Faithful (31 page)

Curt Schilling calls the Lincoln, Rhode Island, Little League team to give them a pep talk before their game tonight. The kids and their coaches are gathered around a speakerphone on a table. Everyone’s pumped.

“Are you gonna win it?” Schill asks.

“Yeah!” everyone says.

And then one kid—a skinny little joker—leans over the phone and asks, “Are you?”

Just as the room busts up (there’s no more explosive laughter than nervous laughter—Vincent Price
Masque of the Red Death
laughter), the ESPN crawl at the bottom of the screen reads: GARCIAPARRA (CHI-NL) OUT WITH STRAINED WRIST.

The advantage we have in the wild card is that with the unbalanced schedule the teams in the West will be facing one another while we feast on scrubs like the Jays and D-Rays. Tonight we plan to cash in, throwing Pedro against Ted Lilly in the mostly empty SkyDome. Reed Johnson leads off the Toronto first with a home run. Orlando Hudson follows with a triple. Again, Pedro’s come out like his brother Ramon, as if he’s not warmed up to game speed. He settles down after that and throws a great game, only giving up two more hits, but Lilly’s on, and with our lack of righty power (and Tek serving his suspension for shoving A-Rod), he shuts us down, 3–0, a three-hit complete game—only the second shutout against us (Jason Schmidt’s is the other). The Yanks beat Cleveland on a Sterry Sheffield home run, and the Angels won to pull even with us. And the kids from Rhode Island lost.

This is a true adventure in surrealism: I’m in Boston (exploring possibilities for a musical play with John Mellencamp) and the Red Sox are in Toronto (exploring possibilities for extending their season into October). Tim Wakefield, the pitcher who’s closest to the center of this Red Sox fan’s heart, is on the hill, and I keep running out to check with Ray, my long-time limo driver, who’s parked in a loading zone and listening to the game on the radio. At first things don’t go well; for most of the season Wakefield’s had problems with the gopher ball, and he gives up another in the first. The Jays keep pecking and are leading 3–0 when the Red Sox begin to crawl back, courtesy of Manny “We gotta jus’ keep goin’, man” Ramirez, who plates a couple with a base hit to center. Then Doug Mirabelli, who regularly catches Wakefield (and will be standing in for Jason Varitek this week while Tek finishes serving his four-game suspensionfor the brawl with Alex Rodriguez), hits a monster three-run homer to left center, putting the Sox up, 5–3.

I’m headed back to my hotel with Ray when Wake leaves the game. At that point the Red Sox still lead by two, but the Blue Jays have loaded the bases with nobody out. Enter Mike Timlin, who strikes out two…and then we lose WEEI’s AM signal amid the tall buildings. Ray and I sit, not speaking, at a seemingly endless red light, listening to static. When we get rolling again and the static finally clears, I hear the merry voices of the Giant Glass singers (“Who do you call when your windshield’s
bus
-ted?”), and know that Timlin either gave up a disastrous multibase hit and is being replaced—the barn door securely locked by Terry Francona after the horse has been stolen—or he actually wriggled out of it. When the game comes back on, the Red Sox are batting. It turns out that Timlin coaxed Alex Rios, the third batter to face him, into hitting a mild ground ball. Ray and I slap hands, and we’re back at the Boston Harbor Hotel before the Red Sox have finished batting.

I rush upstairs, ready to watch the final inning of what turns out to be another one-run nail-biter on TV…only to discover that the Boston Harbor may be the only hotel in the Boston metro area that
doesn’t
carry NESN. No Red Sox on TV, in other words. I try the radio. Nothing on the FM but opera and Aerosmith, nothing on the AM band but one constant blat of static. I do the only reasonable thing, under the circumstances; I call my son in New Hampshire and have him call the final three batters Joe Castiglione–style over the phone. It feels like bad mojo—the Red Sox
always
seem to lose when I watch or listen with my kids—but this time the Sox hold on, and I go to bed happy even though the Yankees have turned relentless again. We’re now 7-2 over the last nine games, and it’s hard to be unhappy with that.

