Faithful (13 page)

As the great Criswell predicted, the Yankees did indeed lose. Vazquez faltered in the middle innings, so we’re a game up on them. The buzz is just temporary, since it appears now that Nomar won’t be back till June, and Trot has problems with his left quad and is sitting. “We need those guys,” David Ortiz says, “like a human being needs to be fed every day.”

Last night Steph noticed that Ron Jackson was coaching first. The paper has the answer: Lynn Jones hurt his eye at home in northwestern Pennsylvania. It sounds serious, because Francona says, “There’s a chance they can save some of his eyesight.”

Our league-best record is long gone, obviously, but I’m shocked to find that distinction now belongs to the Angels, with the surprising White Sox right behind them. The season’s so young that one hot streak puts you on top.

Tomorrow we’ve got Monster seats, front row, and I call the Sox customer service line to see if I can bring my fishing net for BP. The woman who answers doesn’t know. She asks around the office; the consensus is that security will probably not let it in, but there’s no set policy. I tell her I’ll try. Got to make them make the play, right?

Tonight it’s Wake and his 2.25 ERA against Jeremy Affeldt, who’s yet to win a game. I’m thinking we should score a bunch of runs, but it’s Wake who struggles. It’s a windy night—usually good for a knuckler—but his ball looks awful straight. It also doesn’t help that in the third we have Carlos Beltran picked off first but Bellhorn—maybe distracted by Desi Relaford trying to score from third—drops Millar’s toss. It’s 2–0, but not for long. In our half, Johnny answers with a leadoff shot over the Royals’ pen. Bellhorn singles, Manny singles for the second time, Millar doubles. Tie game.

Between innings, the camera finds Trot in the dugout—a nice surprise—and there’s Prince Nomar. Neither’s close to being ready; it’s more of a token appearance to raise morale.

Word on Lynn Jones is that somehow he gouged his eye with a screwdriver. They’re still not sure if he’ll regain sight in it. While he’s out, former Sox catcher Bill Haselman, who played with the PawSox last year, will coach first.

In the sixth, Wake gives up five hits and Bill Mueller rushes a throw on a chopper, sailing it into the stands. The Royals score four runs before the creaky Benito Santiago grounds into a round-the-horn double play.

By the eighth Affeldt’s pitch count is pushing 110. He’s a young guy but he’s never gone this deep in a game before. Tony Pena must want to conserve his pen for the rest of the series, because he leaves him in. Manny singles for the third time. Kapler hits a short fly to left that the wind takes away from Matt Stairs; it falls, and we’ve got first and second for Mirabelli, who lines one into the left-field corner. Stairs fires the ball in to second, but it’s wide and gets by Relaford, and Kapler scoots in to make it 6–4.

Timlin throws a perfect top of the ninth. Before Johnny can lead off the bottom, two fans run out on the field, delighting the crowd. When Johnny finally gets up, he’s laughing and loose, and walks on a pitch that’s really too close to take. MacDougal, the Royals’ young closer, stares in at veteran ump Joe West; West whips off his mask and stares back. A passed ball puts Johnny at second, so we don’t have to worry about the double play. With Bellhorn up, I expect we’re in for a long at-bat, but he gets a pitch belt-high and yanks it deep to right. Juan Gonzalez runs a few steps toward the corner, then pulls up as the ball lands a dozen rows in. The game’s tied at 6 and Fenway’s on its feet. Here in Avon, we’re hollering and trading high fives.

They don’t want to pitch to Manny with the game on the line, but they don’t intentionally walk him either, just nibble a little and then stay away on 3-2.

MacDougal’s gone and righty Scott Sullivan’s on. With two down, Francona pinch-hits the switch-hitting Tek for the righty Kapler. Tek rips Sullivan’s first pitch down the right-field line for a sure double. Manny’s running on contact. The ball skims along the wall instead of kicking out. “Don’t touch it!” I coach the fans past the Pesky Pole. I see other fans along the wall doing the same with their neighbors, holding their arms out wide as if to prove they’re not fouling anyone. Gonzalez scoops the ball and fires to Relaford, whose relay to Santiago is just enough off the plate to the first-base side to let Manny tiptoe in standing up. He leaps into the arms of Kevin Millar and the Sox win 7–6. Here at home, Steph and I are jumping and high-fiving, slapping at each other like first-graders.

