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'78: The Boston Red Sox, A Historic Game, and a Divided City
The thrilling inside story behind a crucial chapter in Red Sox lore—and a turbulent time in a troubled city.
George Steinbrenner called it the greatest game in the history of American sports. On a bright October day in 1978, the Boston Red Sox met the New York Yankees for an epic playoff game that would send one team to the World Series, and render the other cursed for almost a quarter of a century.
In this book, award-winning sports columnist Bill Reynolds masterfully tells the story of the team and the players at this pivotal moment. This cultural history takes readers through the social issues that divided Boston that summer, and masterfully depicts their influence on one game beyond the realm of sports.
George Steinbrenner called it the greatest game in the history of American sports. On a bright October day in 1978, the Boston Red Sox met the New York Yankees for an epic playoff game that would send one team to the World Series, and render the other cursed for almost a quarter of a century.
In this book, award-winning sports columnist Bill Reynolds masterfully tells the story of the team and the players at this pivotal moment. This cultural history takes readers through the social issues that divided Boston that summer, and masterfully depicts their influence on one game beyond the realm of sports.
320 pages, Hardcover
First published February 21, 2009
11 people are currently reading
112 people want to read
About the author
Bill Reynolds
87 books14 followersBill Reynolds is a sports columnist for The Providence Journal and the author of several previous books, including Fall River Dreams and (with Rick Pitino) the #1 New York Times bestseller Success Is a Choice. He lives in Providence, Rhode Island."
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
March 7, 2010
There are a couple things you can do to really piss off someone from Boston. You can tell them you're a Laker fan. You can tell them that Tom Brady's tuck rule call really WAS a fumble. But if you really want to enrage someone from Boston just say two words--Bucky Dent. Or three words if you're from Boston since he's known there as Bucky Fucking Dent.
This book by Bill Reynolds chronicles the 163rd game of the 1978 season between the Red Sox and Yankees that determined the AL East winner. Reynolds also does a good job describing not only the game, but the climate that existed in Boston during 1978, most specifically the busing crisis that took place from 1974 and continued through 1978.
All the classic names are in this book--Yaz, Reggie, Jim Rice, Munson, The Goose, Lynn, Fisk, the Spaceman, and of course, Dent. Most people believe that Dent hit his homerun in the ninth inning and it was a walkoff. That's what time has done to this game. In fact, Dent's homerun gave the Yankees the lead, but in the sevent inning. The final was 5-4, which means a lot of other huge factors came into play during the last three innings of this classic game. Reynolds does a good job getting that point across to the reader.
While the book is half about baseball, the other half is about the busing crisis that made Boston look like a racist city, which is basically is. Next time you are at a game at Fenway, check to see how many blacks are in the crowd. Hardly any. It's weird. Boston was the last to integrate in baseball by over 12 years, and they passed on Jackie Robinson and Willie Mays because they "weren't good enough" to play in the majors. Can you imagine Mays playing for ten years with Ted Williams? Maybe there wouldn't be a curse talk in 2003 if that had happened. While Boston was the last to integrate in baseball, it should be noted that the Celtics were the first to have five black players on the court for an NBA game, and they had the first black NHL players. Of course, all this occured 12 years after Robinson broke the color barrier, so I'll let the reader debate whether Boston is a racist city or not.
A good book for anyone that is a fan of baseball or just Boston in general.
This book by Bill Reynolds chronicles the 163rd game of the 1978 season between the Red Sox and Yankees that determined the AL East winner. Reynolds also does a good job describing not only the game, but the climate that existed in Boston during 1978, most specifically the busing crisis that took place from 1974 and continued through 1978.
All the classic names are in this book--Yaz, Reggie, Jim Rice, Munson, The Goose, Lynn, Fisk, the Spaceman, and of course, Dent. Most people believe that Dent hit his homerun in the ninth inning and it was a walkoff. That's what time has done to this game. In fact, Dent's homerun gave the Yankees the lead, but in the sevent inning. The final was 5-4, which means a lot of other huge factors came into play during the last three innings of this classic game. Reynolds does a good job getting that point across to the reader.
While the book is half about baseball, the other half is about the busing crisis that made Boston look like a racist city, which is basically is. Next time you are at a game at Fenway, check to see how many blacks are in the crowd. Hardly any. It's weird. Boston was the last to integrate in baseball by over 12 years, and they passed on Jackie Robinson and Willie Mays because they "weren't good enough" to play in the majors. Can you imagine Mays playing for ten years with Ted Williams? Maybe there wouldn't be a curse talk in 2003 if that had happened. While Boston was the last to integrate in baseball, it should be noted that the Celtics were the first to have five black players on the court for an NBA game, and they had the first black NHL players. Of course, all this occured 12 years after Robinson broke the color barrier, so I'll let the reader debate whether Boston is a racist city or not.
