Fenway Park

Within a single week in April 1912, one icon of the ages sank and another rose.  The Titanic took its legendary dive just over a century ago, on April 15.  Five days later, the first crack of a baseball bat signaled a piece of history snapping into place at Fenway Park. The inaugural game at what is now America's oldest operating Major League Baseball park was 100 years ago Friday. The Boston Red Sox played the New York Highlanders, with Boston beating the Yankees' predecessor 7-6 in 11 innings.

Fenway Park 100,Dodger Stadium 50 The Boston Red Sox alumni took the field Friday, from Jim Rice to Carl Yastrzemski , from Johnny Pesky to Pedro Martinez , all in a graceful celebration of Fenway Park's 100th birthday. If Frank McCourt had had his way, the party never would have happened. McCourt tried to buy his hometown Red Sox in 2001, with a plan to build a new ballpark on his Boston waterfront parking lots. He had the right idea. Luke Scott of the Tampa Bay Rays took a lot of grief last week for calling Fenway "a dump.

With the World Series crowds gone, the housekeepers of Fenway Park have turned their attention from sweeping up the mounds of paper cups, popcorn containers and ice cream wrappers to preparing for winter. From taking the screen off The Wall in left field to replacing sod destroyed by the postseason media crush, groundskeeper Joe Mooney and his crew are readying the old ballyard for another cold New England season.

Within a single week in April 1912, one icon of the ages sank and another rose.  The Titanic took its legendary dive just over a century ago, on April 15.  Five days later, the first crack of a baseball bat signaled a piece of history snapping into place at Fenway Park. The inaugural game at what is now America's oldest operating Major League Baseball park was 100 years ago Friday. The Boston Red Sox played the New York Highlanders, with Boston beating the Yankees' predecessor 7-6 in 11 innings.

Fenway Park, the fabled ballyard celebrating its 75th season this year, opened in the Titanic's shadow and has been host to a team whose history is nearly as dismal. The ballpark's grand opening on April 20, 1912, did not even make Boston's front pages. The ocean liner Titanic's tragic sinking on its maiden voyage a few days earlier still ruled the news.

The year was 1912. The Titanic supposedly was unsinkable. The Philadelphia Athletics were considered unbeatable. So were the New York Giants. And a new era in Boston sports was beginning as the Red Sox moved into a new home--Fenway Park. On April 14, the Titanic hit an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic. The tragedy took 1,500 lives. Six days later, after a week of heavy rain, the Red Sox formally opened Fenway Park before a packed crowd of 27,000 fans.

If a New England philanthropist has his way, the Boston Red Sox will open their 1995 season by burning the contract that sent Babe Ruth from the Red Sox to the New York Yankees. Alan Shawn Feinstein, the Cranston, R.I., owner of the original copy of the 1920 contract that shipped the then-Boston pitcher to New York, offered to give the document to Red Sox management, if they promise to torch it at home plate of Fenway Park next opening day.

Fenway Park--land of the rising ERA, lair of the Green Monster, home to Boggs, Burks and Evans--has seldom seen anything like it: Back-to-back shutouts. By opposing starting pitchers. By Angel starting pitchers. And only five Boston hits in the process. After the rain that followed Chuck Finley's masterful one-hitter here on Friday night, Kirk McCaskill allowed the Red Sox all of four hits on Sunday afternoon. One Boston runner even ventured as far as third base.

Floyd Bannister, just like most of the left-handers in the American League, doesn't look forward to pitching in Fenway Park. The Green Monster that seems so close in left field is an inviting target for right-handed hitters. But the 31-year-old Bannister forgot his fears Saturday, retired the first 17 batters he faced and settled for a two-hitter in pitching the Chicago White Sox to a 9-1 victory over the Red Sox at Boston.

There are two ways to look at the Angels' seven-game trip to Toronto and Boston, which begins tonight against the Blue Jays. It couldn't come at a better time: The Angels just completed a 5-1 homestand in which they played nearly flawless baseball and are carrying maximum momentum east, which should improve their chances in cities where they are a combined 37-71 since 1996.

Boston Red Sox executive Theo Epstein agreed to a five-year contract with the Chicago Cubs, according to multiple media reports. Epstein, 37, would leave the Red Sox with a year remaining on his contract as general manager and take over what is expected to be an expanded role with the Cubs. The Associated Press, radio station WEEI in Boston, ESPN the Magazine and SI.com cited unidentified sources in reporting that Epstein has agreed to a deal. Details were still being worked out. Red Sox collapse at issue As the Red Sox disintegrated in what would become the worst September collapse in baseball history, some at Fenway Park grew concerned that the pain medication Terry Francona was taking after a half-dozen procedures on his knee might have been affecting his ability to manage, according to a report in the Boston Globe.

