The Boston Red Sox top minor league affiliate team has finally completed its move from Pawtucket, R.I. to a new $160-million public baseball stadium in Worcester’s Canal District.
Despite the three-year moving process, the team already has become a rallying point for city and business leaders. And at the heart of all decisions made by the team – leaving Pawtucket after 50 years, picking the Canal District as its new site, designing the baseball stadium, the formation of its charitable foundation – is Larry Lucchino.
The coronavirus pandemic has unsettled plans for the team’s inaugural season at Polar Park – the fifth ballpark Lucchino’s been involved with – but neither the health crisis nor construction challenges could diminish what team and Worcester city leaders said bringing the team would accomplish: a heightened sense of hometown pride.
What do you think the future holds for Central Mass.? “It is not only the Heart of the Commonwealth, it is the Heart of New England, one of the most beautiful, diverse, cultured, artistic, educated areas in the world. And it has room to breathe, and room to grow.”
A long-time Worcester admirer: “My participation, as a teen, at Bob Cousy’s summer basketball camp enhanced a lifelong admiration for this champion of Worcester. The ‘Cooz’ was my idol!”