A good book for anyone that is a fan of baseball or just Boston in general.
February 26, 2018
I have many great memories of my teams winning it all, whether it was the NY Giants (1987, 1991, 2008, 2012), the NY Yankees (1977, 1978, 1996, 1998-2000, 2009) or the NY Rangers (1994). NY Knicks, I'm not holding my breath waiting for you!
Of all these great memories, few can match the 1978 baseball season - when the Yankees raced back from a 14 game deficit to the Red Sox on July 19th, leading to a one-game playoff at Fenway Park on October 2nd. Most people remember this game for Bucky Dent's improbable three-run shot over the Green Monster, but there were lots of other big swings and great plays made by players on both teams, and the outcome of this game wasn't decided until the drained Yankees reliever, Goose Gossage, got Red Sox legend Carl Yastzremski to pop up.
Bill Reynolds does a great job of not only capturing all the drama and excitement of this epic game, but also setting it against the tension and division that the city of Boston faced as it dealt with an ongoing school busing controversy.
As Reynolds describes it:
"It had been four very difficult years in Boston, four years no one ever could have envisioned, four of the most ugly and tumultuous years in the city's long history. It had been four years of bleak newspaper headlines and TV stories and the perception that Boston was a racist city, all the residue of the worst school busing crisis in American history. Boston needed a great playoff game, needed something that could serve as a form of civic catharsis - needed the Red Sox, the one thing that had always had the potential to bring everyone together, if only for a little while."
If you're a sports fan - especially a Yankee or Red Sox fan - you'll love this book. Reynolds does a great job of setting the stage for the one-game playoff and describing all of the iconic players and strong personalities that existed on both teams: Luis Tiant, Jim Rice, Yaz, Carlton Fisk, Bill "Spaceman" Lee, Don Zimmer, Reggie Jackson, Thurman Munson, Lou Piniella, Mickey Rivers, Gossage, Ron Guidry, Billy Martin, George Steinbrenner, and many others.
At times the comparison between the busing crisis and the one-game playoff was stretched, mostly because the busing controversy lasted for several years, before, during, and long after the game was played. However, Reynolds makes a good case for how sports can unite a divided city and help people temporarily forget about the problems of their every day existence.
Of all these great memories, few can match the 1978 baseball season - when the Yankees raced back from a 14 game deficit to the Red Sox on July 19th, leading to a one-game playoff at Fenway Park on October 2nd. Most people remember this game for Bucky Dent's improbable three-run shot over the Green Monster, but there were lots of other big swings and great plays made by players on both teams, and the outcome of this game wasn't decided until the drained Yankees reliever, Goose Gossage, got Red Sox legend Carl Yastzremski to pop up.
Bill Reynolds does a great job of not only capturing all the drama and excitement of this epic game, but also setting it against the tension and division that the city of Boston faced as it dealt with an ongoing school busing controversy.
As Reynolds describes it:
"It had been four very difficult years in Boston, four years no one ever could have envisioned, four of the most ugly and tumultuous years in the city's long history. It had been four years of bleak newspaper headlines and TV stories and the perception that Boston was a racist city, all the residue of the worst school busing crisis in American history. Boston needed a great playoff game, needed something that could serve as a form of civic catharsis - needed the Red Sox, the one thing that had always had the potential to bring everyone together, if only for a little while."
If you're a sports fan - especially a Yankee or Red Sox fan - you'll love this book. Reynolds does a great job of setting the stage for the one-game playoff and describing all of the iconic players and strong personalities that existed on both teams: Luis Tiant, Jim Rice, Yaz, Carlton Fisk, Bill "Spaceman" Lee, Don Zimmer, Reggie Jackson, Thurman Munson, Lou Piniella, Mickey Rivers, Gossage, Ron Guidry, Billy Martin, George Steinbrenner, and many others.
At times the comparison between the busing crisis and the one-game playoff was stretched, mostly because the busing controversy lasted for several years, before, during, and long after the game was played. However, Reynolds makes a good case for how sports can unite a divided city and help people temporarily forget about the problems of their every day existence.
