Red Sox Independence Day History

Written by: Jere Smith on 1st July 2009

Red Sox Independence Day History | read this item

The Boston American League team won its first Independence Day game in 1901, and hasn’t looked back since. The Red Sox have never dropped below .500 in their history of games played on July 4th. In fact, they won their first eight Independence Day games (four doubleheader sweeps) and broke out to a 25-9 record between the 1901 and 1919 seasons.

All the July 4th games were doubleheaders back then. It wasn’t until the 60s that teams stopped regularly scheduling twin-bills on the holiday. In the team’s 108-year history, the Sox have played 54 double-dips, the last one in 1973, and 44 single games, compiling a record of 89-63 on Independence Day. In ten different years, either due to Sunday laws, rain-outs, or work stoppages, the team didn’t play on 7/4.

Here are some more stats:

In doubleheaders: 17 sweeps, 28 splits, 9 times swept, for a 62-46 record.
Single games: 26 wins, 18 losses.
Overall at home: 50-25
Overall away: 39-38
Longest winning streak: 8 (1901-04, 1936-39)
Longest losing streak: 4 (1928-29)
Most runs scored, game: 19 (1948)
Most runs allowed, game: 12 (1939, 1940)

Team by team all-time:

[Team (# of games): record (first/last time faced)]

Phi/KC/Oak Athletics (53): 32-21 (1905/1987)
Baltimore O’s/NY Yankees (27): 17-10 (1901/2008)
Wash Senators/Minnesota Twins (25): 16-9 (1904/2000)
STL Browns/Baltimore O’s (10): 4-6 (1903/1996)
New Wash Senators/Texas Rangers (6): 2-4 (1961/2005)
Cle (5): 2-3 (1963/2001)
Det (5): 2-3 (1944/1991)
Chi (4): 2-2 (1992/1999)
LA/Cal/Ana Angels(4): 2-2 (1964/1994)
KC (3): 3-0 (1979/1995)
Mil (3): 2-1 (1976/1989)
Sea (2): 2-0 (1986/1993)
TB (2): 1-1 (2006/2007)
Tor (2): 2-0 (1977/2002)
Atl (1): 0-1 (2004)

From 1904 to 1933, Boston only played Philadelphia or Washington on July 4th, all doubleheaders. 51 of the team’s first 90 Independence Day games were against the Athletics. While the A’s never played the Sox as the Kansas City Athletics, they met in the team’s final year in Philly (1954) and their first year in Oakland (1968). Since then, the once-common match-up has only happened twice, with single games in 1984 and 1987. As for the Senators, they’ve only played the Red Sox five times since becoming the Minnesota Twins nearly five decades ago.

The first two years of their existence (1901-02) saw the Red Sox playing Baltimore, who’d become the New York Yankees in 1903. The Yanks wouldn’t play Boston again until 1934. But the teams have played enough times since to make the Yanks the Red Sox’ second-most common opponent. Boston has dominated the Yanks, A’s, and Twins franchises, by far their three most-played July 4th opponents.

Others among the original eight American League teams didn’t play the Sox for a long time. The first match-up with Detroit wasn’t until 1944. With Cleveland, 1963. And, amazingly, the Red Sox and White Sox didn’t play on July 4th until 1992, and have not met since 1999. Only once in 108 years have the White Sox come to Boston on Independence Day. The same can be said of the Indians, who have only come to Fenway once, in 1970. The Tigers have only played the Sox in 1944, 1945, and 1991.

July 4th record by decade:

1900s: 12-4
1910s: 13-5
1920s: 4-12
1930s: 13-5
1940s: 6-9
1950s: 10-6
1960s: 7-8
1970s: 8-2
1980s: 4-5
1990s: 6-4
2000-2008: 6-3

Red Sox July 4th home run leaders:

Ted Williams: 6
Carl Yastrzemski: 5
Dwight Evans: 5
Bobby Doerr: 4
Jim Tabor: 4 (All in 1939! And two were grand slams.)
David Ortiz: 3
Lou Clinton: 3 (Out of only 49 homers for the Sox lifetime.)
George Scott: 3

Besides Ortiz, the only active Red Sox who have homered for the team on July 4th are Jason Varitek and Mike Lowell, who have two each. (Note: We only have complete box scores from 1954 on, but I did check Baseball Reference’s home run logs for most Boston hitters from before then.)

A few notable July 4th wins:

1984: Jim Rice hits a walk-off grand slam in the tenth to beat Oakland, 13-9.

1939: The Red Sox score 35 runs in a doubleheader sweep of Philadelphia.

1979: Dwight Evans notches his 100th career homer, a walk-off blast that beats the Royals 6-4.

1948: The Sox score 14 runs in the second inning in a 19-5 rout of Philadelphia.

1911: Harry Hooper scores the winning run in the bottom of the ninth on a fly out. The perfect throw to the plate is dropped by Senators catcher John Henry.

1970: Both Conigliaro brothers go deep in a 5-1 win over the Indians.

1902: Cy Young pitches a 12-inning complete game, and the Americans score two in the bottom of the 12th to beat Baltimore (the future Yankees), 5-4.

1977: Boston hits eight home runs, seven of them solo shots, in a 9-6 win over Toronto.

The Sox take on Seattle at Fenway this Saturday, July 4th, 2009. It will be just the fourth Independence Day game in Boston in the last 15 years.

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Topics: boston red sox independence day history july 4th

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