Yankees vs. Red Sox Part 3: Hell Freezes Over

 

 

In 2004, as Yogi famously put it, it was déjà vu all over again.

The was between Boston and New York had begun even before spring training when Alex Rodriguez, already considered one of the greatest players in baseball, became a free agent. The Yankees and Red Sox opened their pocketbooks and the Bronx beat Beantown again, this time offering a ten-year $250 million contract. It was classic Steinbrenner and it pissed off everyone in baseball, not just Boston, but that was the game.

The AL East was a repeat of the war of the previous year, this time with even more bench clear brawls and all players openly seething. For the first time as a fan and a viewer I saw just how visceral that contempt was between the two franchises and particularly given how last year had turned out, it became real to me in a way it had only been figurative from all the books and TV clips I'd seen.

I was increasingly becoming immersed in my passion as a TV critic, though I was still more than five years before making my first semi-professional attempts. I remember I was distracting during the early days of the postseason with the new fall schedule, particularly ABC's Sunday night lineup of Desperate Housewives and Boston Legal. I'd also been watching the third season of The Wire which, in those pre-streaming days I tended to watch on Monday nights. I was following most of my regular shows such as Scrubs, half of what was on the WB and much of CBS's lineup of procedurals.  And at the time the postseason on baseball was divided between ESPN and Fox with the American League series on Fox during that period.

So during October I was basically watching TV with one hand on the clicker; checking the scores between commercials of one show or the other. That hasn't changed in twenty years until the World Series.  My mother was following this because once again the Yankees had the best record in the American league, going 101-61, once again the best record in baseball. This time the Red Sox were 98-64 which was the second best record in baseball and third only behind the St. Louis Cardinals who'd gone an impressive 105-57. For the third consecutive year the Yankees faced the Minnesota Twins and once again they went through them, albeit in 4 games instead of 3.

Boston was up against the Anaheim Angels, two years ago the World Champions and now back in the ALCS. In Anaheim the Red Sox trounced Boston both times with Curt Schilling winning Game 1, 9-3 and Pedro winning Game 2, 8-3. They went back to Fenway for Game 3.

I remember that game vividly. The Red Sox were ahead 6-1 going into the top of the 7^th. Then the Angels loaded the based with nobody out. Then Timlin walked in a run to make it 6-2. Then Vladimir Guerrero hit a grand slam to tie the game and Fenway went quiet.

At that moment I was truly a Red Sox fan in my soul. Because even though the game was tied I could see just how this would play out. The Angels would take the lead in the next inning, the Red Sox would lose the clincher, all the momentum would go out of them and Anaheim would make an incredible comeback. And considering that Boston had crushed Anaheim's hopes in a similar situation 18 years earlier there would have been a sad poetry to it.

That feeling was maintained even though the Angels didn't score and the game went into extra innings. I didn't know that there was one big difference between 2003 and 2004 and his name was David Ortiz.

In the tenth Johnny Damon single. Pokey Reese hit into a fielder's choice. Manny Ramirez struck out. Mike Scosisa then took Franciso Rodriguez out and brought Jarrod Washburn in to pitch to Ortiz. The man who was about to become known to the world as Big Papi hit a two run homer to win the ALDS for Boston.

So for the second straight year the Red Sox were facing the Yankees in the ALCS. Like I said, déjà vu all over again.

Whatever hopes I had for Boston beating New York went out the window in Game 1. Curt Schilling had gone 6-1 in the postseason and I remembered how much he'd owned the Yankees when he pitched for Arizona. He was up against Mike Mussina. The scene was set for a pitcher duel, so naturally it became a blowout.

Schilling sustained a torn tendon against the Angels and was ineffective. The Yankees took an 8-0 lead as Mussina pitched 6 perfect innings. Bellhorn' spoiled the party and the Red Sox managed to get 5 in the seventh. They closed it to 8-7 but then they brought it on Mariano and hope died. The Yankees finished 10-7.

Game 2 was a pitchers duel between Pedro and Jon Lieber with the Yankees finally winning 3-1.

Game 3 was scheduled for Friday but there was a rain out. The next day I was sleeping over at a friends house and only occasionally looked at the game. I spent most of it wishing for a flood in what could have been called the Boston Massacre had the term not been more famously used in 1978. The Yankees won 19-8.

