What year is your favorite Red Sox season?

[Lose Remerswaal]

Your favorite season doesn't have to be one where the Red Sox won it all, it could be the year you fell in love with the team which was eventually capped off by a World Series Championship (or 3).  I have one friend who fell in love with the team due to the heartbreak of 2003, which is why that year (and 1986 and 1978) is included in the choices.  For me, the choice was hard between 2004 and 1967.  '67 made me a fan of baseball and the Sox, but 2004 was like the consummation of that love, after 35+ years of blue balls.

 

[Mooch]

The 2013 season will always be the most special to me: I ran the Boston Marathon that spring, finishing 9 minutes before the bombings, with my wife and kids watching the race from the corner of Boylston and Exeter, between the two explosions. I've never been more proud of a team in my life, beginning with Ortiz's speech at Fenway and ending with Jonny Gomes placing the trophy with the 617 jersey on the finish line. That entire year, starting with me taking my two sons to their first game at Fenway the Sunday before the Marathon and culminating with a Championship, gave my family more enjoyment than any sports season ever.

 

[grimshaw]

I'm actually going with 2003 - through game 6 of the ALCS.  That was the first year, I felt as though they belonged with the big boys, and the Yankees didn't want to face them.
6 guys in the lineup had 25 home runs or more and they scored 961 runs.  It seemed like they were in every game, could overcome any lead, and were always putting pressure on pitching staffs late in games and vice versa, since their pitching was just ok.
 
Pedro was Pedro, Nomar was in his last prime season.  They had the Embree, Timlin, Williamson trio peaking at the end of the year.  Todd Walker had some big time clutch hits vs the A's, as they had the come from behind to snag the series.

 

[Bunt4aTriple]

2013 was so satisfying, but it didn't have any of the angst that came with 2004.  It was the difference between playing with house money and having the mortgage payment on black.  Higher risk/higher reward.

 

[JoePoulson]

As cathartic as 2004 was, and I was even at game 4 in St. Louis, I voted 2013.  I've never had as much fun throughout a whole season as I did that year.  I was fortunate enough to have been in Fenway the night they beat Toronto to clinch the AL East, so it enhanced that magical season even more.  
 
Great thread idea, and I can't wait to read the responses.

 

[Minneapolis Millers]

Like Lose (but a little younger!), I was torn between '75 and '04.  I chose '75, as I was just becoming a real fan, and the team seemed full of hope and possibility despite the Game 7 loss.  Then came '78, '86, etc.  Much despair that was not washed away until '04.

 

[fairlee76]

As '67 is to Lose, 1999 is to me with the same feelings on 2004.  In 1999, I was getting ready to move back to Boston to be closer to an ill family member and that team, shortcomings and all, was a much-needed distraction.  Five years and one major personal heartbreak later, the 2004 team provided the ultimate sporting distraction.  I'll feel forever lucky to have lived here during that time.  Every now and again, I'll remember what the region felt like the day after Aaron Boone (like a goddamn funeral) and the day after Game 7 in 2004.  Just amazing how much that team captivated the Boston metro area.  Not sure we'll ever see that again.

 

[mt8thsw9th]

What made 2013 so great is that next to no one picked them to make the playoffs, never mind winning the World Series. They were playing with house money all year.

 

[BaseballJones]

2004.  Vanquishing the Yankees in such historic fashion, and then capping it by winning the World Series.....  I was asked during the celebration in St. Louis if it was worth the wait.  
 
It was.
 
There have been other incredible years, but 2004 can never be topped, IMO.

 

[RedOctober3829]

2004 was without a doubt the most satisfying season.  After the heartbreak of '03, to come back the next year and do it in the fashion they did it was indescribable.  They did something no other team in MLB history had done and they did it against their most hated rival in the most iconic stadium in sports.  Then, they dominated the best team in baseball to win the World Series.  
 
2004 was also bigger than the game.  It was about finally reaching the pinnacle after so many years of heartbreak.  I got to share in the moment with my family who have stuck with the team through thick and thin. It was about visiting my uncle's and grandfather's graves and putting the World Series pennants on their stones and telling them all about the series.  It was about finally believing that they could do it.  It was winning it for so many former Red Sox who were close and never got that opportunity.  Seeing Pesky celebrating was so emotional for me.  
 
2004 will never be topped for me in a Red Sox season.  '07 and '13 were awesome don't get me wrong but that set of circumstances in '04 can't ever be repeated. 

