Red Sox fans who have loved their trip down memory lane with the Netflix documentary “The Comeback” can thank the Yankees.
No, not just because New York became the first and only team in the history of professional baseball to blow a 3-0 series lead in the 2004 American League Championship Series. Although that certainly led to a good deal of happiness in New England.
According to The Boston Globe’s Dan Shaughnessy, the original plan centered around the best rivalry in sports. Shaughnessy, who was a central figure in the docuseries released this week, wrote this in the Globe on Friday:
“One last note on the Barnicle brothers’ excellent ‘The Comeback’ documentary on the 2004 Red Sox, which is now on Netflix,” Shaughnessy wrote. “Journalist/author Howard Bryant originally conceived of the doc as a series called ‘Superpowers.’ It was going to be about the Sox-Yankees rivalry in 2003-04, but the Yankees declined to participate, saying, ‘We don’t have rivals.'”
Is that not most the Yankee thing you’ve ever heard?
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The Yankees are represented, to a slight extent in “The Comeback.” To his credit, former New York manager Joe Torre is a prominent figure who helps tell the other side of the story. Other than that, though? There’s nothing else from the Bronx Bombers’ side, especially if you don’t count New York sports radio icon Mike Francesa.
Ultimately, having a three-part documentary devoted solely to the best story in New England sports history is probably the preferred outcome. That said, anyone who lived the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry of 2003 and 2004, specifically, can’t help but reminded of just how good it was for those two years. A documentary about it would have been fantastic.
Instead, the Yankees had to be the Yankees.
Featured image via Brian Fluharty/Imagn Images
