Red Sox Busy Making the Yankees’ Ears Ring

They remain Idiots, success apparently no obstacle for the Boston Red Sox, who returned from a World Series winter with their eccentricities undamaged by mere nationwide fawning.

Still crazy after all these weeks, the Red Sox on Wednesday banged out a full-squad workout, their first baseball without a whiskey pick-me-up since October, and paddled around again in the phenomenon they have become.

Now that they have their final-out baseball back, if not the man who took it, they did get around this week to the pressing issues of the ring ceremony, Alex Rodriguez’s lameness, Jose Canseco’s most-valuable-player plaque and whatever else whipped through their heads between fungoes.

To be fair, not all Red Sox players are untamed. Second baseman Mark Bellhorn, for one, is pretty quiet. “He’s a gentleman,” Johnny Damon observed. “The rest of us aren’t.”

Damon’s blond streaks haven’t even grown out, and already Manager Terry Francona has had to ask his men to lighten up on A-Rod, and the Red Sox brass has gathered here to determine the proper etiquette in presenting World Series rings.

They could have saved themselves the trouble and called the New York Yankees, who have become expert at it.

Instead, after the high-level meetings, during which they considered the wishes of their public and their players, and researched ring-distribution precedent over the last decade or two, and then considered how the Yankees might feel about all of this, the Red Sox will have their ceremony on April 11, before their home opener, which is against the Yankees.

The Red Sox then had two officials -- the team president and its executive vice president of public affairs -- address the media to explain the decision. And although this might have appeared to be team-official overkill by two, they fielded about 15 questions on the subject.

President Larry Lucchino first called the Yankees an “evil empire,” but Wednesday he said the opening ceremony was intended to be a celebration, “and less of an in-your-face” gesture.

Given the rivalry, and the fact that the Red Sox joined it officially in October, Lucchino granted, “You could argue there’s something appropriate about it happening vis-a-vis the Yankees.”

As Lucchino settled onto a bench outside the clubhouse on a warm afternoon, a fan shouted, “We love you, Larry!” To which Lucchino smiled, turned and under his breath said, “Today.”

October victories against the Yankees can be fleeting, as Lucchino is probably aware.

After the Red Sox won their previous World Series championship, in 1918, the Yankees pretty much ran the century, which led to all the angst, which led to last season, which led to the T-shirt amid Wednesday’s crowd that read “Y2anKs,” when the Yankees won their last title.

During a meeting Tuesday, Francona directed his team to remove itself from last season’s championship, and Wednesday even refused to answer a question that included the words “two-thousand-four” in it.

“This is two-thousand-five,” he said.

While some of the Idiots have moved on -- Pedro Martinez and Derek Lowe, notably, who were replaced by David Wells and Matt Clement -- most of the regulars are back. Their hair is still all theirs, and their grins are still cockeyed, and their targets are still generally named Alex. At one point, six Red Sox over six consecutive days took their swings, the observations having mainly to do with Rodriguez’s character, his qualifications as a Yankee and his baseline chop at Bronson Arroyo during Game 6 of the American League championship series.

Rodriguez has been mostly magnanimous, except he mistakenly referred to Arroyo as “Brandon,” which got everybody laughing again.

“It’s probably intentional,” Arroyo said. “Maybe he thinks I’m a nobody.”

Meantime, catcher Jason Varitek lugged his bag of gear into the clubhouse, fell backward into his chair and, with Francona nowhere in sight, warmed to the subject of last year. He shook his head slowly at the weeks that followed, the people who yelled from behind frosted car windows and from across cobblestone streets.

“The biggest thing,” he said, “I didn’t hear, ‘Congratulations.’ I got, ‘Thank you.’

“I got ‘Thank Yous’ over ‘Congratulations.’ That’s pretty amazing.”