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Boston, Massachusetts The first time James "Lou" Gorman flirted with a Red Sox World Series championship, he nestled between his two female significant others on a raw night at Shea Stadium. To his left shivered a frail Jean Yawkey, owner of the 1986 Boston Red Sox, for which he was then general manager. With the Sox a single strike away from winning the Series, Mrs. Yawkey shared the front office worry that the team had not ordered sufficient champagne. To Gorman's right sat his wife, Mary Lou, gripping his hand with a white-knuckle clutch in those minutes before all thoughts of celebratory toasts vanished between Bill Buckner's legs. "To tell you the truth, I never did care for champagne that much, and liked it less after that night," said Gorman, now 79 and still in the Red Sox organization as an executive consultant. Gorman joined the Red Sox in 1984 as vice president of baseball operations and general manager, a position he held through the 1993 season. Since that time he has been a consultant for public affairs with an emphasis on community projects, plus coordinator of the Red Sox Hall of Fame, which began in 1994.  Lou Gorman at Fenway Park As GM, Gorman led the Red Sox to three postseason appearances, including the 1986 AL pennant, Eastern Division titles in 1988 and 1990 and six winning seasons in 10 years. But his bond with the Red Sox began when he was a kid from South Providence, Rhode Island. "My father brought me to Fenway for the first time when I was about 10, and after the game I remember waiting outside and seeing the players come out: Johnny Pesky, Dom DiMaggio, Bobby Doerr and Ted Williams," said Gorman. Gorman himself had but a single afternoon in uniform in that ballyard from whose box seats he's since watched thousands of games. As a hot high school prospect from Providence, he suited up for a New England High School All-Star team at Fenway against the city of Boston's best. "The game was sponsored by the Hearst Newspapers. Two players would go on to the Polo Grounds for a major league tryout. I played first, and so did the great Harry Agganis. He went to New York and I was an alternate," Gorman recalled. "But after the game, Ted Williams took me aside and told me to go get my bat. He picked it up and said he liked my swing, but said the bat was just too heavy for me. I was walking on air. Imagine, Ted Williams liked my swing." Gorman spent a brief time playing in the Phillies farm system, but sweet swing or not, he couldn't put up major league offensive numbers and was cut. His minor league comeback ended one summer in New Hampshire when a kid named Don Drysdale confirmed what Gorman already knew. "I couldn't hit a curveball to save my life. That's 50-some-odd years ago, and you can still feel it in the gut," Gorman said of being released. "And so when it's your time as a GM to tell a Jim Rice or a Dwight Evans it's time to hang up the spikes, you have an idea of what's inside of them, too." Gorman's on-going 44-year career in professional baseball, including his time as Red Sox GM and front office posts building the New York Mets, Seattle Mariners and Kansas City Royals, dovetailed with 34 years as an officer in the Naval Reserve. He had two full tours in Korea and retired as a captain. He credits his military service as the underpinning of his approach to baseball. "You try to remember that it's not about you, it's about the well-being of your unit, and in baseball, the success of the game itself," said Gorman.
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