January 7, 2017
An interesting book about an era and an event that aren't necessarily related, that of the racial climate in Boston in the 1970s and the 1978 special playoff game between the Yankees and the Red Sox at Fenway Park. Boston in the mid to late '70s was racked with racial tension over court-forced busing in order to integrate the schools in South Boston. Reynolds does a pretty good back and forth detailing the history of the busing controversy and the players involved in it and then switching back to baseball. This was the era of the Bronx Zoo on the Yankees, Billy Martin already fired by the time the playoff game happened on October 2nd, but the Yankees that we came to know, (Reggie, Ron Guidry, Thurman Munson, Lou Piniella, Mickey Rivers, Bucky Dent, et al) are all profiled as are the Red Sox, (Yaz, Mike Lee, Luis Tiant, Carlton Fisk, etc.) led respectively by the stoic managers, (compared to the unhinged Martin) Bob Lemon and Don Zimmer. By 1978 the busing thing was winding down into sullen despair and failure, (most people had concluded it was a failure in what it wanted to achieve) and naturally, (no spoilers here since we know the drill) the Red Sox blow the game and lose; (they had led the Yankees by 14 games in June.) Not sure the premise of the book linking the two things are valid, but I enjoyed reading all of it.
November 21, 2025
I wrote a long, nice, thoughtful, balanced, detailed review of this and Goodreads crashed as I was about to click post and it’s gone. Goddammit, Goodreads.
I’m not writing all that out again but suffice to say, I really liked this, but with reservations. The baseball chapters are perfect. The busing chapters are well written but a little both-sides-y at times due to Bill Reynolds’ sentimental style. Bill Reynolds, one of the greatest sportswriters ever, was fundamentally interested in understanding where every major player in his story is coming from but not in criticizing anyone too harshly. That made him one of the best at writing about sports and other relatively unserious things. It also makes the chapters on race and Boston society of the 1970s a little… thin and undercooked. It is great, though, that Reynolds points out the hypocrisy that the white-flight suburbs were allowed to keep their all-white schools.
‘78 works best if understood as a sincere journalistic effort to lay out the facts of both the Boston busing crisis and the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry in the 1970s, while letting readers draw their own conclusions. To the extent there is a thesis, it is that sports’ cultural healing power comes from its relative meaningless and unimportance. And I think it’s a beautiful point to make, that people need unimportant things to care about.
I’m not writing all that out again but suffice to say, I really liked this, but with reservations. The baseball chapters are perfect. The busing chapters are well written but a little both-sides-y at times due to Bill Reynolds’ sentimental style. Bill Reynolds, one of the greatest sportswriters ever, was fundamentally interested in understanding where every major player in his story is coming from but not in criticizing anyone too harshly. That made him one of the best at writing about sports and other relatively unserious things. It also makes the chapters on race and Boston society of the 1970s a little… thin and undercooked. It is great, though, that Reynolds points out the hypocrisy that the white-flight suburbs were allowed to keep their all-white schools.
‘78 works best if understood as a sincere journalistic effort to lay out the facts of both the Boston busing crisis and the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry in the 1970s, while letting readers draw their own conclusions. To the extent there is a thesis, it is that sports’ cultural healing power comes from its relative meaningless and unimportance. And I think it’s a beautiful point to make, that people need unimportant things to care about.
July 7, 2025
A perfect book. Sports intertwined with learning about historical events.
Bill Reynolds intertwines the 1978 season of the Boston Red Sox, who saw a 14 game lead dwindle to a 1 game playoff with the hated and defending champions New York Yankees, snapshots of the Red Sox players background, and the forced busing in Boston that began in 1974, had quickly turned into a crisis and still had not settled by 1978.
I knew nothing of the mandated busing issues in Boston during this time or the key players such as Louise Day Hicks. I did know of the issues with Boston being deemed a "racist city" with issues as recent as 2017 with Adam Jones, outfielder for the Baltimore Orioles, accusing the Red Sox fans as being racist. But I never thought of the black players that were on the Red Sox during the 70s or, maybe more importantly, the ones who refused to come to Boston.
Though a little repetitive at times, this is a very solid book that goes beyond baseball and shows baseball and its players are impacted by events outside the game though spectators might separate the two, creating a paradox of sorts.
Bill Reynolds intertwines the 1978 season of the Boston Red Sox, who saw a 14 game lead dwindle to a 1 game playoff with the hated and defending champions New York Yankees, snapshots of the Red Sox players background, and the forced busing in Boston that began in 1974, had quickly turned into a crisis and still had not settled by 1978.
I knew nothing of the mandated busing issues in Boston during this time or the key players such as Louise Day Hicks. I did know of the issues with Boston being deemed a "racist city" with issues as recent as 2017 with Adam Jones, outfielder for the Baltimore Orioles, accusing the Red Sox fans as being racist. But I never thought of the black players that were on the Red Sox during the 70s or, maybe more importantly, the ones who refused to come to Boston.
