Читать книгу Rage. The Legend of "Baseball Bill" Denehy онлайн

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The Boston Red Sox had offered me $25,000, much lower than I expected. For some reason, I never felt a connection with the Red Sox. If only Bots Nekola had followed through. My Aunt Jody, a die-hard Red Sox fan, was heartbroken. Until the day she died, Aunt Jody wanted me to be a Red Sox.

I turned down Boston because several of their starting players did not take the field for infield practice before a game against the Yankees. I was in the Red Sox clubhouse when it was time for the Sox to take infield practice. First baseman Dick Stuart, the worst-fielding first baseman I ever saw, should have taken infield practice every day, but that’s not the kind of player he was. I had the impression that the Red Sox didn’t care about winning. And since winning was an important part of my psyche, it was easy to cross the Red Sox off my list.

Harry Hesse, the head New England scout for the Yankees, came in with an even lower offer—$15,000—and he wouldn’t go any higher.

Harry told me, “You’re going to get a World Series check every year.” Harry turned out to be very wrong about that. This was the fall of 1964, and the Yankees, having just been purchased by CBS, wouldn’t see the World Series again until 1976.