(5 of 6)
Nomar, who earlier booted the ball that led to the four runs, thus prompting his goat horns to grow longer at a Pinnochioian pace, is in the dugout figuring he likes the look of that Contreras split about as much as I do. So he says to himself, whatever he throws me first, I go after. I can't let him get to his out pitch. What Jose throws is a slider, and his next pitch to Manny is a fastball. Two pitches into the seventh inning and the Red Sox have sent spheroids a cumulative 820 feet, the wind helping them accelerate as they zoom over Bernie's head in center. Ortiz's hot shot hits the first base bag — we're hitting, and we're getting lucky, too — and suddenly we're tied. Mr. Torre elects to walk Varitek intentionally to load the bases, and his reliever Heredia elects to walk Damon on four more straight pitches, handing the Red Sox a 7-6 lead. "This," I say to Bob, "is the great game this series has been waiting for."
It's madness at the Stadium, 56,000 disbelieving fans watching plastic bags whipped around in the whirlwind — make that maelstrom — screaming, desperately, for their boys to come back. I paid 200 bucks to be here and I want to see the celebration! But Embree, Timlin and Williamson are doing a fair impression of the Nelson, Stanton, Rivera act of old — eerily familiar, in these confines — and the Yankees will be denied this night. Trot adds two with a mighty blow in the ninth — third deck, way up, deep rightfield — and there it is. Nine to six, but just as important: 16 hits by our side. We are hitting again.
Will we hit Clemens tomorrow?
Yes, I reflect on the train ride home, everything is in place: Game Seven, Roger's last game, Pedro's redemption . . . Too bad, I reflect as I watch the Marlins prevail on the tube, the Cubs won't be joining us. Weren't those fans smiling, ever so recently? Ah, the vicissitudes of fate.
Thursday dawns lover-ly; it is a crisp and clear and somewhat calmer day, a perfect day for baseball or anything at all. Ernie Banks, were he still swinging the bat, would choose to play two today. But Mr. Cub and all things Cubby are yesterday's news, and today is about Sox-Yanks, a historic 26th meeting in a single season (Yanks ahead 13-12; about two-thirds of the contests thrillers). It's about Pedro-Roger redux, probably with a chin-music soundtrack. "It's every kid's dream," according to the Sox Embree, who slew the arogonautic Jason so heroically last night. "You sit in your backyard growing up and you dream up these kind of matchups in your head, a showdown between two Hall-of-Fame-caliber guys." According to Theo, the wunderkinder GM of the Bosox, it is fate and destiny: "We've been on a collision course for 100 years. It's definitely appropriate, definitely meant to be and certainly poetic. It's special for both franchises, regardless of the result." The sage Mr. Torre, who doesn't strike me as the mystical type, allows merely: "I guess it was supposed to come down to this." No fewer than five different folks involved with the ongoing fracas that is this series, including a manager, a GM and a few players, are quoted in the morning sports pages in echo: "It doesn't get any better than this."
At the schoolbus-stop, young Reed and I share a handshake and a pledge, that our friendship will endure whatever might transpire at the Stadium tonight. I hand over the ticket stub from last night's game, and he thanks me for this third souvenir. Then he and Caroline, who finally told me this morning that she is officially a Red Sox fan (she has been taunting her dad, as six-year-olds do), board the bus. Reed in that Yankee shirt of his goes west, and I in my Bosox cap turn east and hoof it down to the train station. What will the day bring for both of us? For Stan, too, who lives right over there, and for the folks up in Massachusetts — Gail, Scott, Millie, Bag, Annie, Mike, Bruce — and the fellow exiles down here like Jane, the traitors like New Hampshire-native Mike, for anxious Thomas of Toledo, who never forsook his Nomar . . . What will it bring, for all of us?
At the office, work has little to do with work today. I begin by fielding the many emails and voicemails left last night by other citizens of Red Sox Nation. (A representative excerpt, this from Bruce: "Gentlemen, In Latin, the translated phrase is 'the thing speaks for itself.' A day ago, we were in mourning. Tonight, a different tale. Anyone wonder about the strength of the winds, and the demeanor of the sky all day? I looked at it as a cleansing of all that had taken place in the past. I say New England is due. Anything can and will happen in Game Seven. I say, bring it on. It's the middle of October and the Yankee fans are still worried — how about that? If security allows the game to take place, Pedro will rule, Wake will save and destiny will be fulfilled. God Bless America! Red Sox Nation, sleep well. Battle looms. Be courageous and unafraid. The Yankees do not suck, in fact, but they are beatable! Go SOX!" And this from Bag: "I can see and hear it now at the victory celebration at City Hall Plaza a week from next Monday. After first trooping out for the crowd's adulation — to the tune of "When the Saints Come Marching In" — Pesky and DiMaggio from '46, Yaz, Scottie and Lonborg from '67, Carlton, Rice, Evans, Lynn and Luis from '75, Bruce and (again) Dewey and Jimbo from '86, and after a moment of silence for all who could and should have lived long enough to see this day, but especially Ted, Ned Martin and Ken Coleman, each of whom would have been there if the same event had happened in '99, when it should have, the crowd welcomes this year's heroes as Bing sings, "Fairy Tales Can Come True...")