Larry Lucchino, whose hard-charging management style helped usher in the Red Sox’ most successful period in franchise history and later brought professional baseball back to Worcester, died Tuesday at 78, multiple outlets reported.
Lucchino partnered with principal owner John Henry and chairman Tom Werner to purchase the Red Sox from the Yawkey Estate in 2002 and oversaw the team’s transformation from perennial also-rans to baseball’s most dominant franchise in the early part of the 21st century. After going 86 years without a championship, the Red Sox, with Lucchino leading the way, won titles in 2004, 2007 and 2013.
As team president, Lucchino pushed and prodded his fellow partners and employees in a brusque but effective management style. He mentored Theo Epstein and brought him to Boston and later famously clashed with him, resulting in Epstein’s abrupt resignation following the 2005 season before later agreeing to return. Epstein sought autonomy from Lucchino, and that power struggle was never truly resolved.
Lucchino’s imprint on the ballclub and the ballpark was incalculable. He oversaw the renovation of Fenway Park while also serving as the most public face of the ownership troika. He could be combative, as when he labeled the New York Yankees “the Evil Empire” after the Red Sox and Yankees battled for the services of Cuban free agent pitcher Jose Contreras.
He had already been a consequential figure in baseball before joining forces with Henry and Werner. Lucchino, an acolyte of former Baltimore Orioles owner Edward Bennett Williams, was the driving force behind the construction of Oriole Park at Camden Yards, the ballpark which managed to blend old and new and set the template for a generation of new ballparks that were built between the early 1990s and early 2000s.
Lucchino also was later partly responsible for the construction of Petco Park in San Diego when he served as president of the Padres.
In 2015, Lucchino was ousted as president and CEO of the Red Sox and replaced by Sam Kennedy. He continued in the role of president/CEO emeritus of Fenway Sports Group, and also as chair and part owner of the Pawtucket Red Sox. After failing to secure funding for a replacement for McCoy Stadium from the state of Rhode Island, Lucchino moved the Red Sox’ Triple A franchise to Worcester in 2021.
He was also closely involved with a number of philanthropic endeavors, including serving as chair of the Jimmy Fund, the charity most closely associated with the Red Sox. Lucchino himself was a cancer survivor, having battled non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
He is survived by his wife, Stacey, and two stepchildren.
Story by Sean McAdam, MassLive.com.