 

[Jimbodandy]

1977 was my first year in little league and the first year when I built my schedule around the Red Sox.  That team was enjoyable to watch at the plate.  Except for the black hole of Burleson and Doyle, everyone else could go deep in a hurry.  Eight guys with double-digit homers, five with 20+, three with 30+.  They won 97 games and kept it interesting all year.  This game was a perfect example of how an 8YO could get hooked to the sport by that team:  
 
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS197707040.shtml

 

[Savin Hillbilly]

I was torn. In a way, 2013 would be the best answer to the "favorite" question, because I don't think I've ever seen a Sox season that topped that one for 6 solid months of sheer fun. By contrast, much of 2004 was angst-ridden and frustrating. But the final 8 games of 2004 were the most exhilarating experience I've ever had as a Red Sox fan*, by such a large margin that it seems weird to place any other season ahead of it.
 
My dark horse candidate would be 1995, a fun little ride of a year featuring signature performances by two of my all-time favorite Sox players, Valentin and Wakefield.
 
*I would say "as a baseball fan", but having been an 11-year-old Mets fan in 1969, I think that's too close to call.

 

[bankshot1]

I went with '67.
 
The first year in my life the Sox were good. I was 16 and following the Sox the summer and fall was a blast.
 
The Sox were young, full of promise and exciting. Yaz, Tony, Reggie, Jim, Rico, Boomer. They were young and fun and good.
 
And Yaz's '67 season literally had to be seen to be believed. I've never seen a season like it in almost 60 years watching baseball. 
 
and that's not hyperbole, he was that good.
 
And the pennant race that year was incredible, four team alive in the last week, 3 on the last day of the season.
 
and I stood in line and scored Game 2 and Game 7 WS tickets.
 
Lonborg's 1-hitter and Gibby's close-out!
 
Disappointed? Sure, but I was 16 and the Sox were young, and there wold be plenty of other opportunities for that crew to win it all.
 
Just loved that season.

 

[Bob Montgomerys Helmet Hat]

2007 was a joy, and 2013 was a delight.  But I don't know how any season could ever be better than 2004.

 

[Fireball Fred]

2004 - great team, great race, great comeback, great win. The '04 ALCS also included the two best games I've ever attended, although my best days at Fenway were opening day 2005 and the WS clincher in '13. Nobody who wasn't there can imagine what '67 was like; '13 had some similarities however. To me '78 was even more frustrating than '86, because I think that ('78) was the best Sox team of my lifetime, done in by injuries and bad managing in response to them.

 

[E5 Yaz]

1967.
 
I'm of that age where 67 meant everything. To be 9 or 10 in 1967 meant you'd never seen the Red Sox in a pennant race. The race was a classic, obviously, with radios across New England becoming your best friend. No internet, no ESPN ... only the radio, the limited TV schedule and the next day's paper to fill in the blanks. We'd keep score off the radio feed, then compare scoresheets the next day in class. 
 
We all know the storylines -- from Yaz to Tony C to Tartabull to being down to just two games, at home against the Twins -- but it was all just fresh and new with an excitement level I honestly don't think I've matched since. And after the Sox won, waiting for the Tigers to lose as the radio captured the Detroit feed.
 
After they scaled that hurdle, it was just The Long Wait for a title. That had its own excitements and bitterness, but nothing felt the same as 67

 

[foulkehampshire]

The 2003 team was incredible. I always felt very confident that the team was going to score at least one or twice every time middle of the order came to the plate.

 

[snowmanny]

Ras just voted 2016.
 
I went back and forth between 1967 (best pennant race ever), 1975 (Tiant, Lynn, Rice), 2004, 2007 (really the best team of our lifetimes, although coulda/shoulda/woulda on 1977-79), 2013 (most consistently fun from start to finish).
 
2004.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

2004 is the most important, but 2013 was more enjoyable for me. Without that impending sense of imminent failure looming in the distance, I was able to just sit back and enjoy the ride. The feeling I had in 2004 was certainly more powerful, but the enjoyment was held back a bit along the way in 2004 because no matter how rational I tried to be, I was convinced they would stumble and fall. That made the payoff moment bigger, which is awesome, but the question is which season, not which moment. When you start with the low expectations and you add in the bombing and the way the team rallied with the city, Papi's bleeeeep moment, and the fact that they got to clinch it in Fenway, the ride, start to finish was just more fun for me.

 

[pedro1918]

"Don't let us win tonight."
 
2004.
 
It really is the total experience of 2003 and 2004.  It is something we will never experience again.  The intensity of those seasons was exhausting.   The games, the players, the incidents, the lows and the most incredible high.   We won.   We beat those bastards. 

 

[mt8thsw9th]

The 2003 team was incredible. I always felt very confident that the team was going to score at least one or twice every time middle of the order came to the plate.

