Hardball Hyperbole: Chapter 10

In today’s edition, the Yankees won the AL East, Boston earned the wild-card spot, and then both teams took care of business in the divisional round, setting up the AL Championship Series that everyone wanted to see.

The collective sigh that emanated from Yankee Stadium on the afternoon of Sept. 7 when New York averted a sweep at the hands of the Red Sox could be felt in each of the five boroughs, out to Westchester County, to Long Island, and across the river into New Jersey.

That 3-1 victory stopped a skid where the Yankees had lost nine of 15 games which cut their once-comfortable 7.5-game lead to 1.5. Had David Wells blinked first, or Bernie Williams not hit his seventh-inning homer which broke a tense scoreless duel, Boston would have been a half-game back and riding a wave of foot loose and fancy free momentum.

Instead, the Yankees did what they almost always did, especially when it pertained to the Red Sox. That victory tipped their world back on its axis and it kick-started an eight-game winning streak that essentially decided the AL East race because at the same time, the Red Sox went 3-4 and lost four games in the standings.

“If it’s not pretty, people want to know why,” Joe Torre said of the Yankees struggles before the winning streak. “But we were certainly capable of making a run and it couldn’t have come at a better time.”

Following a Sept. 13 doubleheader sweep of Tampa Bay, the seventh and eighth straight victories, Derek Jeter said, “We can’t worry about Boston. We have a big enough lead where if we play well and play how we’re supposed to, we’ll win our division.”

And that’s exactly what happened. Boston could not mount a charge over the final two weeks and actually lost ground. With a record of 101-61, the Yankees finished six games ahead of the 95-67 Red Sox, thus setting up the AL Divisional Series matchups this way: Boston as the wild-card facing AL West champion Oakland, and the Yankees meeting AL Central champ Minnesota.

There were moments during ALDS week where it looked like the Yankees-Red Sox AL Championship Series - which everyone outside of Minnesota and Oakland was pining for - might not happen. But in the end, destiny smiled and the Yankees, after dropping the opener at Yankee Stadium, ushered out the Twins by winning three straight, and the Red Sox overcame losing the first two games by roaring back to win three in a row to knock out the A’s.

Yankees vs. Twins

When Mike Mussina took the mound for Game 1 at Yankee Stadium, he did so with a career record of 20-2 against the Twins, 4-0 since he signed with the Yankees in 2001. In two of those winning starts during the 2003 regular season he’d pitched 15 innings and allowed only three earned runs. So yeah, even though the Twins had posted baseball’s best post-All-Star Game record at 46-23, the Yankees were feeling pretty good.

However, Mussina gave up a run in the third on a sacrifice fly and two more in the sixth when Torii Hunter drove a ball to right-center that should have been a single but skipped past Williams and rolled to the wall. Matt LeCroy - who I have come to know and like during his three seasons as manager of the Rochester Red Wings - scored from first, and when cutoff man Alfonso Soriano threw wildly trying to nail Hunter at third, Hunter was able to scamper home.

That proved to be more than enough as the Yankees did nothing against Minnesota starter Johan Santana and four relievers until they scored once with two outs in the ninth during a 3-1 loss.

Just like that, visions of 2002 when the 103-win Yankees were knocked out in the ALDS round by the Angels began dancing in the heads of the fan base, for sure. Not in the Yankees’ minds, though, as this turned out to be the proverbial blip on the radar.

This was the first postseason game ever between these two teams, and what we know now but didn’t know then was just how lopsided their future encounters would be. In the next 17 postseason games, which came in six different series, the Yankees would lose only once. And none of those came in the final three game of this series.

As he so often did during his fantastic career, when the Yankees needed a clutch outing Andy Pettitte delivered. He pitched seven innings in Game 2, gave up just one run on four hits and three walks with 10 strikeouts, and Mariano Rivera handled the final two innings perfectly to close out a 4-1 victory.

