Empyreal Environs

Game 162: September 30, 2007
Twins	3	W: Matt Garza (5-7) H: Scott Baker (1) S: Joe Nathan (37)	79-83, 1 game winning streak 20-24-8 series record
Red Sox	2	L: Julian Tavarez (7-11)	96-66, 1 game losing streak 33-14-6 series record 2007 AL East Champions
Highlights: Terry Francona made sure to pull Mike Lowell with two outs in the sixth so that he could be acknowledged by the fans in what could be his final regular season game as the Red Sox third baseman.

Descendants of the founders of the Royal Rooters threw out the first pitch on Sunday, including 96-year old Kitty Dooley, daughter of Jack Dooley. Peter Nash’s documentary Rooters: The Birth of Red Sox Nation, presented Dooley, along with Michael “Nuf Ced” McGreevy and John “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, as the founders of the Rooters.

These raffish fans didn’t pay for plastic cards and ticket perks. Their fervor derived from gambling as much as following the game itself. A Rooter named Sport Sullivan laid the groundwork for the 1919 Black Sox with Chick Gandil in a room in the Buckminster Hotel. The players didn’t make the millions they do today, so grafting was an inevitable way to supplement their income.

Just as the real seediness has been leached from Las Vegas and glossed over with a glimmering veneer of respectability, baseball fandom today can be mere pageantry. The first item on the agenda of the well-manicured masses is to unveil their gadget du jour to call every member of their contact list to make sure they are seen on every acquaintances’ plasma TV. It’s about being seen, not observing.

The row behind me unleashed a swarm of beach balls after the traditional rendition of “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” They claimed it was to celebrate one of their ilk’s birthday and all in the name of a good time. The thing they most enjoyed, however, was deriding people in another section who took issue with the tossing of the tchotchkes. A few folks took it upon themselves to rip the balls.

I am all for enjoying oneself at the game as one will, but just as the purposeful destruction of the toys was over the top, so the relentless yammering of the beach ball contingent (which included threats of throwing the discarded toys purposefully at the heads of their opposition) was excessive.

For me, there’s no choosing between the self-indulgence of drunkards and the self-righteousness of killjoys, so I occupied myself with trying to keep track of Terry Francona’s revolving lineup card. Following the likes of Kevin Cash, Eric Hinske, and Brandon Moss became tedious. I simply succumbed to the realm of the sensory: the touch of the sun, the caress of the breeze, the last strokes of summer before she yields to the fall.

Hail, October.

1 October 2007 ∙ 6:11 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: games in-person ∙ Twins

Game 161: September 29, 2007
Twins	2	BS, L: Nick Blackburn (1, 0-2)	78-83, 2 game losing streak 20-24-7 series record
Red Sox	5	W: Tim Wakefield (17-12) H: Javier Lopez (13) S: Hideki Okajima (5)	96-65, 2 game winning streak 33-14-5 series record 2007 AL East Champions
Highlights: Jacoby Ellsbury needs to brush up on his baseball rule knowledge. The rookie outfielder tried to advance to second when he had already grounded out. His insistence on standing on first while the Twins tried to snare Kevin Youkilis in a run down seemed to confound the Minnesota defense, so perhaps his gaffe yielded an unexpected benefit. Terry Francona, Brad Mills, and Coco Crisp were highly amused.

Tim Wakefield is the only player who experienced the previous AL East title still with the team. If the cost for his post-clinch carousing was two solo shots, it was a price the Red Sox offense could match and beat.

Especially with the regression of J.D. Drew to his expected levels of production. His poor performance in May and July are dragging down what has been an outstanding September (.342 BA, .454 OBP, .618 slugging). The right fielder fell a double short of hitting for the cycle, but more importantly his extra base hits provided the prelude and coda to the win that secured home field advantage throughout the postseason. (Later in the evening Cleveland would fall to Kansas City, leaving Boston with the best record in baseball and the edge in the season series against the AL Central champions.)

Drew’s fourth-inning triple soared over Torii Hunter’s head at the juncture of the left and center field walls. He was plated by Kevin Youkilis’s gap double that roped into left-center. It was Youkilis’s first extra base since his return to the lineup.

With two men on and two out in the seventh Drew got a hold of a hanging slider and deposited it into the bleachers for the lead.

Just before the game-breaker Coco Crisp had scored on a bloop single to shallow center off the bat of Mike Lowell. Had Hunter made a play like Crisp did against the Twins center fielder in the second, the inning would have been over. Hopefully managers and coaches voting on the Gold Glove took note.

Javier Lopez appeared to have broken up his tendency to allow the first batter he faces to reach on a walk or line drive. He sat three batters with consecutive ground outs to first. Although these easy outs came against the weakest part of the order, it was a step towards establishing some consistency and confidence in the sidearmer’s stuff.

With Jonathan Papelbon otherwise indisposed, Hideki Okajima was tapped to perform closing duties. Joe Mauer and Hunter both singled with alarming nonchalance.

With runners at the corners, Okajima rebounded by freezing Justin Morneau for the first out; the called final strike was open to interpretation. Michael Cuddyer rapped a comebacker to the mound and a 1-4-3 double play ended the threat and the game, the first win for the American League East champions.

30 September 2007 ∙ 9:24 AM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Drew (J.D.) ∙ Okajima ∙ Twins

Game 160: September 28, 2007
Twins	2	L: Kevin Slowey (4-1)	78-83, 1 game losing streak 20-24-7 series record
Red Sox	5	W: Daisuke Matsuzaka (15-12) S: Jonathan Papelbon (37)	95-65, 1 game winning streak 33-14-5 series record 2007 AL East Champions
Highlights: Yūshōki means a championship flag or pennant; 優 symbolizes superior, skilled, or excellence, 勝 means victory, and 旗 translates to flag. After leading the division since April 18, the Red Sox prevailed in their division last night. The last clinching game I had attended was for the wild card; coincidentally it was a match-up against the Orioles. Until last night, September 25, 2003 was one of the best nights at Fenway I’ve had.

When I go to games after work I usually park at Wellington, the most convenient T stop between my office and home. The parking attendant there knows that I go to games and we chat about the team’s progress (or lack thereof) even though she is more of a basketball fan.