Top of the sixth, down 3–2 with two on and one out for Doug Mirabelli against a tiring Miguel Batista. Doug’s the slowest guy on the team, a real double-play threat. The book here is to pinch-hit a lefty, and we’ve got a whole bench full. Problem is, with Tek still out, and Theo and Francona not wanting to waste a roster spot on Andy Dominique, our backup catcher is Doug Mientkiewicz. Mirabelli stands in and crashes a three-run bomb off the scoreboard in left-center. How does that proverb go: some have greatness thrust upon them?

Same thing in the bottom of the inning, when the Jays load the bases with none out. Embree’s arm is dead from overwork, and Leskanic and Adams have had control problems. Mike Timlin’s thrown way too many innings lately, but Francona’s got no one else. Timlin goes to the slider and whiffs Reed Johnson and Orlando Hudson, then gets Alex Rios on a force-out. He gives one back in the seventh, but Mendoza (another unlikely hero) gets two outs in the eighth, and Foulke handles things from there. So, thanks to some clutch play from the shallow end of the depth chart, we keep pace.

With Nomar gone and Trot possibly lost for the season, we don’t have a true number five hitter to protect Manny and David. Francona’s tried a number of guys there lately—just as he tried Dauber and Tek early in the season. When he posts the lineup for our nineteenth and final game of the season against Toronto, Bellhorn sees that Bill Mueller’s in the number five slot and jokes, “Are we trying tonight?”

Dave Wallace likes to say that if your eight best pitchers throw 80% of your innings, you’ll be in good shape. That’s great if you have eight good pitchers. Toronto has two. Kid righty Josh Towers implodes in the fifth, giving up back-to-back jobs to Manny and David, and then, two batters later, a two-run shot to Cabrera on a hanging curve. Schilling goes 6 1/3 and leaves with the score a comfortable 10–1, giving Francona a chance to use some of our worst arms (Terry Adams, Mike Myers, Mendoza—who actually throws well) and rest the real pen for one night.

The Yanks and Rangers lose, but the Angels put up 21 runs against the Royals to stay even in the wild card. Next Tuesday we start a nine-game stretch against the Angels, Rangers and A’s. If we can go 6-3 or better, we’re looking at the playoffs.

You never take the field expecting to lose, but when your number five starter is on the mound, you know you’ve got to work a little harder. Number five guys can be kids on their way up (Clemens, early on; Aaron Sele; Casey Fossum), vets on the way down (the execrable Matt Young; the puzzling Ramon Martinez; the scuffling Frank Castillo; the iffy John Burkett), or guys in the middle just trying to hold on (usually junkballers like Al Nipper or Wake). The recent number five fad is the converted closer (Derek Lowe, Anaheim’s Kelvim Escobar), which makes more sense, giving a shot to a guy who actually has good stuff—as opposed to the normal borderline number five guy stuff—and hoping he develops into a number two or three.

All number five guys have promise, otherwise they wouldn’t be in the majors, but it’s rare to see one over the age of thirty bloom into a solid starter, the way ex-Sock Jamie Moyer did in Seattle. More often, the number five who exceeds expectations isn’t the vet or the phenom (he’s already a number one or two, like the Cubs’ Kerry Wood or Mark Prior) but a guy in his mid-to-late twenties getting his second shot and putting it all together, the way Bronson Arroyo does tonight.

Arroyo’s skinny as a stick, but he’s no kid. At twenty-seven, he’s been a pro for ten years, signing with Pittsburgh out of high school and rising through their farm system, seeing limited action with the big club for parts of three seasons until they waived him before spring training last year. He pitched brilliantly for Pawtucket, earning a September call-up, and threw so well—especially against the Yankees—that we made room for him on our playoff roster. This year, with Kim out, by default he became our number five guy, and though his record’s only 7-9 (partly due to lack of run support, partly to our weak middle relievers), his ERA is 4.07, a full run better than Lowe’s, just .29 behind Pedro—better, in fact, than all the Yankee starters except Kevin Brown. Tonight he has his curve working and shuts down the Tigers for 7 1/3, giving up only an unearned run in a clutch 4–1 win. On the mound he’s contained but assured, then almost cocky, sauntering off after striking out the side, as slow as Pedro. It’s the kind of performance that makes you wonder if he’ll turn into a number one someday.

