“In my case,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora quipped Tuesday afternoon, “I always say we’ve all been in the hangover part of it, and it’s not because we won a championship. It’s because we had a few extra pops the night before.”
I happen to believe in the Hangover Effect, the affliction that plagues many a World Series champion the subsequent year as a result of the mental and physical toll that winning it all takes on a club. Of course, I possess zero rings to Cora’s three, and he isn’t buying it as an explanation for the 6-11 record his reigning Red Sox brought into Yankee Stadium — their first time there since eliminating the Yankees in last year’s American League Division Series.