 
Probably no game summed up the fight of the 2003 team more than this game, in my mind. Granted it was a loss, but it encapsulated what was great, and flawed, about that team.
 
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS200306120.shtml

 

[canvass ali]

I had to think about this one a while but ultimately, the '67 season was my favorite.  I was 8 and my whole family was swept up in it.  It was pure fun and excitement, no clouds of old dashed hopes hanging over everything.  I had one of those red rubber balls with the apple-red coating (I don't see those anymore) and threw it against the garage wall for hours while doing my own radio commentary and 'crowd roars'.  With everything that came to pass in the intervening years, the 2004 post-season was without doubt the best, most intense few weeks of sport fandom imaginable, but....for an entire season of fun and incredible memories, it has to be '67.

 

[Devizier]

Hard to say. 2004 and 2013 merit consideration, but I'll throw in my hat for 1999. Pedro at his apex, Nomar just crushing balls left and right, the series against the Indians. That team really had terrible hitters for the most part, but they were fun to watch.

 

[cornwalls@6]

"Don't let us win tonight."
 
2004.
 
It really is the total experience of 2003 and 2004.  It is something we will never experience again.  The intensity of those seasons was exhausting.   The games, the players, the incidents, the lows and the most incredible high.   We won.   We beat those bastards.

This sums it up perfectly for me. 2003 & 2004 almost seem like one long, emotionally exhausting, but ultimately glorious season. Not certain I'll ever fully invest in a team with quite that much fervor again(although the Pats come close). 2013 was a joyride, just a blast. But lacked almost all the angst/dread of losing that 2003 & 2004 had.

 

[67WasBest]

67WasBest is a name I had prior to 2004, but it still holds for me.  I was 9 and my youth had as much to do with it as anything.  The energy and excitement of that year have always, and will always be with me.  From there, I enjoyed 2013 the most, but 2004 and 2003 were right there with 13, just a notch below 67.

 

[54thMA]

1975 was it for me. My Uncle Peter came to visit that summer, he and my Aunt Rosella spent three months here, staying with my Grandparents. My Uncle was a huge Red Sox fan, he took me to 15 games that summer, it was the year I fell in love with baseball and the Red Sox thanks to him.

Lynn and Rice were rookies, what an exciting team, Tiant and Lee, Fisk, Burleson, Denny Doyle, Evans and Yaz.

They played the Yankees in June at Shea Stadium as the toilet was going through renovations; Tiant lost the first game, then the Sox won the second game, they played a double header on Sunday, Sox won the both games, Lee pitched out of bases loaded no out jam, Lynn made the greatest catch I've ever seen and the Sox never looked back.

They swept the A's in the ALCS, went on to lose the greatest World Series ever played, Fisk's home run in game 6 should have been the series clincher. Red Sox became my team from then on, I hung in there and my loyalty paid off almost 30 years later.

My Uncle died in December of 2003, never got to see the Red Sox win it all; love you Uncle Peter, I'll see you in heaven someday, you'll be easy to spot wearing that dog eared Red Sox cap you loved so much...............

 

[TheoShmeo]

I would have been very surprised if 2004 wasn't getting over half of the votes.
 
There were aspects of other seasons I enjoyed more.  2004 was not without its negatives.  The Sox were just OK until they took off.  As much as trading Nomar was the right thing, it was still rough to see.  And the Yankees series, as wonderful as it was in retrospect and during that cathartic Game 7, was still an emotional grind. 
 
And 2013 was very special for the obvious reasons.  The marathon.  The fact that the team was solid wire to wire.  The personalities.  All the comeback wins.  The almost magical feel the season had.
 
One could easily make a case for 2007 and other seasons, as well.  I did love the Cowboy Up aspect of 2003 and I really thought it was Our Year, as everyone kept saying.
 
But in the end, I can't get past that the 2004 season and victory was the ultimate game changer.  It changed how we view the Red Sox, eliminated the Charlie Brown, perpetual near miss aspect of the team, and changed our relationship with the Yankees and their fans.  I cannot imagine a bigger sports catharsis than that one. 
 
Two more factors that are unique to that season figure in: (1) that it came one season after the heart break of the Grady Boner game and (2) that it came after the Sox were down 0-3 and the 19-8 game.  Sort of like the Pats did in the last SB, the turning the tables in both ways and specially turning almost certain defeat into victory aspect makes that season impossible to top for me.
 
********
 
If you don't want to read about the Pats, Cs and Bs, stop reading.
 
If you asked about the Pats, I would be hard put not to select 2001/SB 36 for many of the same reasons.  There's a difference in that the legacy of angst was bigger with the Sox and the Pats have no Yankees in their story, and the later SB champs were substantially more dominant than the first winner.  But that it was the first would make me give serious consideration to that team.  In the end, I might take this past season given the nature of the SB, the Butler play and the DG context and post SpyGate context.  I'm not sure which one I would choose.
 