This past Tuesday the lot was packed. I wove through row after row until I found a guy I thought would be leaving shortly. It was a prime spot right in view of the station and kiosk. I paused behind his behind his truck for about five minutes. The attendant saw me from her booth and gestured as if to say, “What the dealio? Is that guy not moving?”

I shrugged in response and shifted into first to hunt for another spot, but she shook her head and made a stop sign. She walked over to the driver of the truck and asked him to leave. He hadn’t realized I had been waiting and left quickly. Before returning to her post she nodded at me. I smiled and waved my gratitude.

She was in the booth again yesterday. With her I don’t feel restricted by jinxes. “We’re going to do it tonight,” I stated.

As a Celtics fan, she was intimate with futility. Smiling skeptically she wished me good luck.

I arrived at Fenway around 4:30. The first picture I took was of the white 1988, 1990, and 1995 banners that signified winning the AL East pennant.

The timbre of the game was keenly intense. Having only been to one postseason game, this is the second-most rapt I had seen a Fenway crowd. There was an explosion of smiley faced yellow beachballs but it quickly subsided. A few people tried to start the wave but it thankfully never caught on. I was only distracted by text message updates from a friend observing the events in Charm City. After seemingly endless barrages of Bronxian RBIs I finally replied, “Ok just let me know if Os score.”

Polite Heckler™ Matt was so engulfed not even Nick Punto’s ramshackle performance at second diverted his attention. Cotton Candy Girl, formerly Diet Coke Girl, did, however.

Even the relief corps contributed to the ardor of the evening. While sitting on their benches they periodically pounded on the bullpen ceiling in a steady, menacing beat.

We 37,000 or so congregants were transfixed by Daisuke Matsuzaka’s eight-inning performance, especially since he came out for that final inning with 105 pitches already on the balance sheet. “Is Tito waiting for [Torii] Hunter to hit a two-run game-tying homer?” muttered the cynic behind me. Of course that man didn’t bother to stay for the entirety of the Yankees/Orioles game.

Mike Timlin and Javier Lopez had been warming since the seventh. In that frame Matsuzaka gave up two runs, one of them a solo shot to Justin Morneau who deposited a souvenir into the section next to mine. That will happen when facing MVP-caliber hitters.

Calling the Red Sox starter a rookie is something of a misnomer. This is a man who as a teenager pitched a 17-inning game, closed the ninth the next day for a win, and pitched a no-hitter in the championship game, all on his nation’s biggest stage. Matsuzaka’s eight-strikeout performance last night is just the first rung of the ladder as he elevates his game into postseason form.

The heart of Boston’s order beat as one last night to surge to an early lead. In the first David Ortiz smacked a two-out double off the wall over Jason Kubels’s head and was driven in by Mike Lowell’s liner to the opposite field. J.D. Drew golfed a shot to left that evaded Kubel’s pursuit to plate Lowell. Ortiz would tack on another run in the eighth with his 35th homer, a shot off majestic trajectory that soared through Fenway’s luster to land in the Monster seats.

Jonathan Papelbon defied the Sports Illustrated cover jinx and pounded out his 37th save of the season in flawless fashion. He would display less than chic fashion sense later in the evening after his Yankee counterpart Mariano Rivera failed where Papelbon succeeded.

As this situation was unprecedented, even as Papelbon pitched to Michael Cuddyer I nervously wondered where I could meet up with Jere, who was in the same section as me, to watch the rest of the Baltimore tilt. Red Sox management provided for us all by playing the game on the jumbotron. I tried to quell my propensity to yell obscenities at the screen while watching sporting events.

Do the tendrils of Red Sox memory extend so far as to still grow unknown in the souls of players like Jay Payton and Chad Bradford? Payton drove in the tying runs with a triple to right in the ninth against the Hammer of God, who lately has been more like the Doornail of a Minor Mesopotamian Deity.

Chad Bradford surrendered a leadoff double by Derek Jeter in the top of the 10th. When pinch runner Bronson Sardinha advanced to third on Bobby Abreu’s ground out to first, Dave Trembley walked two batters to get the force at every station. Oddly enough, the last two outs came by air.

The Orioles found themselves in a near-replica of the situation the Yankees did in the top of the frame. Tike Redman doubled with one out and Joe Torre gave the four-finger salute to Nick Markakis and Miguel Tejada.

Former ranch hand Kevin Millar froze on Edwar Ramirez’s change-up for the third strike, reminding the thousands remaining why he was not entirely missed.

Melvin Mora bunted towards third, a do-or-die tactic that actually worked. The remaining Fenway faithful erupted into frenetic euphoria as Redman crossed home. It was like going to your rich buddy John Henry’s crib for a game on his massive HDTV. And it would only get better.

Pictures and accounts of the championship-clinching celebrations to follow.

29 September 2007 ∙ 3:50 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: 2007 American League East Champions ∙ Japanese language ∙ Matsuzaka ∙ Twins

Game 159: September 27, 2007
Twins	5	W: Boof Bonser (8-12) H: Juan Rincon (14) H: Matt Guerrier (14) S: Joe Nathan (36)	78-81, 1 game winning streak 20-24-7 series record
Red Sox	4	L: Josh Beckett (20-7)	94-65, 1 game losing streak 33-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 2
Highlights: Faraway, so close.

Green light, 7-Eleven

David Ortiz must have had the green light in the bottom of the ninth, but Joe Nathan pitched to the slugger warily. Ortiz had already demolished a pitch in the fifth to tie the game. The Twins closer wouldn’t be the convenient one-stop spot to clinch the division.

Your wheels are turning but you’re upside down

The Yankees beat the Devil Rays as the Red Sox attempted to rally in the ninth. While the bats were not entirely stifled, Boston was unable to convert key scoring opportunities. Mike Lowell grounded into double plays in the third and seventh, neutralizing two of Ortiz’s four hits. In fact, Ortiz reached base in each of five plate appearances.

You say when he hits you, you don’t mind
Because when he hurts you, you feel alive

Josh Beckett may have slightly tarnished his Cy Young credentials by relinquishing two homers and taking a loss, but he struck out six and didn’t surrender a single base on balls. As the team heads into the playoffs, perhaps the frustration from dropping his final start will stoke the flame of his contained ferocity against their ALDS opposition.