It’s a huge win—a steal, really. Two in the eighth, then three in the ninth off a cold closer. Manny ran hard all the way and Sveum sent him in—classic strategy at home: play for the win and make them throw you out. I watch
Extra Innings,
wallowing in the highlights and locker-room interviews. Sox win, Sox win!

What’s better than the Sox winning? The Sox winning and the Yanks losing. Last night the Mariners rocked Jon Lieber, so we’re two games up. And we can’t forget the O’s, just a half game behind them. Toronto’s under .500, and Tampa Bay’s already in a death spiral. That’s the kind of year a fan fears—out of the chase by May (like the Pirates, who got one-hit last night). As Sox fans, we need to remember how lucky we are.

And we’re damn lucky today, with front-row seats on the Monster. All along Lansdowne, people stare at the net; Trudy pretends she’s not with me. The guy at the turnstile asks me what I think I’m going to do with it, but just laughs and lets me through. Trudy and the kids can’t believe I’m getting away with this.

The Royals are hitting, clumps of players spread around the outfield. It’s a bright cool day up on the Monster, and the wind’s in our faces, perfect for home runs. We’re in M9, next to the second light standard, but that’s too far toward center. I stake my claim to an empty spot in M5 above the power alley.

I’ve just started to extend the handle when a ball comes right at me. It’s going to be short. I reach out and down. I’d have it if the handle were fully extended.

“Hey, no fair!” Trudy calls from M9. “That’s cheating.”

With the handle fully extended, the net’s about ten feet long, giving me incredible range. It really
is
unfair.

Mike Sweeney’s taking his cuts. He sends one directly over my head. I raise the net straight up and even jump, but the ball carries over it, banging off the third-row facade and then back past us and down to the field again.

A few swings later, Sweeney hits one just to my right. It’s going to be close. I scoot a few steps and swing the net over. The ball clanks off the handle and drops at my feet. Inelegant, but hell, it’s a ball, and Sweeney’s as good a player as they’ve got.

I’m not sure who hits me the next one. It’s right at me, and a few feet out from the lip, so I’m not taking it away from anyone, but I misjudge it and it bangs off the handle a good foot from the head of the net, and falls back to the field. The boos and laughs shower down, and I slump back in a stool and hang my head. “Nice going, Netman.” “Netguy, you suck!”

The guy beside me points out a dent in the handle. It’s a good-sized ding, the metal buckled inward. I can’t close the handle all the way anymore.

Juan Gonzalez puts a bunch out by the Coke bottles, and then some guy in a blue fleece sweatshirt hits another right at me. It rises past the solid background of the roof and up into the blue sky, then falls fast. It’s going to be short, and I dip the net out and down. I don’t think I’ve got enough reach, but I must, because it’s a swish, just a gentle tug on my arms and then the ball swinging in the mesh, caught. The crowd goes wild. “Yeah, go ahead, Netman!” “Hey, gimme one—isn’t it catch and release?”

The ball has a pink stamp on the sweet spot: KCR enclosed by a thin circle, like something on special at CVS. The hitter was Benito Santiago—the BEN from his bathead’s imprinted backwards across the cowhide.

Like Mark Bellhorn, I had a chance to redeem myself. And just in time too, because that’s it for BP. Packing up, I’m visited by two people. A burly security dude who tells me I’ll have to surrender the net to him before game time (so I don’t interfere with play), and a reporter for the Greenfield, Mass, paper who saw the catch and wants to interview me. I get to use my Bellhorn analogy. “You’re down one minute and the next you’re up again. That’s baseball.” And, canned and corny as that sounds, it is: as long as you keep at it—stubbornly, dumbly—something good might happen.

It’s a beautiful day, we’re in the front row, and Schilling’s on the mound. He’s throwing 92–93, with great location. KC’s throwing another kid, Jimmy Gobble, and I’m proud of the Faithful for not making turkey noises at him. He’s throwing well too, mostly soft breaking stuff. We get a run off him in the third, Bellhorn doubling in Johnny. The Royals get it back in the fifth when Santiago homers to the exact spot in M5 where I was fishing. It’s 1–1 in the fifth and the game’s not even an hour old.

In the bottom of the fifth Pokey stings one down the right-field line. Gonzalez gets over to the wall by the Pesky Pole in time to cut the ball off—trying to hold Pokey to a single—but the ball slips through, bouncing past him along the wall and curling into the corner. Pokey’s rounding third as the ball comes in to cutoff man Desi Relaford. The crowd’s up—Sveum’s sending him. Pokey’s chugging now, and the throw’s on the mark. Santiago lunges with the tag as Pokey dives flat-out and slides a hand across the plate—safe! The place goes insane, a good three-minute celebration that lasts halfway through Johnny’s at-bat, and while we don’t score again that inning, we’re on our feet to salute Pokey when he trots out to short.