If you asked about the Celts, it would be a very tough decision.  1984 was over the Hated Lakers and that Game 7 was ridiculous.  But 1986 was epic dominance, and I loved that team and having Bill Walton and Bird together.  1986 gets the nod, by a hair.
 
If you asked about the Bs, it would be the Bobby Orr goal year of 69-70, as that was my first real championship in any sport and Bobby Orr was my first sports hero.  (The Cs won during my life before then, but I was too young to appreciate it.)  

 

[Manramsclan]

I voted 2004 without hesitation. It has as much to do with what happened as what was going on in my life at the time.
 
I was living in New York City and was in Greenwich Village when Aaron Boone ended the 2003 season for the Sox. It was crushing. I remember that shortly before then, a deep anger and resentment at Yankees fans bubbled up inside of me. They were finally going to feel what we felt our whole lives. Turns it it would have to wait.
 
I was 27 in 2004, and had more time on my hands than I do now. In various states of unemployment, I didn't have much money but life was much simpler. I did have enough to have the MLB.tv package on my computer. I probably missed some games that year, but it felt like I watched every single one.  I had figured out all the Red Sox friendly bars in the city, and for every ESPN or nationally televised games I was there. One particular game, a late season tilt against Baltimore, I was in a lower west side bar. It was post-trade so Alphabet and O-cab were featuring prominently, the former on D. There was some crazy double play with an out at home (maybe with Leskanic pitching?), and O-cab had a big hit. The magic was starting to happen. I had been pretty loud (as I usually am). I was going a little nuts. Somebody came to the back room to look at the TV, and then looked at me, nodded and smiled. It was Philip Seymour-Hoffman. I smiled back and nodded.
 
That whole August was a great time to be a Sox fan. It was fun, crazy, improbable. They had been underachieving and then they started to achieve the shit out it. I got to see it all. A time like that may never come again. 
 
I was in the bleachers when Big Papi took Jarrod Washburn deep to win the ALDS. I was in Brooklyn when they took the 19-8 whooping and I tried to deal with it by drinking until the sun came up, but it didn't work. I set up a shrine with pictures of the team and candles and weird offerings intended for some sort of jobu-like baseball god. I walked to the subway that morning(or was it two days later? My liver wasn't sure) with my Sox hat on to catch the Fung Wah to Boston to go to game 4, seeing many shit-eating grins of Yankee fans who met my glance with an air of superiority. I sat in the same seats in the bleachers when Dave Roberts stole second, and watched Papi's homerun sail toward me into the bullpen. I watched game 5 in Boston with friends, actually watching the TV in a huge mirror to reverse our fortunes. I came back to New York City for games 6 and 7 and watched it all unfold. I rode the subway the next day with my hat on, and locked eyes with a man in a Yankee cap. He looked down. In my entire life, that had never happened before. Everything was about to change.
 
At 3-0 in the World Series, Rob Corddry filmed a Daily Show segment in my house. He was interviewing my then girlfriend as someone who was injured by voting. They came in and looked around. He saw my shrine, and pointed at and looked at me with his eyebrows raised, like "Riiight?" He said, "I can't believe I'm saying this, but I think we got this. I feel good." I nodded and no more words were spoken about that subject. There was a tacit agreement: We agreed on what was said, but we  had already said too much.
 
That season was so rewarding as a fan, especially because of the season that came before it. Living in New York City while it was happening was particularly awesome, and could've been the other way. I got to celebrate in their house ALL YEAR LONG. I remember at random times from October to April, I would just laugh to myself and say "The Boston Red Sox won the world series!" I would call people and that's all I would say. I did it just because I could. 
 
What followed wasn't better or worse, just different. 2005 seemed like so much pressure. I wanted another one, and they did too. It didn't happen that way. 2007 and 2013 were amazing, amazing years with different characters and storylines. Both teams did it right, but nothing NOTHING will ever beat the Greatest Comeback In Sports History™, the vanquishing of an 86 year old curse, "Why not us?", a band of merry idiots, and a time in my life where I only had to answer for myself, where baseball could be the most important thing in my life. After that, I had to start growing up.

 

[mikeford]

We came back from 3-0 down to beat the Yankees and then won the World Series in a goddamn SWEEP.
 
 
Nothing touches 2004. It cant.

