The passions that now surround the Red Sox and Yankees are so intense they constantly seem on the verge of bursting into flames. But the blazing scene in Fenway Park here on Patriots' Day was almost ridiculously emblematic of the furnace of feeling that engulfs these teams and their rivalry.
In the final innings on Monday, black smoke billowed over the old park from a spectacular brushfire a couple of blocks away, filling the sky across the entirety of right field and center field with end-of-the-world darkness as the Red Sox came back from a three-run deficit to beat New York, 5-4, for a three-games-to-one victory in this series.
As if on cue, the last Yankees' rally in the ninth inning, and the showy fire, were extinguished at the same minute -- 2 p.m. on the Fenway clock. If this is what baseball between these rivals is like in April, how on earth are we going to survive their next 15 meetings in five more series?
Already the season's themes are stacking up like cordwood. The Yankees, with their $183 million payroll, are under .500. Okay, it's only 6-7. But, with Nomar Garciaparra and Trot Nixon out of the Red Sox' lineup, this was New York's chance to build an early-season lead, not dig a quick hole. The Red Sox may even have some room to breathe when they go to Yankee Stadium this weekend. Yes, in less than 100 hours, this starts all over.
Will Alex Rodriguez still be AWOL then? A-Rod went 1 for 17 here and seemed quite ill at ease with his new life under the Apple microscope. Afterward, the Red Sox's Johnny Damon said, "Our fans should be happy he's not here. They should be glad we still have Manny and Nomar instead."
Best of all, however, was the sheer energy and melodrama of this game that, if it had been played in postseason, would have left the country buzzing for days. "I feel like I played all four games today," said stunned Red Sox Manager Terry Francona. "That was really something."
"The whole park was electric," said the Red Sox' tattooed right fielder, Gabe Kapler, who got the game-winning eighth-inning RBI single, thus atoning for the truly amazing base running feat of forgetting the number of outs twice in the same inning. "There were fights breaking out all over the place, like usual, cops escorting fans out of the park, which is always cool. It just shows the passion."
Of course, Gabe, if you watch the fights in the stands, maybe that's why it's so hard to keep track of the outs.
Theo Epstein, the Red Sox' 30-year-old general manager, watched the final ninth-inning scene unfold in front of him, but still could not believe it was happening.
"The whole thing was just ridiculous," he said. "That fire -- I live right over there."
For all Epstein knew, his home might be burning as the Red Sox bullpen tried to put out its own kind of fire. The blaze, with 10-foot-high flames visible from some rooftop box seats, seemed to be just one good wind shift away from heading straight to the Fens. Many discussed the wisdom of staying until the last out. Yet how could you leave?
With one out in the top of the ninth inning, Bernie Williams hit a drive to deep left center field off reliever Keith Foulke that looked like a certain double.
Instead, Manny Ramirez appeared. With a glove -- which he usually wears more as a fashion statement than an occupational tool -- on his hand. Normally, Manny is one of the worst left fielders who ever lived. But a half-dozen times a season, he makes plays so spectacular and dangerous that they defy belief.
"I knew where I was at," Ramirez claimed afterward.
Whether he really knew what risks he was taking, Ramirez made a full-speed catch just as he did a face-plant into the wall. The ball should have bounced out of his glove. But it didn't. His forehead should have knocked out a bulb in the scoreboard. Instead, his shoulder cushioned the blow. When A-Rod followed with a clean hit to left field, it didn't tie the score. Instead, it was just a meaningless single by a $250 million player who's now hitting .160 and had a throwing error in the seventh inning, too.
Foulke, the free agent brought in to anchor the Red Sox bullpen, ended this series just as any Red Sox fan would wish. Foulke not only fanned Jason Giambi, he left him with his bat on his shoulder just as he had started the final inning by fanning Derek Jeter looking.
"To get Jeter and Giambi looking, that's impressive. That's why we got him," said Damon.
Foulke wasn't alone in raising the Red Sox' sense of themselves. Curt Shilling, the other major Red Sox offseason addition, dominated the Yankees and Mike Mussina. Why, Pedro Martinez didn't even pitch here. He will start at Yankee Stadium on Sunday.
The Yankees expected to win this game easily, especially after Kevin Brown was given a 4-1 lead against Bronson Arroyo, who's a stop-gap starter until injured Byung-Hyun Kim returns to the rotation. However, Brown, who's your typical $100-million-contract Yankee, was charged with all the runs that blew the lead. One came on a wind-aided Jason Varitek home run barely over the right field fence. Another scored on a checked-swing, broken-bat dribbler by a 240-pound slugger David Ortiz that traveled perhaps 60 feet.
Of all the Red Sox breaks, the best was last. With one out in the eighth, David McCarty hit a routine fly ball toward Hideki Matsui in left field. A sudden and almost complete shift of wind redirected the ball at least 10 yards and left the shocked Godzilla stumbling after the fluke double. That brought up Kapler, and few players ever wanted to atone more deeply.
"What I did is absolutely inexcusable -- in spring training, in Little League, anywhere. I'm furious at myself," said Kapler.
Everybody else is just laughing. Twice in the second inning Kapler thought there was just one out when, in fact, there were two -- meaning he should have been running as soon as a pair of balls were hit to the outfield. On the first occasion, he only got to second base, not third, on a single. He fumed, kicking the dirt as the crowd of 35,027 -- all of whom knew the correct number of outs -- booed lustily.
Then, after this public display for his shame, Kapler forgot again on the very next play, going back toward second to tag up on a long fly out. As he went back, Pokey Reese, the base runner on first, flew past him. Ooops!
From the dugouts to the stands to the press box countless conversations discussed the remote possibility that anyone could ever have done such a thing. A year ago, old-school Grady Little might have had a stern word or, conceivably, even jerked Kapler out of the game. Not new-age Francona who lightened the mood and pressure.
"[Terry] said it was going to take eight hits to score me. After that I was able to smile a little bit," said Kapler. "If Pokey hadn't run by me, I'd probably still think there was only one out."
"I guess we're not the smartest team. I've forgotten the number of outs twice this season myself," said Damon. "We obviously aren't looking at the scoreboard a whole lot. We must be looking at the chicks in the stands."
Unless they start to burn down.