Red light, grey morning
You stumble out of a hole in the ground
A vampire or a victim
It depends on who’s around

Jacoby Ellsbury, who had been replacing Coco Crisp while the senior center fielder has been battling a virus, left the game in the fifth after a few hard fouls off his legs that caused leg cramps. J.D. Drew shifted over to center and Bobby Kielty took over in right. Drew continued to build upon his recent success; the outfielder extracted two walks and drove in the first run of the evening with a shattered-bat single to center.

And if you look, you look through me
And when you talk, you talk at me
And when I touch you, you don’t feel a thing

Hideki Okajima retook the mound in the eighth, his first appearance since September 14. Beguiling batters with his precipitous head drop, he induced a fly ball out off the bat of Justin Morneau, gave up a single on a rope to Michael Cuddyer, and then whiffed Garrett Jones and Matthew LeCroy to complete his inning. He looked sharp and refreshed; the antidote to Eric Gagne’s toxin.

And if you listen, I can’t call
And if you jump, you just might fall
And if you shout, I’ll only hear you

A homer into the Monster seats in the eighth by Jason Varitek kept the contest close, but the backstop didn’t carry his power into the ninth. With the bases loaded and one out Varitek flailed at Joe Nathan’s slider for the second out. Kevin Youkilis fared worse when he pinch hit for Kielty, striking out on three pitches to end the game.

Just the bang
And the clatter
As an angel
Hits the ground

If the local nine can reverse last night’s outcome, the battered Angels club will be in the offing. I’ll be there tonight in the same seats as I had Wednesday, hoping to witness a divisional clinch.

28 September 2007 ∙ 11:51 AM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Beckett ∙ Okajima ∙ Ortiz ∙ Twins ∙ U2

Game 158: September 26, 2007
Athletics	6	L: Jerry Blevins (0-1)	75-84, 3 game losing streak 22-24-4 series record
Red Sox	11	W: Mike Timlin (2-1)	94-64, 2 game winning streak 33-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 2
Highlights: Through the magic of Jerevision I learned that I made my regional cable network debut last night. Please, no autographs. Talk to my people; they can give you an address where you can order an official autographed 8x10 glossy.

Jon Lester’s outing wavered between brilliant and banal. He fell one short of his career mark of 10 for strikeouts in a game but also relinquished two home runs. In my mind he is neck and neck to get a playoff start with Tim Wakefield, but the latter has the edge in experience. Perhaps the best route is to consider them a starting dyad with the knuckleballer getting the first part of the game. That would hopefully render the southpaw’s arsenal all the more effective given the different angle of attack and velocity change.

The Red Sox batters bailed out the spotty pitching with potent offensive bombardments. Manny Ramirez’s reinsertion into the lineup, even in the second spot, sent a jolt of electricity through the batting order. The left fielder knocked in three sound singles and walked; after this base on balls in the sixth Brandon Moss replaced him as a pinch runner.

Dustin Pedroia all but nailed down Rookie of the Year honors with his 3-for-5 showing. His leadoff longball into the second row of the Monster seats sundered the 5-5 tie. His shot fractured the fragile remnants of Oakland’s pitching and defense.

Next Ramirez finagled a base on balls and Brandon Moss replaced him as a pinch runner. David Ortiz powered a fly ball off the left field wall that was far enough to get him to second but close enough to trammel Moss at third.

Who else but Mike Lowell would bring the two runners home, his single just missing the top of the Monster. The third baseman is the new single-season RBI leader for Red Sox playing the hot corner. He had already driven in three runs in the third and fourth innings. His fourth inning RBI single was distressing; he barreled down the first base line to beat the throw to first and came up hobbling. Visions of Eric Hinske and Kevin Youkilis at the corners thankfully dissipated as Lowell waved off the trainers and remained in the game.

To see how even seemingly minute defense substitutions can impact the game one need only look so far as Nick Swisher in center. Pressed into service due to the injuries to Travis Buck and Mark Kotsay, Swisher does not fit the lithe and limber profile of the typical middle ball hawk.

He went back on a can of corn off J.D. Drew’s bat, ball inevitably trailing into his glove. From my vantage point in front row of the center field bleachers he receded from view. Instinctively I stood up to peer over the wall to see what should have been the first out of the inning.

Instead I saw the ball slant away from Swisher’s glove to hit the warning track and bounce nearly as high as the wall.

Polite Heckler™ Matt was on hand to advise the hapless Oakland outfielder. Bob Geren pulled Jerry Blevins right after the miscue. “Nick! He’s not pulling that pitcher because he’s doing badly. It’s because he’s embarrassed for you.”

For once in the Polite Hecker’s life his quarry acknowledged the jibe. Swisher looked up at him and smiled. Thus encouraged, Matt followed with, “Nick! It’s okay! I don’t think anyone noticed.” During the warm-up pitches, Swisher was also counseled to visit mlb.com and peruse the instructional videos put forth by Harold Reynolds. This last rejoinder elicited another smirk from the outfielder, laughter from the bleachers, and a visit by the usher.

Because of the warning, an audience of only one was privy to the final barb. “I was going to invite Nick out for drinks after the game,” grinned Matt. “I invented a drink called the ‘Nick Swisher.’ The bartender would make the drink and then throw it over the patron’s head.”

Terrible posture, Empy. Matt has his thinking cap on.

Screen capture courtesy of A Red Sox Fan from Pinstripe Territory.

27 September 2007 ∙ 12:03 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 3
Tags: Athletics ∙ Lester ∙ Lowell (Mike) ∙ Polite Heckling™ ∙ Swisher

Game 157: September 25, 2007
Athletics	3	L: Chad Gaudin (11-13)	75-83, 2 game losing streak 22-24-4 series record
Red Sox	7	W: Curt Schilling (9-8) H: Manny Delcarmen (11) H: Eric Gagne (4) H: Jonathan Papelbon (1)	93-64, 1 game winning streak 32-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 3
Highlights: Manny Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis returned to action in the first game of the final home stand of the season. The team honed its postseason edge as the games, like the daylight hours of fall, dwindle. Judging by the performances last night, the chance for a few of the players to make the playoff roster also diminished.