“I think it was incredible,” said Jason Giambi who delivered the biggest hit of the night, a two-run single that capped a decisive three-run rally in the seventh. “We sent the right guy to the mound, no doubt about it. Andy Pettitte has been our guy all year long. I know I haven’t spent a lot of time around here as a Yankee; this is my second year. But the game he pitched tonight, I don’t think there could have been a bigger one in the postseason.”

Game 3 was another taut pitchers’ duel, this time Roger Clemens against Kyle Lohse, and Clemens - backed by three early runs, two coming on a homer by Hideki Matsui - turned in seven workmanlike innings before Rivera threw two more perfect innings to finish off a 3-1 Yankee victory.

And then in Game 4, with Santana back on the mound trying to extend Minnesota’s season, the Yankees delivered the kill shot with a six-run explosion in the fourth with Nick Johnson hitting a two-run double and Soriano a two-run single that turned the rest of the night into a funeral for the Twins.

“It was only a matter of time before the offense came around,” said Giambi, who went 2-for-4 with a pair of doubles. “There are too many good hitters here. If we keep our approach, hitting the ball the other way, we are going to be tough to beat the rest of the way. I could feel it on the bench that we were going to get one big inning.”

So, the Yankees punched their ticket. Now it was left to the Red Sox.

Red Sox vs. A’s

All year long, the Red Sox had bashed their way to this moment with an offense that produced 961 runs, second-most in franchise history behind only the 1950 team of Ted Williams, Johnny Pesky, Dom DiMaggio, Bobby Doerr and Walt Dropo that put up 1,027.

The Red Sox led the AL with a .289 team batting average, a .360 on-base percentage, a .491 slugging percentage, an OPS of .851, total bases with 2,832, and were second in home runs with 238, just one behind the Rangers who had a league MVP named Alex Rodriguez hit 47.

Every regular in the lineup had an on-base percentage of at least .333, six hit at least 25 home runs led by Manny Ramirez’s 37, eight hit at least 30 doubles, and three drove in at least 100 runs.

But in the first two games in Oakland, the mighty Red Sox were neutered by the excellent A’s pitching staff and they lost 5-4 in 12 innings, and 5-1 in Game 2 when Oakland curveball ace Barry Zito racked up nine strikeouts and the A’s scored all of their runs in the second inning against Tim Wakefield.

“We’re going back to Boston, where we kill the baseball,” Kevin Millar said. “I’m not worried. We’re going to pound the baseball. We’re going to put the pressure on them the same way they did it to us. They’re going to have to win Game 3, which is the hardest game to win.”

Millar got one thing right. The Red Sox were indeed going back to Fenway for the next two with their season on the brink, but they did not kill the baseball. They managed only 14 hits combined in Games 3 and 4, but their pitching bailed them out and they evened the series, necessitating a trip back to the West Coast for a decisive Game 5.

In Game 3, Derek Lowe and former Yankee Ted Lilly battled through seven taut innings and the bullpens carried the game to the 11th inning tied 1-1 before Trot Nixon - pinch hitting for Gabe Kapler - hit a walk-off two-run homer to dead center off Rich Harden for a 3-1 victory.

“These are the playoffs. It was a must-win for us,” Nixon said. “All the home runs you have during the regular season and your career don’t mean much unless you start hitting home runs in the playoffs because this is what you work for all year during the spring and the season to get to this position. To hit that home run tonight, it’s tops on my list.”

The next day, the Red Sox fell into a 4-2 hole when Jermaine Dye ripped a two-run homer off John Burkett in the sixth. But Ricardo Rincon relieved Oakland starter Steve Sparks in the bottom of the inning and the first batter he faced, Todd Walker, homered to cut Boston’s deficit in half.

And then in the eighth, with future Red Sox closer Keith Foulke on for a six-out save which would have sent the A’s to the ALCS, he gave up a double to Nomar Garciaparra, a single to Ramirez, and then an electrifying two-run, go-ahead double to David Ortiz, his first hit in 17 at bats in the series. Scott Williamson’s perfect ninth wrapped up a 5-4 Boston victory.

