Getting It Done

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More to say! Theres Varitek to talk about. He started the evening batting righty-on-righty against Mussina because he had done so dreadfully lefty-on-righty all those years. Later, he flied to center off Rivera, tagging the best closer of all time with a second consecutive blown save for the first time in his career. Tek came up again with two outs and the winning run on second in the 10th, and I thought he was going to do it. He faced tired old Paul Quantrill, whod given up the two-run shot to Papi in the 12th the night before, and Jason, now comfortable on the southpaw side . . . popped up.

And so on the 11th! And two Sox pitchers (name em: Myers, Embree) struck out the side! And then Mueller singled and Bellhorn singled (after fanning at two bunt tries) . . . but it came to naught. The Sox couldnt buy a bunt — well, they never could, not since 1918 — and Damons series went from worse to worst as he popped up his sacrifice try. The 12th looked just like last nights (oops, this mornings) 12th — Manny followed by Ortiz — but this time they couldnt get it done, Ortiz robbed by an ump of his first post-season stolen base (but why was he running, anyway?).

How about Wakefield! How about Wakes 13th? A strike-out earned him a base-runner, on the first of the innings three passed balls. (Varitek never catches the knuckler in the regular season; Mirabelli does — and now we know why). Finally, there were guys on second and third and Tim hadnt done a blessed thing wrong. (The walk was intentional.) Wake fanned Sierra to end things but, whoa, that was weird. I was rooting for a pop-up rather than a K at the end, imagining a triumphant nanosecond following the punch-out, then a fourth PB and a loss. All of this is why we love baseball.

To the 14th we went, and Wake set em down one, two, three — Captain Jeter third.

And then deliverance.

I asked Jake subsequent to that fantastic inning, Was Ortizs one of the ten — no, five — greatest at-bats youve ever seen live?

Easy.

Top three?

I think so.

Best?

Maybe. The thing is, everyones so overwrought and exhausted and desperate at that point, you dont think about that. It just seemed to go on forever.

Foul, foul, ripped foul, a . . . homer? . . . no, foul. Foul. Foul. And then the hero broke his bat, the ball dropped into centerfield, kerplop, and Fenway was bedlam once more: three celebrations worthy of a pennant, all due to David (tonight with an assist from Wake). As I said, its why we love the game.

My dear friend Jake had lived in Section 27 of Fenway Park for 16 of the last 27 hours on planet earth; he worked at his office six-to-eight (probably six) of the other 11 hours, hed commuted two and slept in his Andover bed something like one, if you do the math and figure in an hour dedicated to nightcaps, showers and breakfasts. He was . . . well, he was tired, happy — and content to let the series return to New York.

Well take it from here, good buddy.



Back in the Empire State, it was nothing like a homecoming (except for the warm embrace of my family). On Tuesday, I donned my Sox cap and headed to the train for the ride to Grand Central. Though Yankee fans were getting nervous and therefore ugly, I had to wear the cap to work. Our twins were wearing their Red Sox T-shirts to Jennies School for Little Children, Caroline was wearing her B-hat to second grade. Would Daddy chicken out? He would not. How could he, when Caroline was sticking up for the Sox even against the imposing Sister Margaret at CCD class? Id learned from Wendy, our Mary Poppins of a nanny (except better), that Sister Margaret had given Caroline grief over her Sox garb. Apparently the priests and nuns of Saint Johns and Saint Marys were trying to enforce some sort of pro-Yankee fiat within the flock, just like some of the bishops out West are coercing Bush-backing. But even Sister Margaret would not bully a four-year-old. When Wendy arrived to pick up Caroline, and Sister Margaret brought up the subject, Mary Grace looked her square in the eye and declared, Red Sox win. The simplicity and innocence of the child left the old girl dumbstruck. Sister Margaret, good Catholic that she is, knows Truth when she hears it.

The stadium on raw Tuesday night was nothing like it was a week earlier. It was on edge. And Curt Schilling was nothing like he was a week earlier. He was on a mission. I wondered, subsequently, what Sister Margaret thought about Curts insistence that God was carrying him and his dicey tendon through the seven innings. I never credit that stuff — hey, Marianos a real minister, and hes just blown two saves — but Tuesday night I was thinking: Whatever works.

Something carried Schilling, theres no question about that. Something bore him up. He was huge. It was one of the most impressive starting performances Ive ever witnessed. The reason I say so: The Yankee fans looked upon it, and knew what they were seeing. They were silenced from the get-go. Curt, as he had said he hoped to, shut them up.

As for the bats, the top of the Yanks order — one through four — which could not make an out in the first three games, now had their third straight night of ineffectiveness. Go figure. A-Rod looked nervous. Matsui looked like a rookie. It was all very strange. The Sox were curious to look at, too. After five frames, Mueller (hitting in the two-spot that night) Ramirez and Ortiz were oh-for-eight, and we were ahead four-to-oh. Everyone below the equator in our lineup seemed to be two-for-two, and the guy who wasnt, Bellhorn, had just jacked a three-run dinger. Thats the kind of Red Sox team thats going to win games.

The Bellhorn homer delivers us crisply to the subject of umpires. I was gleeful — gleeful — at the way Game Six transpired. Theres nothing better that having umps overturn calls to get it right, then have Yankee fans feel theyve been wronged. Jobbed. Cheated.

Lets face it, Bellhorn cranked it out, and A-Rod did a dirty deed. All of Mr. Torres later mumbling about something else going on during the A-Rod play is baloney. His third baseman, who the Times was kind enough to point out the next day has been "anemic all season in clutch situations," got caught out.