 

[Pedro 4 99MVP]

I love to read all the reasons that people choose other seasons. It brings back some great memories. But, how can it not be 2004? The idiots, Millar telling CHB "don't let us win tonight", only team ever to comeback from down 3-0, all the late nights/late inning heroics, beating the MFY, putting the curse to rest. Before '04, did any of us have any confidence that this franchise would win 1 WS, let alone 3?  I love all your other reasons, and it is fun to read about other great years,  but there is no way I can choose anything except 04.

 

[CarolinaBeerGuy]

2004 was incredible, but it was so stressful I'm not sure how much fun I was actually having at the time. 1999 was a lot of fun to watch for me and I'll never forget watching the playoff games in the dorm when I was a freshman. That being said, 2013 was the most fun I've ever had watching baseball in my life. That team was so much fun to watch for almost the entire season. As others have stated, there was none of the stress of 2004. That was the perfect baseball season for me.

 

[SumnerH]

1912.  It was the first year at Fenway, and some days early in the season the Rooters would stumble the wrong way out of the 3rd Base Saloon toward the old Huntington grounds before getting oriented.
 
Connie Mack's A's and their $100,000 infield had just won 2 straight World Series and would win again the next year.  But 1912 was different--I don't think the Sox have ever had a 1-2 player combo like Tris Speaker and Smokey Joe Wood that year (both of them put up 10+ WAR seasons).  Tris was the league MVP on a 10.1 WAR season and lead the league in BA, OBP, doubles, home runs, and stolen bases.  Along with Smokey Joe Wood's 34-5, 1.91 ERA campaign they propelled us to a 105-win season and a spot in the Series against the hated Giants.  
 
John McGraw used all his regular tricks, but we'd somehow outfoxed the knuckler Tesrau in his surprise game 1 start over Matthewson, and battled the latter to a draw in game 2.  But Buck O'Brien just didn't have it and coughed up both of his starts, and Wood finally spit the bit in game 7 after dealing complete game gems in games 1-4.  So it was tied up 3-3 after game 7.  Wood was gritty as hell--he'd been shelled in game 7, but came back out to close out the last 3 innings of game 8.
 
Everyone remember's Snodgrass' muff to put the Series-clinching run on 2nd in the 10th inning of game 8, but they forget that the only reason there was a game 8 was because Duffy had booted one in game 2 that allowed that game to end in a 6-6 tie.  Otherwise the Series would've been a 4-1 shellacking rather than the 8-game, 4-3-1 classic it turned into.
 
 
EDIT: Seriously, 2004.

 

[phenweigh]

I was a little too young to appreciate '67.  Maybe not so much as too young (I turned 8 in August) as too out of touch.  Back then I spent my summers in Wales, MA, and getting a good radio signal was iffy.  Back home in Chicopee for September, we could tune in and enjoy, and that certainly started my journey as a Sox fan. 
 
'75 was fantastic.  Those Sox seemed to win so many exciting games, whether it was a late rally or great defense.  Then came one of the best world series ever, with the incredible Game 6 win.  Game 7 had to end in victory after that, right?  The Sox lost ... it hurt ... but it seemed with all the young talent a championship was on the way soon. 
 
'04 ended in euphoria, but so much angst along the way ... I suppose it goes hand-in-hand.  The final out against the Cardinals was one of the most bittersweet moments of my life.  My daughter was being admitted to the hospital, and much of the game was watched in waiting rooms and then in her room.  Finally it was time to leave so she could rest, and my wife and I got home in time to watch the last inning.  Though our daughter was supposed to be sleeping, she was watching the game and called from the hospital to share the moment of the final out with us.  A special moment, but it comes with the reminder that Crohn's disease continues to make her life difficult. 
 
'13 got my vote, though the seasons mentioned above are right there as well, and it is certainly hard to argue that 2004 wasn't the most meaningful.  In what was supposed to be a bridge year, the winning was unexpected, and that adds so much to the joy.  Then the team seemed to be at the center of rallying the city, the state, the region to respond to the marathon bombing with pure resiliency.  Even after a great regular season with the best record in the AL, I didn't feel like the Sox were the best team.  It still seems like the ALCS was won with smoke and mirrors.  And the World Series wasn't an anti-climatic sweep.  From start to finish, 2013 is my favorite. 

 

[tims4wins]

The 2004 regular season, for the most part, sucked. The Sox performed under expectations, had the disastrous series in NY in June, we barely above .500 at the trade deadline, had the Pedro / daddy game in September... it wasn't all that fun.
 
But the stress / emotion / anxiety / ultimate jubilation of those 4 days in October cannot, will not, ever be topped. That was the apex of sports watching for me. Nothing has ever mattered as much as that mattered. Which is why 2004 is my favorite season.