Invariably when I talk with someone about my Red Sox fan credentials my sordid past as a Mets fan in Hawai‘i is uncovered. Since the islands have no professional sports franchises of their own, people there root for teams that have players with Hawaiian connections. Sid Fernandez and Ron Darling, both born in Hawai‘i, were on that 1986 team.

It is half a world, half a lifetime distant, but the same tendencies still color my perceptions. I could not help but cheer for Kurt Suzuki a little; he is from the island I grew up on and went to the high school I attended.

I revealed this parochial proclivity to the friend I went to the game with last night. As it turns out, he was an undergraduate at MIT in 1975 and had just moved to the Hub from Ohio. He was amongst the 20 or so people perched on the billboard on Lansdowne Street desperately peering into Fenway to catch a glimpse of the World Series. Back then he was not cheering for the same team he does today.

Our respective rehabilitations prove one doesn’t necessarily need to be born into Red Sox nation. There is a naturalization process that can be successfully completed with diligent study and steady devotion. If I recall correctly, one of the precepts of citizenship is to not boo the players on the team one follows.

It’s a lesson easily forgotten when J.D. Drew is at the plate. There are many strikes against him, and I’m not just talking about the ones he takes while in the box. His salary, his agent, his holdout, his seeming aloofness, the man who he replaced in right field: all these factors insinuated themselves into the collective unconscious of the fans to beget the ideal scapegoat.

We did not boo despite Drew’s strikeout in the first with two men in scoring position. “Perhaps he’s imagining everyone is yelling his last name,” my friend suggested hopefully.

Whether it be the power of positive thinking or regression to the mean, Drew ended the evening with three hits, three RBI, a walk, and an astute nab of a dying liner that could have been a hit but was instead a sacrifice fly and the first out of the ninth.

Curt Schilling gave up a homer to rookie standout Daric Barton in the first but tamped down the Athletics’ lineup for the remainder of the evening. The only other extra base hit allowed by the veteran righty was a double over the head of Brandon Moss and off the left field wall. Schilling can’t, or perhaps won’t, unleash mid-90s heat, but the stuff he did have was precise and studied. Perhaps the only reason why Barton was able to get to Schilling was because the pitcher hasn’t been able to analyze the newcomer’s tendencies yet.

Manny Ramirez electrified the crowd with his return to the lineup. It was the first time he had ever batted second and it seemed to suit him. He roped a single to right in his first at bat and scored the tying run on Mike Lowell’s double. While he popped out to second in his second at bat, he worked seven pitches out of Chad Gaudin in the fifth for a leadoff walk.

Kevin Youkilis was not as prosperous in his homecoming, going 0-for-2 and painfully fouling off yet another ball off of himself.

In the eighth Eric Gagne came in with a three-run lead. He gave up a leadoff single to Shannon Stewart but managed two fly ball outs. In an monumental at bat against Jack Cust, the reborn uberprospect earned a base on balls. While Gagne tumbled, the Devil Rays surged ahead of the Yankees on Jorge Velandia’s first home run, which also happened to be a grand slam.

It was the loudest ovation Gagne has heard on the mound as a Red Sox player since his debut, and it was not for him.

At last Terry Francona was forced to bring in Jonathan Papelbon for the the last out of the inning. One pitch, one pop out to short, and Papelbon notched his first hold of 2007.

When, not if, Francona at last abandons the notion of reforming Gagne, he need only look at the young man who nailed down the seventh inning with two strikeouts, a base on balls, and no hits. Manny Delcarmen may be the one to further prove his mettle for a spot on the postseason roster.

David Ortiz made his team’s lead bullpen experiment-proof with a two-run longball in the bottom of the eighth, adding to the sacrifice fly Bobby Kielty contributed. Kielty drove in Julio Lugo, who drew a walk from his brother Ruddy in their first fraternal face-off.

Francona used Bryan Corey as long as he could. Unlike Joe Torre, he did not need to burn through bullpen arms that he already knows would be seeing extra toil in October. Corey labored the bottom third of the order and surrendered two runs in the process.

Without the dazzling play of Dustin Pedroia, Francona may have had to resort to Javier Lopez, Mike Timlin, or even Hideki Okajima. The second baseman extended as far as his abbreviated frame could and was able to glove Stewart’s arc to shallow right. He didn’t resort to his typical tumble; instead he recovered to pivot and catch Jack Hannahan off the keystone bag.

As a reward, perhaps Francona will let Peewee win today’s cribbage match.

26 September 2007 ∙ 9:19 AM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Athletics ∙ Gagne ∙ games in-person ∙ Pedroia ∙ Schilling

Game 156: September 23, 2007
Red Sox	4	L: Tim Wakefield (16-12)	92-64, 1 game losing streak 32-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 6
Devil Rays	5	W: Edwin Jackson (5-15) H: Jon Switzer (1) H: Gary Glover (15) H: Dan Wheeler (18) S: Al Reyes (25)	64-92, 1 game winning streak 15-30-6 series record
Highlights: It’s peanut butter jelly time! Peanut butter jelly time! Peanut butter jelly! Peanut butter jelly! Peanut butter jelly with a baseball bat! Also, Jerry Remy has been watching too many Cialis commercials.

Tim Wakefield turned in his fourth consecutive non-quality start against a team he usually owns. He was also defeated for the first time in the aseptic dome in St. Petersburg.

Delmon Young must have been inspired by the internet meme that has slid its way onto Tropicana Field; he knocked in a two-run homer in the second inning against the pitcher that used to give him fits.

Big-time nerd Alex Cora homered in the eighth. The dancing banana exhorted his inner geek, unleashing an unlikely power surge. The adrenaline rush also gave him an idea for an uproarious caption for a picture of his polydactyl cat: “I can has Alfonseca awtograf? Hiz mi idle.”

Not only is Jacoby Ellsbury fast in relation to the usual plodding sluggers that were listed in Red Sox lineups of years past, but he is genuinely possessed of blistering speed. It’s not everyday you see a runner steal a base on a pitchout as he did in the third.

The Red Sox mounted a rally in the sixth. Edwin Jackson unraveled, relinquishing four singles and two walks. The visiting exacted three runs out of the scrimmage but fell one run short.