Though a little repetitive at times, this is a very solid book that goes beyond baseball and shows baseball and its players are impacted by events outside the game though spectators might separate the two, creating a paradox of sorts.
July 11, 2017
It was a nice quick read that took three days. With regard to the game it chronicles, it's the standard style of going through the game and going on tangents of the individuals involved. In this case, it's interwoven, with respect to the Boston players, to the backdrop of the tumult that engulfed Boston in the middle to late 1970s with the controversy of busing. Players like Jim Rice, Bill Lee and Carl Yasztremski especially. I liked the book and these type of books in general. The author is a New Englander but shows no bias for the Red Sox or against the Yankees. The late innings are especially well chronicled as is the entirety of the Boston socio/political/cultural situation.
January 12, 2023
The research journey for my novel is heating up, thus I finally read the final 100 pages of this book. The book touched more on the tragic forced busing that caused Boston to erupt which was appropriate.
I was a teenager during an interesting time, but in '78 all the trouble over the last few years in Boston seemed so distant as I tried to find my way through high school in NH.
Insightful book.
I was a teenager during an interesting time, but in '78 all the trouble over the last few years in Boston seemed so distant as I tried to find my way through high school in NH.
Insightful book.
May 6, 2025
A different view of Baseball
I bought this book wanting to read about this classic game. Instead I got a book about how society in Boston was in 1978. I'm a long time baseball fan. I follow sports as an escape from all the political B.S. I was very disappointed in this book.
I bought this book wanting to read about this classic game. Instead I got a book about how society in Boston was in 1978. I'm a long time baseball fan. I follow sports as an escape from all the political B.S. I was very disappointed in this book.
November 17, 2017
Great read , really gets you to feel about the place and times.
October 25, 2020
Red Sox baseball, busing, amidst the backdrop of Boston in the 1970s.
January 30, 2017
This was an interesting book that discussed one of the most famous playoff games in baseball history while a tumultuous busing program was being played out in the background of the city of Boston.
Most, if not all, baseball fans know about the 1978 playoff game between the visiting New York Yankees playing against the home town Boston Red Sox. While this game was being played, Boston was amid a busing turmoil that was being played out in the media. The result of the busing issue, in its 4th year, was that Boston was being viewed as a racist city, comparable to any southern city during the civil rights era. The story intertwines the game and what is happening on the field and how the busing of African American students to white schools and vice-versa affected the city. Described in the book were violent protests that exploded the racial issues dividing the city of Boston. Much of the violence occurred between black and white students and spilled over to people being pulled from cars and beaten, along with men and women being beaten simply because they happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.
With this in the background, the Boston Red Sox focused on playing the game of baseball. Except for Bill Lee, who could be counted on saying anything and everything he could think of to be worthy of the title of “Spaceman”, most players, especially the black players, kept their thoughts to themselves. The fans of the Sox were fine with black players playing for the team, and would often cheer for them the loudest; so long as they didn’t have to live near them. It seems a little hypocritical, but then again it is easy to look back almost 40 years and judge others without having been there.
This is an interesting book that studies social upheaval in the late 1970’s in a northern city that was considered “the Athens of America”. Being forced into busing caused rifts and turmoil that is still being felt today. Race is a very intense issue in America, and was even more so back then. In addition to this add the sports furor that was the 1978 playoff game, the fact the Sox had a 14 ½ game lead in July and were now having to play this game, and you have one heck of story. I would recommend this book to those people who like to read about social history, and even those who like baseball – with the caveat that if you are picking up this book to read solely to read a baseball book, you may want to pass it by.
Most, if not all, baseball fans know about the 1978 playoff game between the visiting New York Yankees playing against the home town Boston Red Sox. While this game was being played, Boston was amid a busing turmoil that was being played out in the media. The result of the busing issue, in its 4th year, was that Boston was being viewed as a racist city, comparable to any southern city during the civil rights era. The story intertwines the game and what is happening on the field and how the busing of African American students to white schools and vice-versa affected the city. Described in the book were violent protests that exploded the racial issues dividing the city of Boston. Much of the violence occurred between black and white students and spilled over to people being pulled from cars and beaten, along with men and women being beaten simply because they happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.
With this in the background, the Boston Red Sox focused on playing the game of baseball. Except for Bill Lee, who could be counted on saying anything and everything he could think of to be worthy of the title of “Spaceman”, most players, especially the black players, kept their thoughts to themselves. The fans of the Sox were fine with black players playing for the team, and would often cheer for them the loudest; so long as they didn’t have to live near them. It seems a little hypocritical, but then again it is easy to look back almost 40 years and judge others without having been there.
