As the Yankees hold hands, sing Kumbaya and make a blissfully
harmonious run at baseball history, their old American League
East rivals, the Red Sox, have been forced to turn their guns on
their own. At week's end the cast of Up with Pinstripes was
77-28, 14 games ahead of Boston and possibly cruising toward a
major league record for regular-season wins. Red Sox fans had
just two words for their gloating brethren from the Bronx: How
dull.
No such tedium exists 210 miles up I-95. Boston, which ended last
week with the second-best record in the American League, is also
on pace to reach the postseason, as a wild- card entrant, but, in
keeping with Red Sox tradition, sitting back and enjoying the
success is strictly forbidden. This summer's run for the playoffs
has been relegated to the undercard by the nasty bout between
Boston's best hitter and his boss.
Vaughn, once a most beloved player in Boston, is now
hearing boos at Fenway.
(David Liam Kyle)
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Slugging first baseman Mo Vaughn and general manager Dan Duquette
have been feuding more furiously than the voices in Albert
Belle's head, but lately the Vaughn-Duquette battle has reached a
new low and threatened the 30-year-old Vaughn's future with the
Red Sox. Vaughn will be a free agent at the end of this season
and had hoped for a long-term contract extension. Boston's last,
best offer to Vaughn—a four-year, $37 million deal—was rejected
at the All-Star break, exactly one year after the two sides
opened the negotiations. Vaughn's agent, Tom Reich, didn't even
make a counteroffer, and thus Vaughn suffered a big setback in
the interminable p.r. war. Once the most popular athlete in
Boston, he has been roundly booed at Fenway and mercilessly
flogged on the radio talk shows. In the clubhouse on July 16 he
unleashed an obscenity-laced pregame tirade at a Boston Globe
columnist, who was not even the one who dubbed him Mo Money. At
last, the tension seemed to be getting to the thick-skinned
Vaughn.
In a subsequent TV interview, an emotional Vaughn talked of an
alleged smear campaign waged by the Red Sox and charged that the
club had private investigators trailing him. Duquette denies that
allegation but does admit the club asked Vaughn to submit to an
evaluation of his drinking as a condition of a contract
extension. Vaughn, who flipped his truck on the way home from a
strip joint last winter and was later acquitted of
drunken-driving charges, refused and said he now wouldn't re-sign
with Boston "even if it was for $25 million a year." For
management's part, Duquette says, "We were concerned about the
use of alcohol in a potentially fatal car accident."
Of course Vaughn, who was hitting .333 with 27 homers and 71 RBIs
through Sunday, has always been more consistent when he hits than
when he talks. Last Friday night, one week after declaring his
Red Sox days numbered, Vaughn said, "I've been here a long time,
and it's been a good time here. I hope to continue with this
situation." According to his friend Mike Easler, a former Boston
hitting coach who is now managing the nearby Nashua (N.H.) Pride,
Vaughn would like to remain in Boston. "I talked to Mo recently,"
says Easler, "and he said, 'Mike, if they could just work out the
numbers, I'd stay.' He's torn. Most people think he's gone, but I
don't. He's a warrior, and right now he feels he's at war."
At a press conference on July 15 to celebrate the announcement
that Boston would host the 1999 All-Star Game, Duquette said he
was hoping righthander Pedro Martinez and shortstop Nomar
Garciaparra would represent the home team. When asked about
Vaughn, he refused to mention his first baseman's name, smiling
and saying again how much he was looking forward to the game.
Later he downplayed the potential impact of Vaughn's leaving as a
free agent, saying the Sox could get a "pretty good hitter for
$10 million."
"Dan wants little robots, not people," says former Red Sox
outfielder Mike Greenwell. "He once told me that it takes talent
to win and leadership doesn't matter. It's all about power for
Dan. Who's got more power, him or Mo? It was the same way with
Roger [Clemens] when he left."
If Vaughn walks, he would be the third former American League MVP
to leave Boston in three years. Clemens left as a free agent
after the 1996 season, and Jose Canseco was traded soon after to
the A's for pitcher John Wasdin, a borderline big leaguer.
Clemens and Canseco, now teammates in Toronto, continue to
bad-mouth Duquette and the Red Sox at every turn and have asked
Vaughn to join them on the Blue Jays next year.
Unlike Clemens and Canseco, though, Vaughn is in his prime and
extremely popular among his teammates. He's also Boston's only
true power hitter and a lightning rod for the daily media horde
in the clubhouse. The loss of Vaughn would leave a much bigger
hole than the ones left by Clemens and Canseco, who are both
having productive seasons in Toronto. Before this year's spate of
bad publicity, Vaughn was probably the most beloved
African-American player ever to wear a Red Sox uniform. The
battle between him and Duquette can only add to the widely held
perception that Boston is a difficult place for strong-willed
black players to find happiness.
"Dan thinks he can replace Mo, but it won't be that easy," says
Greenwell. "I had guys come up to me—people like Jack Clark, Tom
Brunansky and others—and say, 'How the hell did you play here
your whole career?' They didn't enjoy it at all, but I did, and
Mo does too. He belongs there. It would be a shame if he went
somewhere else."
Issue date: August 10, 1998
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