Segregation Games: Boston, Busing, and the Making of Red Sox Nation

by David Faflik

Genres: Sports

181 pages, Paperback

Published May 1, 2026

Reviews

[Chris · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is about buying and desegregation in Boston and also about the Red Sox issues with racism and also desegregation. This book had a lot of good information, but would have been a better read if the author had given more background info and had better fleshed out ideas. If you're from Boston, a baseball fan, and/or a history buff I would recommend. I received a copy of the book from the publisher and NetGalley.

[Laura Bernheim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting and in depth history of the story behind busing in Boston told through the context of sports participation in Greater Boston, and specifically, the Boston Red Sox. The Red Sox, notoriously being the last team in the Major Leagues to integrate. A basic understanding of this aspect of Boston history is needed (both the busing and the racial history of the Red Sox) but there is a lot to chew on and to learn, here. I do think it's curious for a book that's focused on 1975 that there is very little about Jim Rice, who was a rookie that year (part of The Gold Dust twins with Fred Lynn). I realize that Rice declined to be interviewed for this book and that he shies away from speaking about Boston and Red Sox history in regarding to racism, but it would have been interesting to do an analysis of media coverage of Rice vs Lynn that year and Rice's relationship with the media. But this could be my bias as someone who grew up watching Rice play. Overall, I found the book fascinating, especially coming from someone who moved to the Boston as a young child in the late 1970s.
For a companion read, I suggest "Shut Out" by Howard Bryant. At its surface, it's about Pumpsie Green, the first Black player on the Boston Red Sox, but it's actually about the racial history of the Red Sox as a whole and Boston, expanding well beyond Green's debut. It touches a lot on busing and it's connection to the Red Sox.
For younger readers (or younger readers at heart), the middle grade novel, "Gold Dust" by Chris Lynch, which is about two school friends (one white, one Black) and their relationship with the 1975 Red Sox, amidst busing.
Thank-you to University of Massachusetts Press and Netgalley for an advanced reader copy of this book.

[J Earl · Rating 4 out of 5]

Segregation Games by David Faflikis a very well-researched and enlightening look at the dynamics around busing and sports, particularly the Red Sox, in Boston.

Some of this is hard to read, especially if you remember this period as well as someone my age does. I'm sure it is even harder for a member of Red Sox Nation to read, and I'm sure some will try to pretend this isn't accurate or it is revisionism (in the negative sense of the word since all history is revision, taking more sources and correcting older accounts that didn't have or chose to ignore those sources). But many of the sources are accounts of that time, including the perception within the Black community of the Red Sox organization and of many of their fans, so this isn't a writer connecting things that aren't related. Check your internal racism at the door.

Like all communities, even fractured communities such as Boston as a whole during this time, everything is related. Nothing, not sports, not shopping, not any government funded institutions, not even who can openly be friends happens in a vacuum. Both good and bad elements from each of these and more mingle in ways both obvious and subtle. Busing and sports as presented in this book is just one example from one city, albeit a major city and a major sports team.

I was less impressed with the writing style but the information was engrossing to the point that I could deal with an unengaging authorial voice. If you find the topic of interest, from the sports side, the history side, and/or the social justice side, I think you'll get used to his voice and get a lot from the book.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I see what the author was trying to do, and I think the book suffers from trying to do too many things at once while also assuming its readers to be deeply versed in all the various topics. Because of this, pretty much none of the book worked.

1) I get that it's entering an academic conversation, but to us non-Bostonians or uninitiated, trying to fit the racist history of the Red Sox (which I have a decent intro to) into the bussing crisis (which I don't have a decent intro to, despite going to a school with desegregation bussing in St Louis), was something I needed more background and direction from the author to do successfully. He merely talked about each thing next to each other, implying that his deductions were obvious despite him making very few explicit claims. Which leads me to...

2) The two subjects weren't put in conversation in any meaningful way. There's a chapter about one and then a chapter about the other. Occasionally locations are mentioned in both chapters? But no connections are made between the various chapters. When I worked at the writing center at my university, there was one professor who assigned a compare and contrast essay. Every year we had special training reviewing the assignment because to get a good grade you must NOT compare and contrast. Did that prof go to school with Faflik where they just learned incorrectly what a compare/contrast is?

3) Faflik tries to talk theory with the idea of "play." He either doesn't get it or the discussion was truncated in editing. Either way, it adds nothing meaningful the way it was handled.

So, unless this is very specifically your jam, leave this one.

[Nina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was a big fan of baseball, in general, and the Red Sox, in particular when I was in high school in the 70s. My sophomore year of high school was the year we stopped being able to take field trips to Boston, due to the busing crisis and the fears of parents and school officials that our (out-of-state) school buses could be the target of the rock-throwing attacks on school buses happening in the city at the time. Which is the long way round of saying that I was really interested in radio g this book.
While it’s well-researched, it is also very dry and academic, which I didn’t find engaging. If you’re looking for an academic account of the time, this would be a good one.

[Bookish Babe53 · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a book that explored how the Boston Red Socks, and the city of Baltimore allowed held tight to the ills of systemic racism, and allowed it to permeate inside and outside of the stadium. This is a part of the ball clubs and it's city that is not often talked about, heard of amongst those on the outside. This is a city and club that expected their Black players to show up and show out, no matter how they were being treated the the fans and the team, and the city at large.

Although, I learned somethings I never knew, I found the writing to be dry, and took me longer than usual to complete.