Starting the season in Japan when they did — the earliest Opening Day in major-league history — was supposed to help the Red Sox avoid the fatigue that dogged the Yankees for three weeks after they returned from their season-opening trip to the Orient in 2004. But the earlier dates are just going to make things worse for the Red Sox, who should be justifiably exhausted by the time they return to Boston on Apr. 8 for their home opener against the Tigers. By then the Red Sox will have been living out of suitcases for nearly three weeks.
The Sox left Florida on Mar. 19 for two exhibition games and two regular-season games against the Athletics. But instead of returning to Fort Myers to resume spring training, they flew directly from Tokyo to Los Angeles, where they will play three exhibition games against the Dodgers this weekend. Next the Sox will jump up to Oakland for a couple of regular-season games against the A’s, then fly to Toronto for a series against the Blue Jays.
When the Red Sox finally arrive in Boston, they will have been on the road for 19 days, making this one of the longest road trips in modern major-league history. While the Sox have been trotting the globe, spending about 38 hours — an average of two hours per day — in airplanes and living in hotel rooms, the players on the other 28 teams have been going back to their spring training condos every night, sleeping in a familiar bed and eating at familiar restaurants or enjoying a home-cooked meal. Even Oakland is already home, playing the cross-bay rival Giants in an exhibition series this weekend.
This schedule is unquestionably a hardship on the Sox. There are only two unusually long road trips I can remember in recent years involving a major-league team. In 1994 the Mariners were supposed to finish their entire schedule on the road after the Kingdome had to be closed on July 19 because of tiles falling from the ceiling. They played 20 consecutive road games before the the season came to a premature end on Aug. 12 when the Players Association went on strike, sparing the Mariners from the longest road marathon in history.
In 1992 the Astros were forced to take a grueling 26-game road trip from July 27-Aug. 23 while the Astrodome was being rented for the Republican National Convention.
I say modern major-league history because back at the turn of the last century, teams often went on the road for four weeks at a time and then played four-week homestands. Travel was by train in those days, and teams never had to cross more than one time zone.
Teams may get where they’re going faster in the jet age, but the road trips seem l-o-n-g-e-r.
