1918 World Series

1918 World Series
Team (Wins) Manager(s) Season Boston Red Sox (4) Ed Barrow 75–51, .595, GA: 2+1⁄2 Chicago Cubs (2) Fred Mitchell 84–45, .651, GA: 10+1⁄2
Dates	September 5–11
Venue	Fenway Park (Boston) Comiskey Park (Chicago)
Umpires	Hank O'Day (NL), George Hildebrand (AL) Bill Klem (NL), Brick Owens (AL)[a]
Hall of Famers	Umpires: Bill Klem Hank O'Day Boston Red Sox: Harry Hooper Babe Ruth Cubs: Grover Cleveland Alexander (DNP)
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The 1918 World Series was the championship series in Major League Baseball for the 1918 season. The 15th edition of the World Series, it matched the American League champion Boston Red Sox against the National League champion Chicago Cubs. The Red Sox beat the Cubs four games to two. The Series victory for the Red Sox was their fifth in five tries, going back to 1903. The Red Sox scored only nine runs in the entire Series, the fewest runs by the winning team in World Series history. Along with the 1906 and 1907 World Series (both of which the Cubs also played in), the 1918 World Series is one of only three Fall Classics where neither team hit a home run.

The 1918 Series was played under several metaphorical dark clouds. The Series was held early in September because of the World War I "Work or Fight" order that forced the premature end of the regular season on September 2,^[1][2] and remains the only World Series to be played entirely in September. The Series was marred by players threatening to strike due to low gate receipts.

The Chicago home games in the series were played at Comiskey Park, which had a greater seating capacity than Weeghman Park, the prior home of the Federal League Chicago Whales that the Cubs were then using and which would be rechristened Wrigley Field in 1925. The Red Sox had played their home games in the 1915 and 1916 World Series in the more expansive Braves Field, but they returned to Fenway Park for the 1918 series.

During the seventh-inning stretch of Game 1, the band began playing "The Star-Spangled Banner" because the country was involved in World War I. The song would be named the national anthem of the United States in 1931, and during World War II its playing would become a regular pre-game feature of baseball games and other sporting events. The winning pitcher of Game 1 was Babe Ruth, who pitched a shutout.

Although the Red Sox had just won their record-setting fifth World Series title, the 1918 championship would be the last Red Sox win until 2004. The drought of 86 years was often attributed to the Curse of the Bambino. The alleged curse came to be when Red Sox owner Harry Frazee traded the superbly talented but troublesome Babe Ruth (who was instrumental in their 1918 victory) to the New York Yankees for cash after the 1919 season.

The Cubs would not win their next World Series until 2016. The Cubs, who last won in 1908, won the National League but lost the Series in 1910, 1918, 1929, 1932, 1935, 1938, and 1945, allegedly stymied by the infamous Curse of the Billy Goat imposed during that latter Series. The Red Sox, who had won the American League but lost the Series in 1946, 1967, 1975, and 1986, finally won the World Series in 2004 and then won again in 2007, 2013 and 2018. When the Red Sox won in 2018 (against the Los Angeles Dodgers), they became the first team to win the Fall Classic exactly one century apart.

After Game 6, it would be some 87 years until the Cubs and Red Sox would play again. A three-game interleague match-up at Wrigley Field began June 10, 2005, and was Boston's first visit to the park. The Cubs would not return to Fenway Park for nearly 94 years until a three-game interleague match-up beginning May 20, 2011.

To date, Red Sox manager Ed Barrow is the only manager to win a World Series without previously playing in organized baseball, whether in the minors or majors.

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