Faithful (25 page)

Another 10:05 start, another sleepless night. The Yanks have already lost to Tampa Bay, and when Tek breaks a 1–1 tie with a three-run bomb off J. J. Putz in the eighth, it looks like we’ll be six back. Arroyo’s thrown brilliantly, striking out 12 (including 11 straight outs by strikeout at one point), and the only run Seattle scored was due to some typical sloppy fielding.

Because Schilling went so deep yesterday, the pen is rested. Embree and Timlin set up and combine to let in a cheapie, abetted by Bill Mueller winging a double-play ball past Bellhorn into right field, but Timlin gets a big strikeout with two in scoring position to end the inning.

Foulke comes in to close. With one down, he gives up a solo shot to Miguel Olivo.

“They sure don’t make it easy on us,” I tell Steph and my nephews. All the other adults have long since gone to bed.

Edgar Martinez is next. At forty-one, he can’t run, so all Foulke has to do is throw him three low changes and he’s meat. Instead, Foulke throws him an 88 mph fastball over the heart of the plate. Edgar’s been killing this pitch since he was fifteen, and doesn’t miss. Johnny and Kapler both leap at the wall in right-center, but it’s gone, the M’s have gone back-to-back, and the game’s tied.

“Unbelievable,” I say. The boys are angry and want Francona to take him out, but we don’t have anyone else. Embree, Timlin, Foulke—this is our A-team.

Foulke gets the last out on a long fly to right, then struggles so much in the tenth that the boys quit. It’s 1:15 in the morning and we have to get up early tomorrow. Overall, Foulke throws 41 pitches. After starting the year 10 for 10 in save opportunities, he’s 4 for his next 9, and that shaky streak started against Seattle, that Sunday game when Raul Ibanez took him into the pen and McCarty bailed him out in extras with a walk-off job.

In the eleventh, McCarty, leading off, gets on on an error. Kapler bunts too hard down third, and they get the force at second. Again, we’ve got no smallball. Kapler takes second anyway on a wild pitch, but Bellhorn looks at a very wide strike three, and Johnny flies to left.

Since Foulke’s gone two, we have to bring in Leskanic. He gets behind Olivo 3-1, and Olivo singles through the hole. Dave Hansen wants to bunt him across. Curtis does the job for him, walking him. Then, in what must be seen as team play in Japan, on the very first pitch Ichiro bunts them over. Francona intentionally walks Randy Winn and pulls the infield in for Bret Boone. On 0-1, Boone hits a fly to left-center. It’s deep enough to score the run, so the fielders ignore it and jog in as the ball clears the wall for a walk-off grand slam. It’s 1:45, and I’m so pissed off that I’m glad they lost, because they suck. (See—it’s not
we
now, it’s
they
; the loss is so deranging that for a few minutes I have to separate myself from the team.)

They didn’t hit or field for Arroyo. The three-run shot by Tek was a gift. All they needed was six outs, against the worst team in the league.

I want to blame someone, and the obvious target is Foulke. But I know that closers blow games. Even Eric Gagne blew one the other day. And while it’s true that the pen hasn’t looked good lately, Theo hasn’t helped matters by picking up retreads like Anderson, Nelson and Leskanic. Mendoza, who should be covering some of these middle innings, is taking up a roster spot but may never pitch another meaningful at-bat in the majors. But Theo didn’t give up back-to-back jacks.

It’s just a loss, a brutal, late-night, extra-inning loss of a game we should have won, a game we needed (since we need all of them now), and there’s nothing to do but eat it and go on.

It’s also the kind of loss that makes you nervous the next time the game’s on the line, and tonight we get a nightmarish rerun of last night when Lowe has to leave early with a blister and Seattle chips away at our 8–1 lead until it’s 9–7 in the ninth, with two on and no out and Foulke sweating buckets. Seattle has 18 hits, including 4 from Ichiro (along with 4 stolen bases), but has left 14 on.

Because of last night, I don’t believe in Foulke at all. He could give up another walk-off job to Boone here, and I’d just shrug. Because I’m still pissed off at him (at
them
). The Yanks have already won, so a loss would drop us 8 back, and I think, fuck it. 7, 8, 9—it doesn’t matter. If we keep losing on the road like this, we don’t deserve to be in any race.

Foulke doesn’t try to nibble like last night. He leads with his fastball to get ahead, then goes exclusively to the change. He strikes out Boone. Strikes out Edgar. Strikes out Bucky Jacobsen for the game.

For an instant, as the ump rings up Jacobsen, I’m excited, but I cool off just as quickly. We barely squeaked this one out, and it should have been a laugher, after an eight-run fourth (David Ortiz with a three-run bomb, then Manny going back-to-back). Same problem as always: no middle relief. Leskanic let two of Lowe’s runners score. In his one inning, Timlin gave up a run. Nelson allowed two runs and only retired one man. Mendoza sat on the bench and watched. Kim was in Columbus with the PawSox. I have no idea where Theo was.