As previously noted, the Boston baseball writers are masters of the bad vibe, maestros of dark karma. If cast away on a cannibal isle, I have no doubt they would soon be kings…at least until reduced to dining upon each other. Hardly anything seems to knock them off-stride—how could it, when they cover a team which has been denied the ultimate brass ring for eighty-six years?—but one thing that does give them pause is a protracted winning streak. When Bronson Arroyo notched last night’s win over the Detroit Tigers, he helped make the Boston Red Sox nine for their last ten, and the Hub sports pages were flooded with sunshine, most of it thin enough to…well, thin enough to read a newspaper through.

Leave it to Dan Shaughnessy to find a reassuring dark spot; just the right familiar note of negativity. In today’s
Globe
column (untrustworthily titled “Dark Days Appear to Be Long Gone”), Shaughnessy says, in effect: “Does all this winning upset you? Does it leave you with a feeling of vertigo to get up in the morning and discover the Sox have won yet again?
BLAME NOMAR!
” That’s right; blame Number 5, now living it up in Chicago under a different number. Shaughnessy dates the current roll of distressing good times (ooh, my tummy hurts, somebody pass the Dramamine) from July 31st, the day of the Big Trade. Never mind the two horrible losses that followed on its heels, or Orlando Cabrera’s terrible struggle to find his feet in the field and his stroke at the plate as he plays for the first time in years in front of a live audience. No, it’s Garciaparra’s fault, and why? Two reasons. First, because management pulled the trigger and management has to be right. Second, because we have just got to find the dark lining inside this silver cloud. How else can we define ourselves as Cursed, for God’s sake? I think George Orwell said it best in his classic allegory,
Baseball Animal Farm Team
: “Orlando good, Nomar bad.”

Now—have all you little piggies got that straight?

I recently read an interesting note from a sports psychologist—can’t remember who or where, or I’d be happy to attribute it. Anyway, this guy said that when the local team wins, they’re
we,
as in
we
beat the Tigers last night for the third time straight. When the locals lose, they’re
they,
as in can you believe how lousy
they
were in July?

You can call Boston’s recent spectacular run—eleven Ws in the last thirteen games, if my math is right—as a lesson in just how great the disparity is between the haves and the have-nots in the American League, but that would ignore the so-so way
they
played against the same clubs earlier in the season.
[41]
It also ignores the fact that
we’re
doing it now with many players either on the DL or going out there hurt.

It’s a great run, and probably Stewart’s and my e-mails show this best. I hope he’ll lay a couple of those daffy suckers in here. (
“Waaba-waabawaaba, do you beleeeve this shit, Steve?”
and I’m back with
“Waaackawaaacka-waaacka, no fuckin’ WAY!”
) And, to top things off, Anaheim finally
lost
a game yesterday. That means that when the Red Sox/Angels showdown—mini-Armageddon—starts on Tuesday at the Fens, we’re guaranteed the wild-card lead, and if things go the way I’ve got them planned, that lead will be up to two and a half games.

Even the folks at Scribner, who commissioned this book (at no small cost, either, hee-hee), have stopped crying doom. For the time being, at least.

We won again yesterday behind a strong outing by Pedro, and this afternoon there’s a carnival mood around Fenway. Manny, who fouled a ball off his knee and missed last night’s game, comes out for batting practice wearing coach Ino Guerrero’s #65. In the field Manny’s manic, flashing how many outs there are to Johnny, to the family section, to the Monster. In the fifth, down 1–0, he comes up with bases loaded and two out, and the crowd rises, chanting, “MANN-y, MANN-y.” First pitch, he drills a single to give us the lead. Ortiz rips another, then Millar. Wake throws eight strong, and the party doesn’t stop.

It’s strange, this high from winning—a straight drug, uncut. Faithful as the Faithful are, we tend to nitpick, even after a win. Not today. Everything’s clicking, and, sure, it’s only Detroit, but we’ve won 20 games this month. The underachieving Red Sox have become overachievers, and no one is happier than the Faithful.