“As everyone in this room knows, we faced the best pitching in the American League, and they made good pitches,” Ortiz said of the A’s staff. “If I was struggling, I don’t think I would have hit the ball to win the game. Don’t give up on me, people. Come on.”

Now, it seemed almost a foregone conclusion with Pedro Martinez lined up to start Game 5, even though he would be facing the 2002 Cy Young Award winner Zito, that Red Sox-Yankees was happening.

It did not come easily, though. Only three batters combined reached base against Martinez and Zito as the game moved to the bottom of the fourth when Oakland broke through. Scott Hatteberg drew a walk and Jose Guillen lashed an RBI double to right.

Zito rolled through an easy fifth which meant he had thrown 12 innings in this series and given up just one run, but then it all came apart with stunning velocity in the sixth. The Red Sox erupted for their only four runs of the game, but they were enough in what became a 4-3 series-clinching victory.

Jason Varitek started the sixth-inning fireworks with a leadoff homer to tie the game, and then Zito walked Johnny Damon and hit Walker with a pitch. Up came Ramirez who had struggled most of the series, and he launched a 2-2 pitch deep over the left-field wall to give Boston a 4-1 lead.

“I haven’t been swinging the bat good, but I have confidence in myself,” said Ramirez. “I told Ino (coach Ino Guerrero) he was going to make a mistake and I was going to be waiting. I just wanted to relax and stay calm and let it happen, not put any pressure on myself in that situation.”

Pedro gave back a run in the bottom half on doubles by Erubiel Durazo and Miguel Tejeda, and then he got into trouble in the eighth when Chris Singleton singled and raced home on a double by Billy McMillon. Here, Alan Embree relieved and recorded three quick outs, but then in the ninth, the Red Sox nearly gave the game away.

Williamson came in to close but he walked the only two men he faced, Hatteberg and Guillen. So Grady Little called on Lowe, just two days after he had thrown 100 pitches in his Game 3 start.

“If you had any doubts about his heart, there are absolutely no doubts now,” Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein said of Lowe after he sandwiched a walk around two strikeouts to save the game. “That was as clutch as you can possibly be. I don’t know how many pitchers in the game have the guts to make those pitches.”

Well, plenty actually, but it was certainly a gritty performance by Lowe in a game that had dripped with drama the entire way and came to such a frenetic, pulse-pounding end.

Even Yankees third baseman Aaron Boone was caught up in the drama watching on TV back home in New York. “I’m sitting there watching and realized I was biting my nails,” he said on the eve of Game 1 of the ALCS. “And I didn’t even know which way I was rooting!”

Boone comes from a baseball family, three generations of major leaguers from his grandfather Ray to this father Bob to him and his brother Bret. The game is in his blood, and while he might not have wanted to admit it, of course he was rooting for the Red Sox because Yankees-Red Sox would be the only way to decide the AL pennant. Now, with the lightweight Twins and A’s out of the way, here it was.

Boone had come to the Yankees in a trade deadline deal from Cincinnati and thus had played in only six games against Boston - three at Fenway, three at Yankee Stadium. “You only need one to know,” Boone said when he was asked if he had fully come to understand the passion of the rivalry. “One game in August between the Yankees and Red Sox is all you need to know how mad this can get. So I can only imagine what it’s going to be like (in the ALCS).”

Red Sox manager Grady Little knew. “It’s exciting when we play them in April,” said Sox manager Grady Little. “So I know in October it will be exciting, too. I think for a while people could see this coming about and now it's here. Let's play.”

Boone and Little really had no idea just how exciting it actually would be.

NEXT WEDNESDAY: In Game 1 of the ALCS, Tim Wakefield’s knuckleball baffled the Yankees and the Red Sox struck the first blow.