I didn't read was sportswriter Bob Ryan wrote in the Boston Globe but I would have agreed with it a hundred percent:

They are down, 3-0, after last night's 19-8 rout and, in this sport, that is an official death sentence. Soon it will be over, and we will spend another dreary winter lamenting this and lamenting that."

Which was the logical reaction. The baseball postseason had existed for 100 years and in that century not a single team had ever come back from a 3-0 deficit to win a seven game series.  And this wasn't any team. This was the Red Sox, a team who had spent the twentieth century finding ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. And against the Yankees? The winningest franchise in baseball history? Who'd won six pennant in eight years? The franchise that had provided Bucky F---Ing Dent and Aaron F---ing Boone?

No. Get the Fenway organist to prepare a bevy of funeral marches. This was done. Pay no attention to that long-haired idiot Johnny Damon, he doesn't know the first thing he's talking about.

I know that Game 4 was the following day. I was watching Sunday night broadcasting – Desperate Housewives, Boston Legal – and around 11 pm I finally tuned it. At which point it was over.  The Yankees were up 4-3 and Mariano was on the mound in the 9^th.  So what if he walked Kevin Millar?

I had no idea who Dave Roberts was before Game 4. Nor did I know he'd been trained in baserunning by Maury Wills, who'd once told him one day he'd have to steal a base with the entire world watching. Roberts met the challenge and stole second. Bill Mueller hit a single and Rivera for what was only the second time in my years of watching him blew a save. The first time had been Game 7 of the Yankees-Diamondbacks World Series.

The game was tied 4-4. I watched the next three innings from my couch with my parents. Paul Quantrill had come into relief. Manny Ramirez singled. Ortiz hit the ball:

"Going back at the wall, we'll see you back her tomorrow night!" I remember the broadcaster saying. (I can't recall if it was Tim McCarver or Joe Buck.)

They'd staved off elimination in miraculous fashion. Still it was a deep hole.

Game 5 began at 5:11, less than sixteen hours after Game 4 ended. It was Mussina versus Martinez, a rematch of Game 2. The Red Sox took a 2-o lead early in the game but the Yankees would come back to take four runs in the sixth. Once again the bullpen couldn't hold it. Ortiz led off the eighth with a home run against Tom Gordon. Millar walked. Unbelievably Roberts came in again. He went to third on Trot Nixon's single and Varitek tied the game with a sacrifice.

The game went fourteen innings and I remember watching most of them the same way every single viewer did: with my heart perpetually in my throat. Every inning it seemed one team or the other had a chance to take the lead: every inning the other throttled it.

Finally after what I assume was the fourteenth inning stretch. Damon and Ramirez both walked. Ortiz came up with two outs. The at bat was epic: ten pitches and everyone of them you could feel the Red Sox catch their breath. Finally Ortiz singled the center:

Tim McCarver: "He didn't do it again, did he? Yes he did!"  Fenway fans started chanting "Who's your Papi?"  And from that day to this David Ortiz has never had to buy a drink in Boston.

Remarkable, astounding. But the Red Sox were still down 3 games to 2. And they had to clinch the last two games in Yankee Stadium. Where everything had melted down for them last year.

Now I have to say regardless of his political views, Curt Schilling should be in the Hall Of Fame. It's not just that he was a great pitcher; it's that even before 2004 he was one of the greatest big game pitchers in my lifetime.  Then he takes the mound in Game 6 with a torn tendon sheath in his right ankle. Which had been sutured in place by Red Sox doctors. In a procedure they'd only done once before. On a cadaver.

It's not like the bloody sock needs context but I really think it does. Because somehow Schilling pitched 7 innings and gave up just one run in the seventh. At which point the Red Sox were up 4-1.

Then in the eighth Bronson Arroyo took the point. One out. Miguel Cairo doubles. Jeter singles to close it to 4-2. Everyone watching in Boston is going: "Here it comes."

Then A-Rod grounds to Arroyo. Arroyo picks up the ball and runs to tag him but A-Rod slaps his arm knocking the ball loose while the ball rolled down to the baseline Jeter scores.

Now in 2004 there were no challenges, no replay the way there is now. So when Terry Francona challenged the call there were no guarantees the umpires would listen to him. And because this was the Red Sox and given everything that happened to them, history would indicate the challenge would fail, the call would stand, the Yankees would continue to rally, the comeback would end here.