No, only till the sixth inning, when Tejada breaks a 3–3 tie with a bases-loaded single to left. Pedro, who’s been missing his spots all night, nearly gets out of it, but Johnny’s throw on Javy Lopez’s short sac fly is weak and up the first-base line, and it’s 6–3. Earlier, Johnny misjudged a Tejada liner into a triple, leading to their first three runs, and later, in a whacky play, he relays a David Newhan shot to the wall in center toward Bill Mueller (who started, bizarrely, at second, with Youk at third), but Manny—in another classic Manny move—intercepts it, diving, then relays it to Bellhorn (who started at short), and by the time Mark guns it to Tek, Newhan’s in with the easiest inside-the-park homer you’ll ever see. It’s 8–4 and the Faithful boo. Melvin Mora follows with a single, and Petey’s done. Mendoza throws a third of an inning and gives up two hits, and Malaska has to save him. Then Jimmy “I’m the Boss” Anderson comes on and gives up his usual two runs before recording an out. It’s a 10–4 final, and with the Yanks stomping Toronto, we drop to 8 back.

The only Sock who comes out of this one looking good is Gabe Kapler, who made a tumbling catch in right in the fourth, then hit a three-run shot onto the Monster to tie it at 3. The rest of the team looked like they’d gotten about three hours of sleep, which they did, since their plane got in at three in the morning (shades of Opening Day).

Meanwhile, lots of roster moves right before game time. Pokey to the DL with a pulled rib-cage muscle, Youkilis up from Pawtucket. Joe Nelson down, Malaska up. And to have a backup for Nomar, Theo picked up journeyman shortstop Ricky Gutierrez from the Iowa Cubs. Ladies and gentlemen, your 2004 Iowa Red Sox!

It’s a day-night doubleheader today, and since Wake’s scheduled to start and the Yanks are coming in tomorrow, we can’t shift the rotation to cover the extra game. We don’t announce a starter till late morning: Abe Alvarez, a lefty from double-A Portland (Jimmy “I’m the Boss” Anderson is designated for assignment). #59, Abe’s pipe-cleaner skinny and looks about seventeen. He wears his cap cocked to the side like C. C. Sabathia, but throws soft—fastball topping out at 88, slow curve, change. He has trouble finding the plate in the first and gives up three runs, two on a Monster shot by Tejada, who is just murdering us this series.

It’s hot—sweaty hot, heatstroke hot—and we’re in the sun. Over the course of the game I buy ten bottles of water for Steph and the nephews. We squirt them in our hats and down our collars and at each other. “Hey, frozen lemonade!” “Hey, sports bah!”

Ortiz hits two triples, a kind of miracle, but doesn’t score either time. Melvin Mora lofts a shot toward the Sox bullpen that Trot has the angle on, but at the last second he gets alligator arms and shies away from the wall, and it goes over. The Faithful boo him—very rare.

We also boo villain Karim Garcia every time he steps in. It’s his first visit to Fenway since he jumped the bullpen wall during last year’s ALCS to punch and kick a groundskeeper his buddy Jeff Nelson was already assaulting. “You’re a goon, Garcia!” we holler. When he strikes out midway through the game, the crowd behind the O’s dugout stands and jeers at him—maybe the most satisfying moment of the day.

Abe Alvarez leaves with the score 5–1. He hasn’t pitched well, but he’s battled, and for a double-A guy the beefed-up O’s are a tough assignment. Francona goes to a triple-A guy, Mystery Malaska, who gives up a run. Millar, who’s been booed every at-bat since he hit into an early rally-killing DP, crushes a two-run shot to bring us within three, but in the ninth Francona goes to Mendoza (our washed-up guy), and Mora pounds a two-run bomb to put the game out of reach.

All afternoon we’ve been watching the New York–Toronto score, 0–0 in the third, the fourth, the sixth. It’s been stuck in the eighth for more than an hour, as if they’re purposely withholding it. Now that we’ve lost, it changes to a 1–0 Yankees final. We’re nine back, the deepest hole we’ve been in all year, and 2-6 against the O’s.

After the game, as we’re fighting traffic on Storrow Drive and then 93 and 95, the Sox option Abe to Portland, making room for Ricky Gutierrez. Trudy wonders how much they paid him for the guest spot.

Between games, Bill Mueller, who went 0 for 5, decides to shave his head for luck like Trot and Tek and Gabe.

And the league office informs David Ortiz that he’s received a five-game suspension for throwing his bats the other night in Anaheim.

For the nightcap, the O’s roll out
their
kid pitcher with a high number, #61, Dave Borkowski. Gutierrez gets the start at short, Youk at third, McCarty in left. McCarty’s a revelation. We know he’s got a great glove as a first baseman, and an arm that can top 90 mph. In the first, he puts those together, snagging what ought to be an easy sac fly and nailing speedy leadoff man Brian Roberts at home with a perfect one-hop peg. It kills what could be a big inning, and in our half, with two down, he slices a bases-loaded single to right to give us a 3–0 lead.

Wake’s crafty tonight, or maybe the O’s are tired. Both teams are listless, and it’s a quick one. Youk hits a solo shot into the second row of M5. Timlin sets up with a one-two-three eighth, then Embree gets a double-play ball in the ninth, and a strikeout to close it. A neat 4–0 final, and it’s only 9:30.

It’s a win, but losing two of three to the O’s before the Yanks roll in is disheartening. Like Steve said, they’re miserable, and I’m miserable, and the rumors that we’ll trade Nomar while we can still get something for him are more miserable still.