If the lack of updates disturbed you, I’m sorry. I’ve spent the last week helping one of my closest friends move in with me. In the time since my last post, the Red Sox have gone 3-3, including a suburb (and wasted) start by Dave Pauley, Schilling’s 9th Win of the season, a Trot Nixon slugfest, John Lester’s first Major League start, and, of course, another chapter for the “Epic David Ortiz Walk-Off Hit’s” 3 Disc DVD set.
I’ve watched plenty of David Ortiz Walk-Offs. ALDS Game 3, ALCS Games 4 and 5, and his June 2 2005 shot off of then Oriole B.J. Ryan, but Sunday’s was different. He’s not the Papi he was then. Back then, it was shocking, and amazing, and thrilling. Now, we expect it, and when it comes, we give him his due, louder and louder each time.
I was working the Fisher Cats game, covering New Hampshire’s 11-5 drubbing of the Altoona Curve. I’d been watching the Sox game on and off all day, checking the TVs set up in the Upper Deck Saloon on the backside of the stadium. Finally, with the day wearing on, I settled into watching the game on MLB Gamecast, which is kind of like having a robot read you poetry. It’ll be all there, technically, but it’s missing exactly what makes it so great, the emotion. After Willie Harris grounded out, I turned away, only to miss the report of Trot Nixon’s single. When he went to 3rd on Coco’s single, I started to get up, but then I sat down, realizing that Mark Loretta was up, and I had a game to cover.
This is what separates David Ortiz from other hitters. No one in the press box budged with Loretta up with 1 down trailing by 2. Sure, Marky-Mark could have hit a double, and tied the game, or even hit a home-run of his own, and he might have, but it never struck any of us to go watch it. Loretta flew out right about the time the Cats got out of an inning, and all of a sudden, there it was. David Ortiz due up with 2 out and 2 on, trailing by 2. The official scorer asked me if the Sox game was over, and I told him what was going on. We both looked at each other, and IMMEDIATLY dashed out the back door of the press box and over to the closest television just in time to see Big Papi take strike one. There we stood, a collection of about 7 guys, of all ages, shapes, sizes, and levels of sobriety, huddled around a television, oblivious everything else. None of us spoke. We grunted when he took strike one and sighed when he bit on strike two. With almost anyone else at the plate, we would have just waked away at this point. Down 0-2 to a proven Major League pitcher, ugh, spare me. But not David. After working the count to 2-2 by taking some heart-stoppingly close pitches, swung at a pitch right in his wheelhouse. All around me, I heard the sharp gasps of hopeful fans, but it was just a foul. More silence. Finally, the 6th pitch, that fateful 6th pitch. Immediately after it came off his bat, we all knew where it was going, but none of us could say anything.
One man, over a hundred miles away, silenced 7 New England Sports Fans for a spilt second. If there’s a more powerful feat, I’d like to know about it.
Finally after what seemed like an eternity, someone, I don’t know who (hell it could have been me), uttered one phrase, almost a whisper, that summed up the whole thing.
“Son-Of-A-Bitch…”
That, my friends, is why we watch Baseball.
But of course, being the Red Sox, they got blown to pieces in the second game of the double-header.
Which brings us to today.
Santana vs. Schilling. A match-up made in script-writers heaven.
The game? Oh yes, it delivered.
Santana came right out of the gate, all business, setting down 13 out of 24 Red Sox on strikes. Schilling… Well… He got the job done, with a little help from his friends. Some heroics from El Capitan were cancelled out by a MONSTER Michael Cuddyer home run.
After the Sox cruelly failed to score for Schilling, it was down to Papelbon to keep us in it, and let me tell you, after he gave up the lead-off double, I was scared. Then I saw what the people over at Cursed And First and Surviving Grady have been talking about. You could practically see the whole infield pin their ears back and grit their teeth. On the very next pitch, the Sox showed us EXACTLY why we don’t miss Kevin Millar. Lew Ford tried to lay a bunt down, and get the winning run on 3rd with 1 out. Youk (my favorite Red Sox) then proceeded to make him look silly by gunning down Luis Castillo at 3rd. Then, John-Boy, as if to say “Thanks But No Thanks,” struck out the next two men to end the inning, including the Current AL Batting Leader.
On to extras, where the Sox tickled and teased. Putting men on with two outs, letting men on with 2 outs. Long fly balls, silly looking strikeouts, an amazing catch on the part of Torii Hunter, and a crazy-insane diving stop by Twins Shortstop Nick Punto to turn an Alex Gonzalez 2 RBI Single into an Alex Gonzalez Run Scoring Fielder’s Choice.
So there they are, up 2-1 in the Bottom of the 12th and who do we pitch? That’s right, he of the 4.60 ERA, he of the Slap-Punch, The Phone Destroyer Himself, Julian Tavarez.
The son-of-a-gun baited me by striking out the aforementioned Current AL Batting Leader. He subsequently killed my spirit by hitting Michael Cuddyer, and giving up a double to Justin Morneau with Torii Hunter on deck. Luckily, the double was of the “ground-rule” sort, so Cuddyer was stopped at 3rd, and Terry Francona made the decision to walk Hunter.
What happened next was not unexpected, but still painful.
Tavarez gave up a soul-crushing blast to a 24 year-old nobody named Jason Kubel, and I promptly switched the channel.
Meanwhile, the Yanks won 1-0.
Unless I wake up to several scantily-clad women offering me bacon and eggs, followed by MacGyver dropping me off at school in a helicopter, tomorrow’s gonna suck.