(3 of 6)
So Derek's in the dugout holding his head in his hands, and we're down — somehow — 3-0. This was The Brutal Game, one of the most brutal I've ever experienced. It stayed 3-0 for so long, as Fenway sat with teeth clenched. Two men on and two outs and Nomar, who has batted .170 since Labor Day and has stunk — I mean, like bad cheese — gives us one of the worst at-bats in baseball history, fanning on a belt high fastball that the-Nomar-we-once-knew takes to the Monster seats. Nomar courageously walks a few innings later to load 'em up, and Manny immediately trickles one to . . . Boone! (After the game, the batting coach of the Sox will applaud — applaud — Nomar's two bases-on-balls.) Manny does go yard, once, but with the bases clear, rather than filled. And Nomar gets his first RBI in the postseason in the 8th. But here's how: Mo comes in and the recently Great Todd Walker gives us all hope by belting one down right that nearly goes out, and winds up being a triple. Nomar grounds out — way to go! — and Walker scores. My friend Chaz Scoggins of the Lowell Sun, who officially scores the games for the Sox, sounds desultory when he announces Nomar's RBI. And he should sound desultory. And, frankly, Nomar should go to California if, as he says, he doesn't like playing in front of all these people, with all this pressure and attention — and sainthood — being put upon him. He should go there with Mia (who's here tonight; Annie saw her; she's short) and J. Lo (who's also here, curiously, for we thought there were problems with her and the Boston guy). But we are not in California, where all of those folks can and no doubt will go, we are in Boston, and here we are, late in game five, losing, the Yanks batting under .200 for the series and about to go up 3-2, and I'm sick of Nomar, Pedro and Manny. Give me Todd and Trot and Tim and a teamful of guys like that. I'll take Derek, too, who Cowboyed Up after that mess in the second, and got us deep into this game. To scant avail.
Down in Section 8, the cotton-candy guy is giving cotton candy away for free. Millie says to Gail, "Well, no more games till April."
Gail reflects upon several facts: that it's not over till it's over, that there will be another game tomorrow in New York no matter the outcome of this one and that the shelf life of cotton candy must be at least a month. She says: "We could still play here Saturday night. The World Series. He's giving up!"
Later she says to me, forlornly, "I just don't know why they can never win. You just sit there in the stands, watching, wondering."
We are back at her place at this point. She has put out cheese and crackers and Sam Adams for Millie, Annie and the guys. Not everyone gets back out to Wellesley — some don't feel like socializing, perhaps, but some do, and we munch and sip as Gail and Scott's kids, along with Millie's daughter, run amok till way past their bedtimes.
We schmooze for about a half hour, Bag and I recounting yet again how we had scored tickets to the Bucky Dent playoff game almost precisely a quarter-century ago, telling other sad jokes that gradually build context for The Brutal Game. Then Bag bids us adieu, and I repair to the couch to nurse my wounds and my nightcap. Slowly, I get into the Cubs-Marlins game that is on the tube. The camera keeps scanning the smiling, happy, giddy people in Wrigley Field, and I have conflicting emotions.
Good for them!
Why them, and not us?