While were on the subject: Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I cant believe instant replay doesnt already exist in post-season baseball. What I mean is, the umps got their two overturns precisely right, but this phenomenon of the umpire huddle, with the sixth umpire jogging in late (with news as to how the replay and commentary look on national television, perhaps?) is a new-millennium thing — as are the smart overturns themselves. What Im saying is, ten years ago neither Bellhorns homer nor A-Rods dastardliness would have been set right. And you know what I think of the new world order? I like it.

The Yankee fans did not. In the stands, the thugs got thuggish, and suddenly SWAT troops in riot gear lined the field. Ah, this is where I live. The national pastime, New York style. I was wondering to myself what Professor McCarvers commentary was just then. Foul-ball interference on the part of a police officer was no doubt being limned.

Game One was a wild one, Game Two was classic baseball, Game Three was a stinker (or a rout, if youre from the other side), Games Four and Five were otherworldly and Game Six was, again, classic baseball (with the footnote of the overturns). Schilling was a hero, a maligned player (Bellhorn) stepped up, and Keith Foulke was a second hero. He is now Mariano. You could feel it. The Stadium was so tense when he walked those two in the ninth, because everyone there was aware of one salient fact: Foulke knows how to close. In years past, Yanks fans could readily assume that those walks were coming home and somewhere John Sterling was bleating Thhhhhhuuuuu Yankees Win!!! No longer.

By the way, if any of you were listening, drop me a line. What did Sterling say when Keith shut things down for the night?



Yesterday morning the Times ran a big color picture of Curt Schilling coming right at you. It was on Page One, above the fold. "Jeez," I thought, "they're really rubbing it in."

Or were they hoping to goad?

Whatever, we now know how it played out.

I met my friend Mike at the middle flag pole near the Big Bat, as is our New York custom, and we proceeded to climb way, way up into the reaches of the stadium whence the bottles flew the night before. Mike avers that I'm the one Sox fan he can bear to watch a Yanks-Sox game with, and I feel the same way about him (though he knows I consider him, who is after all a native of New Hampshire, to be a despicable traitor). Even in nail-biting time, we behave with consideration.

The atmosphere was something approaching electric, but it wasn't electric. There was the least sense of foreboding in the air, and a larger measure of desperation. Kevin Brown was to start, and any astute Yankee fan not only begrdged him the wall-punching incident, but knew that, despite a couple of pretty fair outings against other teams since coming off the DL, he had been severely roughed up twice by the Red Sox — including once in this series.

It was believed Wakefield would be Boston's starter, but, lo, there was D. Lowe scribbled in on game day. Based on what they had done in this series, either was deserving. Two veteran Sox who had had poor-to-fair seasons were coming up big in showtime. Everyone kept saying Lowe was pitching for a contract, but that was true all year. You get to start Game Seven against the Yankees, I think you try to bring your best, whether you're signed or floating free.

The Sox — Ortiz again — staked Lowe to a 2-0 lead with a smash to right. Brown was lucky he didn't give up more; he looked just as bad as he's routinely looked against the Sox recently. Lowe, though, looked smooth as silk. He was getting grounders, and that's what he does when he's on form.

It wasn't the best of the games, but it was precisely what was needed. Damon came alive with that grand slam after Brown departed in the second. Lowe threw 69 lovely pitches through six before Francona did the absolutely unthinkable: He brought in Pedro, thereby ushering the desultory crowd back into the game ("Who's Your Daddy!?!?!") High in the upper deck, Pedro's presence caused me to sweat.

And looking around, I realized I wasn't alone in my anxiety. The prospective blowout (8-1 when Pedro arrived) had caused the more edgy of the Yankee fans to vent their frustrations — usually upon Red Sox fans. Up and down, up and down went the cops, carting out drunks. Something strange was happening, though: As the uppder deck was pruned, Red Sox Nation became a more prominent presence. Little groups formed. One merry band even tried a rhythmic "Let's Go Red Sox!" cheer.

Hey, you know what happened in the game, it's in the morning papers. And you know the series win was both the biggest comeback and the biggest collapse in sports history — no one had ever come back from 3-0 down in baseball. And you know it all ended on Mickey Mantle's birthday. You know all that.

All I can tell you that might be new is what the scene was in Yankee Stadium a half hour after the final pitch. There was no one in the arena except the considerable contingent of Red Sox fans. We were all high-fiving one another, and posing for pictures with the scrum of happy Red Sox down on the field in the background. Everyone was smiling, Sinatra's "New York, New York" was blaring over and over and over on the loudspeakers, and no one heard it. We owned the Yankees tonight, and now we owned Yankee Stadium. It was a very strange thing. We had got it done — this far, at least; those guys, at least — and we could hardly believe it.



I mentioned earlier that Caroline wrote me a note of consolation at one point. After the Sox had dropped the first two games of what would become The Greatest Series Ever Played, I came downstairs to find a piece of paper next to my coffee mug.

new york yankees stink
red sox rock!!
Yeah!
Dear DaD
Happy Birthday
From Caroline

I've been carrying it around all week, and I'm looking at it now. What I find poignant is, it's nowhere near my birthday. But kids know what cheers a person up. And Caroline knew Daddy needed cheering up. I'm being honest: That note did as much for me — no, it did more — than what the Red Sox wound up doing in this series. Which was plenty.

The note also made me lament that I didn't spend more time with Caroline this past week.

Next year, our kids will be five, five and seven. Theo will rebuild this Red Sox team (farewell, Pedro; a fond farewell, Derek; please come home, Jason), and Theo will get them back into the tournament as a Wild Card. He has $140 million or so to play with, so hell get it done.

But as for me, well, as I say, the kids will be five, five and seven. Im going to do it differently next year.

Really.

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