 

[chrisfont9]

I voted fo '75, the year I started watching (and got to go to a doubleheader in the last week where the Sox won both games 4-0). That felt personal, as well as incredibly exciting.
 
1986 is a little underrated. The heartbreak overshadows what was, up til then, a really great, improbable run that would have easily been my #1 with just one more strike. I loved Hurst and Clemens and the Can, loved the scrappy style that saw them pull out a lot of games along the way, even before the famous postseason stuff. Game 6 and the ALCS were just extensions of what had been going on all season, in my fevered recollection. Plus I was in college, which is a great time to be sports-obsessed.

 

[Number45forever]

The 2004 regular season, for the most part, sucked. The Sox performed under expectations, had the disastrous series in NY in June, we barely above .500 at the trade deadline, had the Pedro / daddy game in September... it wasn't all that fun.
 
But the stress / emotion / anxiety / ultimate jubilation of those 4 days in October cannot, will not, ever be topped. That was the apex of sports watching for me. Nothing has ever mattered as much as that mattered. Which is why 2004 is my favorite season.

I agree with this sentiment in that the first 2/3 of the 2004 regular season were underwhelming.  Nomar was mopey and not playing well, especially defensively.  They were not playing to expectations.  But then August and September they played fantastic.  Then the playoffs happened.  That season went beyond being a sports event for me, it was a touchstone of my life to go through that as a college junior after living through 2003.  Sports were never so important and you were never so invested.
 
But, that being said, I went with 2013.  From day one of the regular season that was a thrilling team to watch.  I loved the players, I loved the personalities and I loved that they won with walk offs in like 15% of the home games or something.  It was nuts.  Plus, add in all the storylines around the bombings, Ortiz, etc.  Also I remember having an argument before the 2013 season with a friend where I was insisting they'd finish in last place again while my friend said they could beat the Yankees out finish fourth.  I for one came into the 2013 season with absolutely zero expectations, and then they won the World Series.  Coming into 2004, I thought they'd win 110 games.  I just think 2013 was totally unique, that gets my vote here.

 

[Huntington Avenue Grounds]

I voted fo '75, the year I started watching (and got to go to a doubleheader in the last week where the Sox won both games 4-0). That felt personal, as well as incredibly exciting.
 
1986 is a little underrated. The heartbreak overshadows what was, up til then, a really great, improbable run that would have easily been my #1 with just one more strike. I loved Hurst and Clemens and the Can, loved the scrappy style that saw them pull out a lot of games along the way, even before the famous postseason stuff. Game 6 and the ALCS were just extensions of what had been going on all season, in my fevered recollection. Plus I was in college, which is a great time to be sports-obsessed.

 
I voted 1986 for these reasons, and more.  I was 15 and it was the team that fully ignited my love for baseball. I was a little to young and out of touch for 1978 to grab me, and the early 80's teams left little to the imagination.  I followed box scores and some games before then but 1986 was when I could venture into Boston myself and must have caught a dozen games. Leaving out the horrible, awful, terrible heartbreak of Game 6, the season was all gravy up to then, and had an amazing comeback in the ALCS to boot.  
 
2013 is right up there too for pure baseball love, with a WS title for the cherry on top.
 
Edit: 2013 was also the year my buddy convinced me to put 28-1 odds on the Sox winning the WS, nice $1300 payday!

 

[JoePoulson]

I think we're all in agreement that nothing will match the high of 2004.  But as others have said, 2004 was too damn stressful at points to truly be enjoyable as a whole.  The baggage of 2003 and the other 85 years added the crushing weight that made 2004 the insane roller coaster ride that it was.  I've never felt the sense of sports relief that I did in 2004, and I never will again (it was actually kind of scary, and it made me re-think my fandom for a bit).
 
On the other hand, 2013 was pure sports bliss from beginning to end.  The smoothest, most enjoyable season of baseball I've ever had the pleasure of watching.  Without question 2004 (and 2007) helped me feel that way about 2013, but I also think getting older was a big part.  The stress of 2004 about killed me, but gave me a high that I'll never forget.  2013 was incredibly smooth and relatively stress-free, and while the high at the end wasn't as high, it was pretty damn close.

 

[Ramon AC]

This can't be anything but 2004.
 
But in the non-2004 category, I'm going to say 1986. I was ten. Clemens and Boggs, Jim Rice was my idol, I thought Spike Owen and Oil Can Boyd had great names, the Henderson heroics, Schiraldi was awesome in 51 regular season innings, I was aware of all these things and the history of 1918 and the heartbreak of 78 and 75 and 67, and my Red Sox were a really good team. Game 6 destroyed me in the moment and in the following weeks, but 1986 cast me as a Red Sox fan for the rest of my life. Watching the standings every day in the newspaper and seeing Boston on top...I was a lost cause for the next 18 years.