This is an interesting book that studies social upheaval in the late 1970’s in a northern city that was considered “the Athens of America”. Being forced into busing caused rifts and turmoil that is still being felt today. Race is a very intense issue in America, and was even more so back then. In addition to this add the sports furor that was the 1978 playoff game, the fact the Sox had a 14 ½ game lead in July and were now having to play this game, and you have one heck of story. I would recommend this book to those people who like to read about social history, and even those who like baseball – with the caveat that if you are picking up this book to read solely to read a baseball book, you may want to pass it by.
November 1, 2022
Yankees still the worst and Boston still racist
July 18, 2015
This is exactly my kind of book. I love baseball, I love history, and I love back-stories. I became a baseball fan in 1979 so I am also particularly fascinated with this era; the Yankee championships that were and the Red Sox dynasty that wasn't despite an incredible amount of young talent collected in the mid-1970s. The book had every ingredient for me and Bill Reynolds more than did the job.
It is not simply about that one regular season playoff game in 1978, it's about everything leading up to it in baseball, Boston, and culture, and also its consequences. The game itself is just the centerpiece. Some may not care for the segues, but I love learning about details of pertinent people and regions.
A recurring storyline is the busing issues in Boston, whose severity I had never understood until now.
There are some minor errors. A few typos and a glaring factual error about Reggie Jackson (he went to Arizona State not Arizona!). I would have liked a few characters expounded on more, but that is nitpicky. It was a great read, I finished it over a couple days, and I recommend it for like-minded people.
It is not simply about that one regular season playoff game in 1978, it's about everything leading up to it in baseball, Boston, and culture, and also its consequences. The game itself is just the centerpiece. Some may not care for the segues, but I love learning about details of pertinent people and regions.
A recurring storyline is the busing issues in Boston, whose severity I had never understood until now.
There are some minor errors. A few typos and a glaring factual error about Reggie Jackson (he went to Arizona State not Arizona!). I would have liked a few characters expounded on more, but that is nitpicky. It was a great read, I finished it over a couple days, and I recommend it for like-minded people.
February 11, 2013
What fun ! A book about the Red Sox losing one of the better baseball games ever. While the Author stretches out the amazing 1978 Eastern Division playoff game between The Sox and The Yankees over the course of the book, filling out the story with unknown (to me) anecdotes (Example: When Don Zimmer later became Yankees bench coach, he once rented Bucky Dent's beach house for a season; finding the walls covered with photos of Dent hitting his 7th inning home run, he went around the house turning each photo so they faced the wall), he intersperses these chapters with the story of the ongoing busing crisis in Boston. Appropriately, the final two words in the book are "Bucky Dent".
Bucky attends most University of Florida home games as his son plays infield for the Gators.... Guess where I am taking my copy of this book hunting for an autograph.
Bucky attends most University of Florida home games as his son plays infield for the Gators.... Guess where I am taking my copy of this book hunting for an autograph.
November 1, 2011
A fascinating book detailing the playoff game between the Red Sox and the Yankees in 1978 set against the backdrop of the busing crisis in Boston. The book alternates chapters between a description of the game (complete with history of the players and other major characters) and a history of the busing crisis as well as a sociological look at Boston in the 1970s. It was well written, interesting, and well paced. It needed more pictures and the end seemed slightly forced. I think it would be hard to write a decent ending to a story that everyone already knows how it ends. A good book to read after reading Game 6.
August 22, 2014
While I found the sections on the busing controversy and pop culture of the mid 1970s very interesting, its discussion at times seemed very detached from the premise of the 1978 playoff game. While I understood the connection the author was attempting to make, this book was more about "A Divided City" than "A Historic Game." That's not necessarily a bad thing, just readers looking for the same-old, same-old about the 1978 baseball season is likely not going to be satisfied with this particular book.
June 5, 2011
Great mix of paralell stories. Heavier into the backstories on the baseball side, but the bussing stories mixed in well. No "moral of the story" here, but a well written, engaging read. Very enjoyable.
January 11, 2014
A look back at fond memories of the 1978 Red Sox...a team I loved as a 12-year old boy. Also, quite an education to what was happening in Boston at the time away from baseball..something I had not a club about growing up in suburban Connectiut.
June 20, 2011
very good detailed book
December 21, 2013
Love the BoSox, hate the Yankees and Bucky f-in' Dent, here you have the whole minute-by-minute story of that infamous season.
February 10, 2016
Great book that ties that epic summer from Red Sox history into the racial turmoil that was going on throughout the city at the time.
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews