The Doctor Who Saved Boston

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The Doctor Who Saved Boston

The memories of the Red Sox run to the 2004 World Series championship this year will remain in the minds of Sox fans forever.

Whether it is David Ortiz’s walk off performances against the Angels and Yankees, Manny Ramirez’s tape measure home runs, or Derek Lowe winning the clinching games of all three playoff series, Red Sox nation will not soon forget the memories that the “bunch of idiots,” as centerfielder Johnny Damon dubbed this year’s Sox club,provided them, nor will they forget the Sox all out assault on baseball and Boston sports history.

But of all the images the fans retain, of all the feelings they experienced, of all the heroes Sox nation put on an altar and worshipped - the most memorable has to be Curt Schilling pitching three games on an inured ankle, blood from broken sutures seeping through his sock and a look of obvious discomfort on his face, winning two, and capturing the heart’s of every member of Red Sox nation.

But to understand the elation of the Nation and the reason that it has turned Curt Schilling into a God in the church that Cy Young, Ted Williams, and Carl Yaztremski built, we have to take a step back and remember the predicament that the Red Sox were in just over two months ago.

It was October 12, and the Yankees had beaten the Red Sox in Game one of the ALCS. It was only one game, but that familiar feeling was back. That familiar feeling that Red sox fans have of doom and gloom lingering just over the horizon returned.

Curt Schilling, the hired gun, the man who Sox management had brought in to beat the Yankees in just this situation, had not only lost the game, but looked utterly ineffective in doing so, allowing six runs in just three innings of work a...

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... 55,000 people from New York shut up.” But in the end he was so much more than just a hired gun, he was a hero in real red socks. And he made more than 55,000 people from Boston stand up and applaud as he became the newest Red Sox player to be canonized in the church of Red Sox nation, alongside Yaz, the Kid, Pudge and Cy.

And not to be forgotten is the man behind the scenes, the quiet and unassuming surgeon who made it all possible, Dr. William Morgan, whose name will be forever linked to Curt Schilling, the Red Sox and the 2004 World Series. He may not have thrown a pitch or swung a bat, but William Morgan saved the 2004 Boston Red Sox from being another team that just missed. And he saved Red Sox fans from finally having to utter those awful words – “wait ‘til next year.” But because of Bill Morgan and the entire Red Sox medical staff, next year is this year.

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