Though hampered by back problems in , he won 18 games for the American League Champion Red Sox, then excelled for Boston in the postseason. In the playoffs he defeated the three-time defending World Champion Oakland Athletics, allowing only three hits in a 7–1 complete-game victory, then opened the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds. His father and mother, having been allowed to visit from Cuba under a special visa, were in Fenway Park that game to watch their son defeat The Big Red Machine in a 6–0 five-hit shutout. This was one of the few times when the Reds were shut out in 1975, making Tiant's victory even more special. All six Red Sox runs were scored in the seventh inning; Tiant led off that inning (the designated hitter was not yet in use in World Series play) with a base hit off Don Gullett and eventually scored on Carl Yastrzemski's single for the first of those six runs.