Boston is now 22-26 in one-run games, but they eked out a series win and postseason berth while on the road.

It comes down to six games in the Fens. Welcome home, boys.

24 September 2007 ∙ 2:42 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Devil Rays ∙ internet memes ∙ Remy & Orsillo hijinks ∙ Wakefield

Game 155: September 22, 2007
Red Sox	8	BS: Javier Lopez (2) W: Eric Gagne (4-2) S: Jonathan Papelbon (36)	92-63, 2 game winning streak 32-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 6
Devil Rays	6	H: Dan Wheeler (17) BS, L: Al Reyes (4, 2-4)	63-92, 5 game losing streak 15-30-6 series record
Highlights: Outside of baseball seikan means to survive or to come back from the dead. The first character 生 in this context means life while the second symbol 還 means return. In the world of Japanese baseball, the word means to reach home plate. The Red Sox did both last night to bring baseball to Fenway in October.

Daisuke Matsuzaka’s line looks terrible in isolation: six and two-thirds innings pitched, six hits, five earned runs, three walks, seven strikeouts, and one home run. He was responsible Carlos Peña’s solo circuit clout in the fourth, an inning where the starter also gave up another run on consecutive singles.

After two quick outs in the seventh Matsuzaka walked two batters, prompting Terry Francona to call in Javier Lopez to face Peña. It was the correct move according to the book, but the small sample size of the resurgent slugger’s success against Lopez may rewrite that particular chapter. The book may also need an addendum about motivated players who exact a measure of revenge against a team that spurned them.

Lopez got ahead of Peña 0-2 but then wafted unappetizing pitches away that the Northeastern graduate would not bite. The count went full and the Devil Rays first baseman knew exactly what the southpaw side-armer would be serving.

With one swing Tampa Bay blazed ahead of the visiting team; Peña’s three-run homer enlivened the outnumbered Tampa Bay fans. As the Yankees had already won the second extra-innings tilt against the Blue Jays in as many days, any loss last night, let alone a late-inning comeback by one of the worst teams in the league, would be distressing.

That shot undid the lead built by perhaps the most unlikely of sources, J.D. Drew. The right fielder doubled in the fourth and homered in the sixth, providing three RBIs for his teammates.

Dan Wheeler assumed the mound in the eighth and dispatched the heart of the Red Sox order in order. David Ortiz, Mike Lowell, and the rejuvenated Drew couldn’t retake the lead.

Meanwhile in Detroit, the Tigers were about to fall to their division’s cellar dwellers. A Motor City loss and a Hub comeback meant October baseball at Fenway.

Jason Varitek joined his Scott Boras stablemate in improbable clutch hits with a leadoff longball in the ninth to tie the game.

In his postgame interview Eric Hinske would say he never heard it so loud in a dome before. This is from a man who played most of his career in a dome. The amiable bench player contributed to the win with his ground ball skipped along the first base line.

Coco Crisp worked Al Reyes for eight pitches but ultimately popped out to third. His at bat may have fatigued the 37-year old closer and allowed Julio Lugo to get a bead on the pitcher’s repertoire.

Lugo turned his wiry frame on the first pitch he saw, a fastball in. The ball soared into the stands just a bit further than Varitek’s. The shortstop’s celebratory jaunt around the bases was premature since Tampa Bay would have three more outs to attempt another comeback, but the shortstop reveled with the knowledge that Jonathan Papelbon was warmed up.

There was no championship pile-up in Tropicana Field but rather restrained handshakes and hugs. Whatever postgame festivities there were the media were not privy to them. They were almost Patriot-like in their return to postseason baseball.

This is not a bunch of idiots; this may be something better.

23 September 2007 ∙ 8:48 AM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: clinch ∙ Devil Rays ∙ Drew (J.D.) ∙ Japanese language ∙ Matsuzaka ∙ Varitek

Game 154: September 21, 2007
Red Sox	8	W: Josh Beckett (20-6) H: Manny Delcarmen (10) H: Javier Lopez (12)	91-63, 1 game winning streak 31-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 7 Postseason magic number: 2
Devil Rays	1	L: Scott Kazmir (13-9)	63-91, 4 game losing streak 15-29-6 series record
Highlights: The one thing old school about Tropicana is that the bullpens sit in foul territory without heed to safety or common sense. In the fifth, Jacoby Ellsbury hurtled his body into the Red Sox bullpen at full speed, blithely maneuvering over pitchers’ mounds, training equipment, and chairs. As he slid over the hills the ball precariously peeked out of his glove. He lay supine near the left field wall surrounded by relievers; the rookie outfielder was seemingly in shock over the rashness of his decision to pursue Greg Norton’s fly ball regardless of consequences. A few of the pitchers made the out sign; Ellsbury had held on for the second out.

Josh Beckett became the 27th man to win 20 or more regular season games for the Red Sox in a season. Early in the game it didn’t seem likely that Beckett would endure for the required innings for a decision. He threw 34 pitches in the first, eight of which were to Delmon Young for an epic standoff that resulted in a game-tying double to right.

It wasn’t one of his longest outings of the year, but it may have been one of the most pivotal collectively and individually. The Red Sox ended their four-game schneid and Beckett tallied his first 20-win season. The worries over his chronic blister problem and disappointing inaugural Boston season have dissipated and reformed into a Cy Young-caliber year.

The Red Sox bats that were silenced in Toronto made a statement in this contest, although Dioner Navarro amplified the noise with his two errors. Jacoby Ellsbury, who had doubled to lead off and advanced to third on a sacrifice bunt, so unnerved Tampa Bay’s backstop with his feints to home that Navarro threw galley-west to third. By the time Akinori Iwamura caught up with the ball Ellsbury had crossed home for the first score of the evening.

Scott Kazmir struck out David Ortiz and Mike Lowell to finish off the first, proving Navarro should have just kept the ball in his pocket. Navarro also hurled badly to the keystone sack in the second in an effort to stop Coco Crisp’s steal, but instead the ball pranced into shallow center. No runs would come of that error, but in the next inning Kazmir unraveled.

