The Boston Red Sox officially completed a worst-to-first playoff run that ended at the friendly and comfortable confines of Fenway Park.

The city waited for, quite literally, a lifetime to win the series at Fenway. The last time Game 6 of the World Series was played at Fenway Park was nearly four decades ago. This time, the Red Sox took Game 6 and ran with it.

"This is for you, Boston. You guys deserve it," Series MVP David Ortiz said. "We've been through a lot this year, and this is for all of you and all those families who struggled."

The Red Sox stormed out to a 6-0 lead in the game and never looked back. Before anyone could notice, they were the champions.

"When the fireworks went off at the presentation of the trophy out there, when the ballpark was filled with smoke, it was completely surreal," Farrell said. "To be in this position, given where we've come from, reflecting back a year ago at this time, there's been a lot that's happened in 13 months."

The end result was a tough pill to swallow for Carlos Beltran and the St. Louis Cardinals. Beltran, who is known as one of the best players in baseball playoff history, landed in the hospital with bruised ribs after game 1 but he shook it off. He was in the starting lineup just a day later, but in the end it went all for naught.

If it wasn't for Beltran's RBI single in the seventh inning, which put the Cards on the board, the team might have been shut out.

Despite the Cardinals' struggles in the series, they also surpassed expectations. Nobody expected the Cards to do as well as they did this year and many figured that they would miss the playoffs altogether. Not only did they make the playoffs, but also finished with the best record in the NL.

"There were some frustrated guys in there, but overall you can't ask us to go about any better than how our guys did," Cardinals manager Mike Matheny said. "Not too many people expected us to do what we did."

"When we started rolling," Ortiz said, "nobody ever stopped the train."