Boston Red Sox executive Theo Epstein agreed to a five-year contract with the Chicago Cubs, according to multiple media reports. Epstein, 37, would leave the Red Sox with a year remaining on his contract as general manager and take over what is expected to be an expanded role with the Cubs, who have gone 103 years without winning a World Series championship. Radio station WEEI in Boston, ESPN the Magazine and SI.com all cited unidentified sources in reporting that Epstein has agreed to a deal.

Terry Francona , the manager who led the Boston Red Sox to their first World Series championship in 86 years, is out after one of the worst months in club history. In a joint statement released Friday, the Red Sox announced they will not pick up the option on Francona's contract for a ninth year in the wake of the team's September collapse in which it blew a nine-game lead in the AL wild-card race. Owners John Henry , Tom Werner and Larry Lucchino acknowledged a change was needed and thanked Francona, who led the franchise to World Series victories in 2004 and 2007.

Dick Bresciani's favorite spot is a red plastic seat high above the left-field line at Fenway Park, where he has spent many hours alone, staring out at the diamond. He's been coming to Fenway for 60 years, and has found early in the morning before a game to be his favorite time. The stands are empty, there's dew on the impossibly green grass, and it's almost quiet enough to hear the ghosts of Babe Ruth, Tris Speaker, Ted Williams and the other Hall of Famers who played in the nation's oldest ballpark.

The Philadelphia Phillies' 2011 World Series championship T-shirts are not yet on sale. Crush the New York Yankees in free agency, though, and you're entitled to crow a little bit. Cliff Lee agreed to sign with the Phillies on Monday, and closer Brad Lidge was all but hawking World Series tickets Tuesday. When Cole Hamels is your No. 4 starter, behind Roy Halladay, Roy Oswalt and Lee, dream big. "I just keep thinking about how many wins we're going to get in the regular season," Lidge told mlb.com, "and how dominant those guys will be in the postseason.

The Angels are in such a funk that their inability to deliver a clutch hit is beginning to take a toll on their usually stout starting pitching, a fact that became evident in their 6-0 loss to the Boston Red Sox in Fenway Park on Tuesday night. With virtually no margin for error, Angels ace Jered Weaver "got a little too fine," words that Manager Mike Scioscia and Weaver used to describe the right-hander's five-inning, six-run, six-hit effort. "That could be a byproduct of us being stalled offensively, putting pressure on himself to make the perfect pitch and trying to strike everyone out," Scioscia said.

Some 40 minutes had passed since the Angels' frustrating 7-6 loss to the Boston Red Sox Saturday, and Troy Percival, who gave up the game-winning hit for the second day in a row, had vanished like an Angel lead. The Angel closer was not in the clubhouse, the training room or the showers. He was not in the equipment manager's office or manager's office. A search party was quickly assembled, team officials fanned out in Fenway Park, and within minutes, Percival went from lost to found.

ARLINGTON, Texas -- Not only is home-field advantage for the playoffs slowly slipping away, it appears more and more likely the Angels will open the American League division series next week in what for them is the most dreaded stadium in baseball: Boston's Fenway Park. The Angels lost to the last-place Texas Rangers, 3-1, Tuesday night, with reliable reliever Darren Oliver giving up three runs in the sixth inning for his first loss since Aug.

The lone Angels highlight Tuesday night came in the second inning, when Torii Hunter leaped above the five-foot-high right-field wall in Fenway Park to rob Boston Red Sox third baseman Adrian Beltre of a home run. It marked the 36th time, according to the Minnesota Twins and Angels — the teams Hunter has played for in his 12-year big league career — that Hunter has robbed an opponent of a homer, and the first time he has...

Tuesday through Thursday: at Boston Friday through Sunday: at Minnesota No American League team has been hotter than the Twins in the second half, and it's not hard to see why. Baseball's best-hitting team entered Friday batting .314 and averaging more than six runs a game since the break. Don't blame the Twins' new ballpark, though. Target Field is only slightly smaller than the dreary Metrodome, and although Minnesota has a much better record and a much higher batting average at home, the team has hit more than twice as many home runs on the road.