The bounty on Red Sox first basemen must be high. Eric Hinske was hit by Kazmir’s first pitch of the third inning. Dustin Pedroia walked without swinging while Ortiz took the opposite tack; the designated hitter was all over the first pitch he saw, lining it far enough into right to plate Hinske. Young missed the cutoff man and Pedroia advanced to third.

Given Bobby Kielty’s splits Kazmir was cautious, but overly so. He pitched wildly, allowing Pedroia to score and Ortiz to proceed to second.

That was all the breathing room Beckett and the relief trio of Manny Delcarmen, Javier Lopez, and even Eric Gagne needed, but Jason Varitek, Ortiz, and Lowell homered in the late innings for more cushion.

There could stand to be more cushion in the AL East division race, but at last the Yankees provided some padding with their 14-inning defeat by the Toronto Blue Jays last night.

Every milestone a member of this year’s club attains leads inevitably to an appreciation of Red Sox history. The highest ERA+ of any Red Sox pitcher with 20 or more wins was Pedro Martinez’s 1999 campaign of 245, and that wasn’t even his career high ERA+. In 2000 Martinez’s racked up an inhuman 285, the highest in history.

Wins are a misleading statistic to gauge starters, but in the context of his team’s recent woes and the playoff drive, the importance of Beckett’s win cannot be diminished to simple numbers. This is a mere “W” as Ellsbury’s catch was “FO7.”

22 September 2007 ∙ 10:45 AM ∙ History & September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: 20-game winners ∙ Beckett ∙ Devil Rays

Game 153: September 19, 2007
Red Sox	1	L: Clay Buchholz (3-1)	90-63, 4 game losing streak 31-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 9 Postseason magic number: 3
Blue Jays	6	W: Jesse Litsch (6-9) H: Casey Janssen (24) H: Scott Downs (22) S: Jeremy Accardo (28)	77-75, 3 game winning streak 22-20-7 series record
Highlights: Buchholz looked sharp for the first four innings of his third major league start. Rookie magic was replaced with rookie mishaps in the fifth, however, as Gregg “Superfluous G” Zaun led off with a double. Adam Lind and Russ Adams followed with consecutive singles to tie the game. The lanky starter panicked when Ray Olmedo bunted, flailing an errant toss to Mike Lowell.

Fortunately, Bobby Kielty backed up the play in foul territory and relayed the ball back to Mike Lowell. Rather than immediately returning the ball back to the pitcher, the third baseman tarried around third base, shoulders slumped, feigning dejection. In the split second Russ Adams lifted his foot off the sack Lowell swatted him with his glove, ball still ensconced within.

Joe West was on top of the play and immediately called Adams out. It was the second pseudo-hidden ball trick turned this season, the first was turned by Julio Lugo against rookie Diamondback Alberto Callaspo on June 8.

The lesson is to never take anything for granted.

One would think this is a lesson Lugo would know since it was he who victimized that unwitting tyro in Arizona, but the veteran shortstop had a lapse of his own last night in the seventh inning. While running out what appeared to be a routine grounder to his counterpart, Lugo let up. Ray Olmedo flubbed the play momentarily; the span of time where Lugo decelerated equaled the amount of time granted by the gaffe.

If Lugo were safe, Jacoby Ellsbury would have scored a run to tie the game and the frame would have continued.

Red Sox fans worldwide are panicked now that the margin between their team and the Yankees is the slimmest since April. I doubt the Red Sox players themselves are astonished by their rivals’ rebound; they were probably more astounded by New York’s long period of mediocrity.

Adherents to Boston baseball had all but declared the Bronx Bromides dead and buried in August. Carlos Camejo can attest, however, that things are not always what they seem.

Camejo was cruising along a Venezuelan highway placidly – until he got into an accident. He was wheeled to the hospital, pronounced dead, and slated for an autopsy.

He awoke to searing pain on his face as a coroner’s scalpel incised his face to begin the postmortem. He, like the Yankees, was not dead.

In the aftermath of being swept by the Blue Jays, many a Red Sox message board are overflowing with premature proclamations of the demise of their team. The division title is in jeopardy, but the postseason probability remains high.

For the sake of Camejo, forego composing witty or profound epitaphs for the 2007 season for any of the remaining contenders. This is where we see who has the mettle for the stretch run.

The anguish of this sweep could be what jolts the Red Sox out of their recent descent. Won’t the medical examiner-wannabes be shocked when their subject sits bolt upright on the morgue slab, poised for a postseason surge?

20 September 2007 ∙ 8:54 AM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Blue Jays ∙ Buchholz (Clay) ∙ Lugo

Game 152: September 18, 2007
Red Sox	3	H: Manny Delcarmen (9) BS, L: Eric Gagne (4, 3-2)	90-62, 3 game losing streak 31-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 9 Postseason magic number: 4
Blue Jays	4	W: A.J. Burnett (9-7) S: Scott Downs (1)	76-75, 2 game winning streak 22-20-7 series record
Highlights: The Red Sox scraped two runs from under the clutches of the outstanding Burnett, who would be a Cy Young contender this season if he hadn’t been injured. In the fourth Mike Lowell planted a single to the hot corner where Hector Luna couldn’t uproot it. Boston’s third baseman scored on Jason Varitek’s double to left. Dustin Pedroia sneaked a single by Aaron Hill and notched the go-ahead run on David Ortiz’s left-center double that skidded all the way to the wall. After Gagne’s eighth inning, three-run meltdown, Julio Lugo brought his team within one run with a two-out solo shot to left. But Jacoby Ellsbury watched the third strike pass him by and Jon Lester’s solid start was squandered.

Throw a fucking strike, Red Sox fucka
You’re a run-walking in Red Sox fucka
You’re a Red Sox fucka, yes, it’s true
Nobody fucks Red Sox quite like you

Make a fucking pitch, Red Sox fucka
You’re the one that fucked the Red Sox, Red Sox fucka
You don’t eat or sleep or mow the lawn
You just fuck the Red Sox all night long

[Farting noses]

MALE FAN: What’s going on here?

FEMALE FAN: What garbage!

ANOTHER MALE FAN: Well, what do you expect? He’s Canadian.

FEMALE FAN: Why are you blaming Canadians? Francona should have pulled Gagne after he walked in the tying run!

