Shank's last column tries to hit on unfamiliar ground:
Watching the Red Sox from the front row of baseball’s alternate universe has been quite the trip, and other thoughts
A baby boomer who came of age in the counterculture late 1960s, I missed America’s troubling recreational teen drug scene. No psychedelics for me. Not even a toke of weed. I was always afraid Groton police chief Mayo Darling would burst through the door of my dorm room.
So now I wonder if watching the 2026 Red Sox is giving my aging peers flashbacks to their post-Woodstock, hallucinogenic experiences of more than a half-century ago? Is this what that was like? Profound sensory distortion? An altered cognitive state?
Seriously, folks. Since the end of June, Sox fans have shared box seats in the front row of baseball’s alternate universe. Go ask Alex (Speier). Up is down and down is up. Caleb Durbin is Wade Boggs and Ceddanne Rafaela is Reggie Smith. The team that couldn’t win is the team that can’t lose. With apologies to Grace Slick, the man on the chessboard is telling us where to go. White Knight Tom Caron is talking backward, and logic and proportion have fallen sloppy dead. Once 14 games under .500 and 15½ games behind the Yankees, the Red Sox enter Sunday within 1½ games of the Yanks and look like a sure playoff team.