 

[Skiponzo]

The Sox (unlike their NL counterpart the Cubs) have had a lot of awesome years but man...2004 has to be it. I know most of you "get it" but so many do not. The feeling surrounding the team that year was just different. Maybe it was the after affect of an excellent yet disappointing 2003, maybe it was Schilling and Foulke, most likely it was all that combine with some higher power feeling. I never said it throughout that year but it always felt like "this is really the year". I remember talking to my wife after the 19-8 game and beginning to cry. I walked away and kept saying to myself "It's not supposed to happen like this. Not THIS year". It's getting dusty in here just typing this so....yeah. 2004 is it for me.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

I voted 1986.  I was seven years old and it is the first season I remember paying attention to baseball at all.  I can still name more players from that season's roster and remember more individual games/moments than most any year other than maybe 2004.
 
But more so, that season was my favorite because it was the only one that I got to follow moment for moment with my grandfather.  He kindled my love for the game more so than my father at that stage.  I remember visiting him a few times that summer and getting up at the crack of dawn when he'd be up before everyone else to have his morning coffee and cigarette, and he'd teach me how to read the box scores in the paper.  We talked about nothing but the Red Sox that summer.  He followed the minor league prospects closely and loved when they'd come up and do well.  I remember two guys in particular he was expecting big things out of...Rey Quinones (boy was he mad when they traded him to Seattle) and Josias Manzanillo.  No idea why he fixated on those guys in particular, but those were his guys nonetheless.  He bought me my first tickets to Fenway, though it was my dad that took me to the game.  It turned out to be Clemens' 20th win of the season.
 
In the spring of 87, he took me to Cooperstown for the first time.  Turned out it was the last baseball related memory I had with him.  He had a series of heart attacks that summer and was in and out of the hospital, so he wasn't able to follow the Sox very well.  He died at the end of August.  Just as well, since the season went to shit anyway.
 
I was bequeathed his entire baseball literature collection, some 100+ books and my grandmother kept up his subscription to Baseball Digest for a few years after he passed just to be able to keep giving them to me.  I still have all of that stuff and there's no way I could let any of it go.  I feel like he's still sitting next to me whenever I'm watching a game.  Had I been a member here for the "Win it for" thread, he'd have been my win it for.
 
So yeah, despite Game 6, it's 1986 all the way for me.
 
But 2004 is a close second.

 

[jasail]

This is a tough question. 
 
2003 was probably one of my favorite years ever. I was 20, at college and without a care in the world and the Sox just took over my life. It was the first time in a long time that I was absolutely rabid about a sports team. I loved this team. I loved the wagon of a line up. I loved the gritty, dip spit covered bullpen. I loved Pedro and Lowe and pray for snow. The ALDS was fantastic and the ALCS was great until the heartbreak of G7. In retrospect, I also hold a soft spot for this season because it was also the last season of baseball I was able to watch with my grandfather, who turned me onto the sport, before his Alzheimer disease set in. 
 
2013 also meant a lot to me. The Marathon bombing impacted me greatly. The sense of camaraderie around the city in its wake was unlike anything I have ever experienced. The team really seemed to thrive on that and this symbiotic relationship seemingly developed. No one expected this team to be great, but they were just a wagon. Then the playoffs that year were fantastic. Blasting Price and the Rays in the ALDS, Vic's heroics, Ortiz being unreal, Xander's emergence and the great pitching from Lester, Lackey and Koji. They were exhilarating to watch. Hell, I got thrown out of 3 bars and a hotel room in Newport (after a wedding) during Game 6 of the ALCS for being too demonstrative. We ended up being put in a hotel conference room with free beer and a TV so my friends and I could watch and celebrate without upsetting the "general public". Standing at the finish line for the rally, really brought the whole thing home. Unforgettable. 
 
Then there was 2004. The pitching was better and my hatred for the Yankees was elevated (both because of 2003 and the failed ARod trade), and that made it enjoyable. But the team didn't play well for most of the summer and I spent most of my summer in NYS and Alaska, so I wasn't as involved as I was in 2003. Plus the expectations were WS or bust. This took a lot of the joy out of it for me. The Nomar trade made it worse. So the regular season came and went with mixed emotions. Yet, the drama of October was incredible. I was in college in NYS that fall. The campus was dominated by kids form NY and MA, and if you weren't a fan of either team allegiances were drawn. In my own small personal circle, I had a house mate that was a Yankee fan, my then girlfriend's house mate came from a Yankee family who owned a local sports bar we drank at, and my favorite professor and adviser was a die hard Cards fan. The stars aligned. Everything was electric. I was such an emotional rollercoaster during the ALCS, I hardly went to class, then during the WS I went home to watch it in Boston; I don't know how I wasn't thrown out of school, it almost seemed accepted or expected. I lived baseball in a way I've never lived anything else for that month and I lived it among hundreds of others with the same fierce passion. Despite the remorseful and celebratory binge drinking, I remember it vividly. 
 