19 September 2007 ∙ 12:17 AM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Blue Jays ∙ Gagne ∙ South Park

Game 151: September 17, 2007
Red Sox	1	L: Tim Wakefield (16-11)	90-61, 2 game losing streak 31-13-5 series record Magic number: 9
Blue Jays	6	W: Dustin McGowan (11-9)	75-75, 1 game winning streak 21-20-7 series record
Highlights: I am Dustin McGowan of the Clan McGowan. I was born in 1982 in the village of Savannah on the shores of Abbhainn Savannah. And I am immortal.

McGOWAN: I have been alive for nine innings. And I cannot die.

RAMIREZ: From the dawn of time we came; moving silently down through the centuries, living many secret lives, struggling to reach the time of the Gathering; when the few who remain will battle to the last. No one has ever known we were among you... until now.

McGOWAN: Dude, I have no idea what you are talking about, but I feel pretty cool because I just pitched a complete game.

RAMIREZ: When only a few of us are left, we will feel an irresistible pull towards a far away land, to fight for the Prize.

McGOWAN: My team is totally eliminated, man. No prize for us.

RAMIREZ: The Yankee. He is the strongest of all the immortals. He’s the perfect warrior. If he wins the Prize, mortal man would suffer an eternity of darkness.

McGOWAN: How do you fight such a savage?

RAMIREZ: With heart, faith and steal. In the end there can be only one.

McGOWAN: Manny, you are really freaking me out now. Maybe you should get some professional help.

RAMIREZ: Crude and slow clansman, your attack was no better then that of a clumsy child.

McGOWAN: I didn’t even pitch to you! And I struck nine of your teammates out! This cannot be, it’s the devil’s work.

RAMIREZ: You cannot die, McGowan, accept it.

McGOWAN: I hate you.

RAMIREZ: Good. That is a perfect place to start.

18 September 2007 ∙ 2:41 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Blue Jays ∙ complete game ∙ Highlander ∙ McGowan

Game 150: September 16, 2007
Yankees	4	W: Joba Chamberlain (2-0) S: Mariano Rivera (28)	85-64, 1 game winning streak 26-20-2 series record
Red Sox	3	L: Curt Schilling (8-8)	90-60, 1 game losing streak 31-13-5 series record Magic number: 9
Highlights: Tugi! Achute me Joba. Ji ama tuta Nebraska. Me jenki. Ma kilin na pich rupha. Hamporo dongol na di kato? Ma... patisa Jason pul... hampu. (Translation from Huttese to English: Greetings! I am Joba. I come from Nebraska. I am a pitcher. My head is too hot. Where is a nearby pharmacy? My... friend Jason needs... medicine.)

Roger Clemens’s apprentices, past and present, were pivotal in the game. Clemens himself lumbered through six innings before turning over the reins to Joba Chamberlain, who let the home team back in the game. Curt Schilling lasted for seven and two-third innings; he was responsible for the game-tying and game-breaking home runs.

Chamberlain is invoked as some sort of second coming of Jonathan Papelbon the way he is presented by the media. Papelbon has had four streaks with no earned runs scored against him of 14 games or more; Chamberlain’s streak ended last night at 12 games with 16 innings pitched.

Mike Lowell blasted a two-out homer into the Monster seats in the eighth to snap Chamberlain’s spell. Lowell’s thunderous clout was his response to Derek Jeter’s three-run shot in the top of the frame.

The home team would fall short in the ninth, however, after coming tantalizingly close to a comeback victory. A shaky Mariano Rivera relinquished a leadoff walk to Jason Varitek, who advanced to third on two groundball outs.

Julio Lugo laced a double to the left-center gap to plate Varitek, bringing the team within one run of a game and series win. Left-handed rookie Jacoby Ellsbury hasn’t seen enough of Rivera to know just how precipitously the closer’s cutter comes in on lefties and was struck soundly in the kneecap; despite the blow he jogged off the pain and stayed on first. It was an ideal spot to watch Dustin Pedroia turn in the at bat of the evening.

Pedroia demonstrated his superb reflexes and judgment, alternatively fouling off or letting fly by eight of Rivera’s pitches. In the end the rookie prevailed over the veteran with a free pass to jam the bases.

David Ortiz did not come through, however. His pop fly was snagged by a backpeddling Jeter. The Yankees shortstop punctuated his team’s win with a fist pump, but it was more animated than usual. His usual move belies a matter-of-factness acknowledgment of the New York club’s superiority, but this time he was emotive, even fired up.

He knows, as Red Sox followers should know, that these two victories in Boston were more flukes than definitive statements of the Yankees’ resurgence. In this series the Red Sox outscored the visitors 20-13 and outhit them 30-23. Boston pitchers didn’t have the edge in strikeouts (23 to the Yankees’ 27) but were superior in bases on balls allowed (New York permitted 17 while the Red Sox had just 10).

The losses were not calamitous for the Red Sox. What was galling is that every defeat would have been devastating to the Yankees, and Boston managed only one. The small comfort the Yankees and their fans feel now that they have not been completely snuffed from contention isn’t as pleasant a sensation as leading the division outright.

17 September 2007 ∙ 1:17 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Chamberlain (Joba) ∙ Clemens ∙ Huttese language ∙ Jeter ∙ Schilling ∙ Yankees

Game 149: September 15, 2007
Yankees	1	L: Chien-Ming Wang (18-7)	84-64, 1 game losing streak 25-20-2 series record
Red Sox	10	W: Josh Beckett (19-6)	90-59, 1 game winning streak 31-12-5 series record Magic number: 9
Highlights: Beckett pulled ahead of Wang in the Cy Young race with his seven-inning, three-hit showing. Wang was chased off the mound in the sixth after David Ortiz’s two-out, two-run double to center in the sixth. The sinkerballer had eight flyball outs compared to six groundball outs, an unusual ratio for him. Ortiz went 3-for-3 and walked twice; his Domino Oreo dessert pizza beard carries powerful on-base mojo.

There is no such thing as momentum in baseball. If any Red Sox fans fell off the bandwagon with yesterday’s abrupt loss, there was still time to clamber back on as the team wove through the gears to cruise to an easy victory. Clay Buchholz got more national screen time not in the form of no-hitter highlights but with a straightforward recitation of the Red Sox lineup.

