Alex Speier has an essay on the 2013 Red Sox in the BP 2014 Annual. It has been excerpted on Slate.
"There is a set of advantages that have to do with material resources, and there is a set that have to do with the absence of material resources and the reason underdogs win as often as they do is that the latter are sometimes every bit the equal of the former. For some reason, this is a very difficult lesson for us to learn. We have I think a very rigid and limited definition of what an advantage is. We think of things as helpful that actually aren't, and think of other things as unhelpful that are." —Malcolm Gladwell, David and Goliath
Why must Goliath stick to a Goliath's game? What happens if a team armed with tremendous material resources ignores the players whom it is “supposed” to sign, and instead competes for the same players sought by those who lack material resources? This was the case study offered by the 2013 Red Sox, with not merely memorable but also startling results.
The Red Sox' one-year transformation from a 69-win catastrophe to a World Series winner represents one of the most fascinating reversals in baseball history. There are few instances of big-market teams so rapidly repudiating their own operating philosophies, and even fewer of teams so rapidly identifying a successful alternative.