So, while I probably didn't like the 2004 team as much as the 2003 or 2013 teams, you can't replace the memories or the joy. I still get choked up when I think of it (or when I have a bad day and watch 4 Days in October). So, 2004 gets my vote. However, 2013 is a serious runner up and if it wasn't for the exercising of the demons, I'd have given it the vote. 

 

[Mighty Joe Young]

2004 - because well , you know
 
2013 was a close 2nd in that it had such a joyous feel to it.
 
1975 was lots of fun too .. my first real RedSox WS  

 

[kieckeredinthehead]

The Sox (unlike their NL counterpart the Cubs) have had a lot of awesome years but man...2004 has to be it. I know most of you "get it" but so many do not. The feeling surrounding the team that year was just different. Maybe it was the after affect of an excellent yet disappointing 2003, maybe it was Schilling and Foulke, most likely it was all that combine with some higher power feeling. I never said it throughout that year but it always felt like "this is really the year".

I had a really different experience of 2004. (And I voted 1999 because baseball is personally important as a backdrop to the rest of life and 1999 was just the right circumstances for me to follow closely, more so than any other year. Recognizing that objectively 2004 has to be it). But I gave up on the 2004 team in early July. Another series loss to the Yankees and it felt like just another year where they were good but not good enough. They played .500 ball for a very long stretch of the summer. Sure by the time they reconfigured post-Nomar and swept the A's in Oakland things felt very different. But I think part of the great drama to that year was - especially in contrast to 2007 and 2013 - the season long anxiety over how good they really were.

 

[Buck Showalter]

2004 ---- Red October wrote it perfectly.
 
'86 was cool too.....the Hendu homer was simply incredible.

 

[chrisfont9]

  He followed the minor league prospects closely and loved when they'd come up and do well.  I remember two guys in particular he was expecting big things out of...Rey Quinones (boy was he mad when they traded him to Seattle) and Josias Manzanillo.  No idea why he fixated on those guys in particular, but those were his guys nonetheless.  

Prospect love: it's not just an internet-era creation!

 

[Minneapolis Millers]

These are great.  Our choices are clustering: the season that got you hooked, the season that was most "fun"/enjoyable, and the season that ended the angst (2004).
 
I voted up-thread for '75 (the season that got me hooked as a kid), but I thought about 1986.  Like ChrisFont9, I was in college.  I was on a study abroad program that spring/summer, and my girlfriend would send me letters with Sox box scores cut out, so I was able to follow Clemens' 14-0 start and 20 K game.  (Aside: Also learned of the Celtics drafting of Len Bias and his death in the same letter all at once - sad and crushing).  Then Fall came, and the playoffs.  The ALCS comeback, taking a 3-2 game lead into Game 6, with Clemens on the mound.  The stars were all aligning.  Then one strike away.  Then...
 
Sorry, but that sucker punch from the baseball gods was so hard, so cruel, it left permanent scars.  There's no way that season, with that ending, could be my favorite.  Same for 2003, with THAT ending.

 

[stp]

I chose 1967 because it was the year I became a fan as very young child.  2004 has to come next, followed by 2013's "Fear the Beards"(that team was so much fun to root for).

 

[moondog80]

2004 is the greatest sports story ever told. Nothing, for any team in any sport, could possibly top it.

 

[nighthob]

In 2001 my father suffered a major heart attack and was diagnosed with congestive heart failure. He got past it, but his doctor gave him 3-5 years given the state of his heart and lungs at the time. In 2003 when Pedro was clearly running on fumes and Grady just left him out there I was shaking with rage, because I thought that that would be my father's one chance to see a world series victory and Gump had just pissed it away. My father lived and breathed baseball. He was a friend of Williams and Yaz and I still have a room full of memorabilia that I got from him (including an autographed Williams home run ball).

For me 2004 wasn't about angst so much as it was about my 70 year old father finally getting to see the Red Sox win a world series after a lifetime of close calls. As much as I loved 2013 (and no mistakes, that team was as much fun as the '75 one that nearly beat both of baseball's ruling juggernauts), nothing ever could top the happiness of being in the room with my father when Johnny Damon hit that grand slam. At that moment we both knew that Boston was going to win it all. For him it was a miracle.