In the first frame Josh Beckett seemed to have reverted to his 2006 ways. After falling behind in the count he tried to challenge Derek Jeter but instead served up a tater that was lost in the the batter’s eye. The strapping starter settled down and sat 12 batters in a row.

The streak was broken with two out in the seventh. Beckett did not pussyfoot; he hit Jason Giambi with his first pitch. The dugouts were warned and Tim McCarver yammered mindlessly about how such retaliation was uncalled for.

McCarver thought that Beckett was exacting a pound of performance-enhanced flesh from Giambi because of Chien-Ming Wang’s hit of Kevin Youkilis in the fifth. Of course no one believes that Wang is dim enough to hit Youkilis just to face the infinitely more lethal David Ortiz. The former Cardinal’s brain must have been addled by many collisions at home plate because I interpreted Giambi’s plunking as retaliation for the previous series, and I am sure I am not alone.

Momentum may not carry over, but hard feelings do. With the countless replays of every clash between Boston and New York on Fox’s broadcast schedule one would think McCarver and his play-by-play companion Josh Lewin could piece together the correct cause and effect.

The Red Sox responded to Jeter’s homer with a run by Dustin Pedroia. The second baseman sent a bounder up the middle, advanced on Ortiz’s single (a rope to center that the sun-blinded Bobby Abreu didn’t pick up until the last moment), and scored on Mike Lowell’s ricochet off the left field loge seats. The hamster exercise wheel his teammates provided him has indeed stretched him out well.

Peewee, as Terry Francona calls Pedroia, made his signature tumble and turn play on his Yankee counterpart for the second out of the second inning. According to Ken Rosenthal, Francona also calls Pedroia a “little rodent,” but to me he’s like a corgi. These dogs are built low to the ground to avoid the hooves of the ruminants they shepherd and are known to roll beneath the underbellies of them.

The game was knotted at one run apiece for the first four innings creating a taut pitcher’s duel. Youkilis’s beaning in the fifth shuffled the lineup: Eric Hinske rotated from left to first and Jacoby Ellsbury entered as a pinch runner and Hinske’s replacement in the outfield. X-rays were negative on Youkilis’s wrist and the event had another positive outcome: Ellsbury flashed around the horn on Ortiz’s single past a toppling Giambi and scored on J.D. Drew’s opposite field shot.

A numerical oddity to note: all three Yankees outs in the sixth inning were fielded by Julio Lugo and Hinske: Jeter G 6-3, Abreu G 6-3, Rodriguez G 6-3.

The full power of Boston’s offense was unleashed in the sixth and seventh innings.

Hinske clanged a double off the bottom of the left field wall for a double to lead off the sixth. The burly first baseman charged hard but clean into Jorge Posada in his attempt to jar the ball out of the backstop’s glove, but Posada held on for the second out of the inning. The setback was fleeting as Ortiz came through with a fly ball to the right-center gap. Ellsbury flew around the sacks and had a fender bender with Posada at home.

Posada seemed to shy away from contact, perhaps thoughts of Hinske were lingering in the corners of his mind. The catcher didn’t even try to tag Ellsbury; by his actions it seemed he thought there was a force at home.

The Red Sox batted around against the dregs of the Yankee bullpen in the seventh. Edwar Ramirez, Ron Villone, Brian Bruney, Sean Henn, and Ross Ohlendorf all took their turns at inflating the stat lines of the opposing batters.

It was an shoddy day for souvenir seekers. Fans reached into the field of play on Pedroia’s fly ball to right in the sixth and Jason Varitek’s in the seventh. There is so little foul territory there that fans should know not to extend past the wall because the ball may clip the line. Joba Chamberlain reached into the stands from the Yankees bullpen to try glove Hinske’s home run ball, but gravity once again was his mortal enemy.

16 September 2007 ∙ 4:52 PM ∙ September 2007 Game Comments ∙ Permalink ∙ Comments: 0
Tags: Beckett ∙ Ellsbury ∙ Hinske ∙ Yankees ∙ Youkilis

Game 148: September 14, 2007
Yankees	8	W: Brian Bruney (3-1) H: Luis Vizcaino (11) S: Mariano Rivera (27)	84-63, 1 game winning streak 25-20-2 series record
Red Sox	7	H: Mike Timlin (8) BS, L: Jonathan Papelbon (3, 1-3)	89-59, 1 game losing streak 31-12-5 series record Magic number: 11
Highlights: Heshioru is the Japanese verb equivalent to smash, snap, or break. In baseball terms, it means to saw off a batter. With maddening regularity Mariano Rivera does this in nearly every appearance, just as he did to Bobby Kielty in the ninth. The word is also used in a phrase that translates literally to “snapping the nose of the arrogant person,” where in English we would say “bring down a peg or two” or “knock someone off their high horse.”

Just as the hopes of Red Sox fans for a series sweep against the Yankees were shattered last night, so was one of my long-held beliefs.

“May you live in interesting times,” according to Stephen E. DeLong, may not be an ancient Chinese curse after all. A geologist by training, his research covered the English-speaking lineage the of the aphorism thoroughly. The earliest reference given to DeLong was a translation of The Secret of the Golden Flower, published in English in 1931, but that version described no such curse. Cary Baynes translated the work from Chinese to English and Richard Wilhelm from German to English. Perhaps something was lost in translation.

The enigmatic epigram, artificial or actual, still resonates, especially when looking back at this most interesting game.

DeMarlo Hale made an interesting call in the third when he sent David Ortiz on Mike Lowell’s single to center field with one out. The designated hitter was out at the dish because of Melky Cabrera’s faultlessly thrown relay. After Kevin Youkilis walked, J.D. Drew reached on a ham-handed attempt at a ground ball by Jason Giambi.

The ball trickled far enough for Lowell to score, so had Ortiz still been on the basepaths he would have scored, too.

Interestingly enough, one baserunner more, one chemically-enhanced home run less, and the game would have been won by the home team.

Daisuke Matsuzaka and Jason Varitek were on the same page, unlike their three previous collaborations. The rookie right-hander turned in a near-quality start, allow