And then the umpires  made the call. A-Rod was called out for interference and Jeter was sent back to first.

And as the Yankee fans reacted to this with the calm and composure they're known for (they started throwing garbage on the field) that, to coin the spiritual, was the hour I first believed. Eventually it got so bad that the Yankees were showering field with debris and Michael Bloomberg had to call the NYPD on to the field in riot gear. The Yankee fan base had never been in this position in eighty years and certainly not since 1996. This stuff happened to other teams, not the Bronx Bombers! They destroyed other teams. The most unprecedented comeback in baseball history, if not sports history, not against the Yankees!

When Game 6 ended I knew the Yankees were dead. The momentum was entirely on Boston's side and I knew there was no way the Yankees could overcome it. The fat lady had already sung even before the first pitch had been thrown even if the Yankees did get Bucky Dent to throw it out

And the Red Sox ended the suspense early. They scored 2 runs in the first on an Ortiz home run because of course. Damon hit a grand slam in the second and the rest of the game was the Red Sox making up for 86 years of pent-up aggression. It was 10-3 at the end of night.

I bought a copy of the New York Post that day for the sports section alone. The headline summed it up: "Hell Freezes Over."

There was still a World Series to go and in an alternate universe – really the one that Red Sox had lived in during the 20^th century – the Cardinals who had crushed their hopes in 1946 and 1967 and had won the most games in baseball in 2004 would have done so here. But the 2004 Red Sox were not just playing baseball; they were exorcising their demons. And once you've beaten your greatest nemesis for 86 years in the greatest comeback in baseball history, the Cardinals didn't have a prayer. And indeed Boston demolished St. Louis in a sweep never trailing in any of the games.

The entire world was different after that and I don't just mean sports. The ramifications filtered down to Hollywood at every level.  Just weeks after the sweep Boston Legal which was written by the native David E. Kelley had Denny Crane and Alan Shore basically use the Red Sox sweep as an excuse for Denny's latest shenanigans with William Shatner saying to the judge as he left "Who's your daddy?" Fever Pitch, the Jimmy Fallon-Drew Barrymore romcom that was being filmed with Fallon's character being a lifelong Red Sox fan getting in the way of a romance had to have its ending rewritten to dealing with the Red Sox's comeback.

 And as a fan of Lost, we would learn that not even on an island where miraculous things happened all the time could top the Red Sox sweep. When Ben Linus updates Jack on what's happened since the plane crash and tells him the Red Sox lost the World Series Jack actively doesn't believe him. He has to show a recording of the final out for Jack to buy it. And to be clear Jack still doesn't know whether to trust it. The following season when outsiders reach the island Jack actually asks Frank Lapidus if the Red Sox won the World Series.

"Don't make me talk about it," Frank says. "I'm from the Bronx. I bleed Yankee Blue."

To top it all off the previous October HBO had run a documentary about the Red Sox called: "The curse of the Babe" the previous year. One year they updated it with "Reverse of the Curse." All of the Boston fans who'd been full of gloom and dismay the previous year were now full of hope and cheer as if the weight of the world had been lifted from their shoulders.

And I'll be honest. I suspect that weight was lifted off the shoulders of every single Red Sox player still alive from that period just a bit if not the same way it had been the fans. For Johnny Pesky and Bobby Doerr, still around from the 1946 team, to Yaz and Lonborg and every from the 1967 team to that outstanding team from the entire 1970s, all the way up to Bill Buckner himself, they no longer had to carry the burden of having come close and failed. Reconciliation was possible, healing could finally begin.

As for the Yankees, I will confess it has been easier for me personally to root for them in the aftermath of being on the other side of a loss like this. It made them all human in a way that the four World Series in five years had made them seem like a machine. I can appreciate their dynasty in retrospect in a way I couldn't when I was watching it the first time. I can appreciate Jeter and Posada and Petite and Bernie in a way that was so much more difficult when I watched them win all the time. It was the first time the Yankee luster had been dimmed in not just my lifetime but the memory of baseball and while things have been as good for them in the last twenty years, I can root for them in a way that was more difficult as a teenager and young adult.

I will close this out with an epilogue for both Boston and New York and indeed  21^st century baseball so far.