World Series winners—had a near-death experience when their bus ran out of control on a highway while returning from a game, highlighting the randomness involved in teambuilding, baseball, and life itself.