“I’ve never seen an inside-the-park home run live,” Steph says. Neither have I.

Schill is cruising, really stretching his arm out, throwing 94 and 95 now. He’s only given up three hits.

In our sixth, Gobble’s breaking stuff stays up. Millar doubles, Manny doubles, Tek singles, Bill Mueller singles. It’s 5–1, and Mr. Gobble is cooked. For the second straight game former Yankee Jason Grimsley provides little relief. With two down and Kapler on, he leaves one in Pokey’s wheelhouse (it’s a very small wheelhouse, but it still works), and Pokey turns on it and sticks it in M3. “
PO
-Key,
PO
-Key!” He comes back out of the dugout and tips his cap. Two homers in two innings—it looks awesome on the scorecard.

In the eighth, McCarty hits a two-run shot that keeps the party going, but the real ovation is reserved for Pokey. When he comes to bat the last time, the entire park rises. He’s never had a two-homer game in his career, but he’s been such a great defensive player, filling in for Nomar. Pokey pauses outside the batter’s box, soaking in the moment, and I think it’s a day he’ll always keep—the way we will.

Another matchup to love: D-Lowe against weak lefty Darrell May. After a brief rain delay, Bill Mueller gets us on the board in the second, driving a high change-up into M3 with Tek on base. 2–0 and all the mothers in the stands are happy.

The next inning, after Desi Relaford walks, David DeJesus hits a chopper to McCarty, who spins and fires to Pokey. DeJesus runs well, so the chances for two are slim, but it’s a good play, cutting down the lead runner. The throw’s perfect. Pokey comes off the bag for a look at first (there’s no one there), and though the ball beat Relaford by a good five feet and the neighborhood play’s in order, umpire Joe West calls him safe. Pokey can’t believe it. Francona comes out to argue, but it’s pointless. The replay shows that Pokey did indeed slide-step off the bag an instant before receiving the ball, so technically the runner would be safe, but in practice it’s an out 99% of the time. Lowe battles and gets two outs, but then Sweeney pulls a grounder down the line past Bill Mueller for a game-tying double. On the replay, broken down, it makes no sense: Sweeney’s a dead pull hitter and Lowe’s been working him down and in, yet Bill Mill’s playing him well off the line. Why isn’t someone in the dugout waving him over?

The next inning, Pokey makes a leaping snag of a Joe Randa laser they have to show two or three times. In slow-mo it’s even more impressive; Pokey heads back on contact and does a little stutter-step before going up for it like he’s timing an alley-oop, leaps and snares it backhanded. The momentum of the ball sends him twisting around so he lands facing the Monster. “It’s like watching
The Matrix,
” Steph says.

It’s a sedate game otherwise. May is spacing out the hits and Lowe’s struggling with his control but seems to get a ground ball whenever he needs one.

That changes in the sixth. Joe Randa singles, and with two down, Lowe walks their eight and nine guys to load the bases. After Dave Wallace pays Lowe a visit, Angel Berroa, their leadoff man, hits a smash that Bill Mueller has to dive to stop. With Berroa’s wheels, there’s no chance at first, so he goes to Bellhorn for the force, but DeJesus is hustling and ties the throw. 3–2 Royals. Lowe’s gone and Mystery Malaska’s on to face the dangerous Carlos Beltran, now batting righty. He gets behind 3-0 and on 3-2 throws a fat pitch that Beltran pulls past Bill Mueller into the corner, clearing the bases. 6–2 Royals.

It’s 8–3 in the bottom of the ninth and Steph and I are playing catch in the backyard, listening to the dregs of the game on the radio when Johnny knocks in Pokey. With two outs and Johnny on, Tony Pena—in a move I can only call paranoid, since he’s up four runs—changes pitchers. It works—der—and the winning streak is over. We turn it off and keep tossing, dropping balls and making plays, banging throws off the downspout, off the porch railing, off the shed.

What’s worse than the Red Sox losing? The Red Sox losing and the Yankees winning, which they do, coming back from a 6–0 deficit to nip the Mariners 7–6. Back to a one-game lead. Baltimore won as well. If this three-team race keeps up, we’re in for a wild summer. It’s kind of strange, knowing we won’t see the Yanks again till the end of June, or the O’s till late July. I’m ready
now
.