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THE SUMMER OF "MORGAN'S
MAGIC" ...
Larry Parrish
keys a Sox comeback
July
22, 1988 ... The Red Sox won their ninth
straight game under Joe Morgan's firm but genial stewardship, this
time rallying from two runs down for a 4-3 victory over the Chicago
White Sox before 33,477 believers at Fenway Park. That pushed Boston
within 3 1/2 games of first-place Detroit in the American League
East, and the Red Sox have made up 5 1/2 games on the leaders since
Morgan took over nine days ago.
And after tonight, 14 straight victories by the Red Sox in the Fens. That has
never happened, not since this oddly angled brickyard was stacked in 1912.
This time Boston fell behind, 2-0, before coming to bat. The Red Sox trailed,
3-1, in the sixth, hung up by Melido Perez' forkball. No problem. Larry Parrish
simply whacked a monster of a double to center to score Benzinger and Jody Reed.
Tie game. Then the Sox used an error on a hit-and-run by Marty Barrett in the
seventh to set up Wade Boggs for the game-winner, which came off loser John
Davis (2-3) on a double-play ball.
Most of the time, the Red Sox have been doing it with half a dozen runs an
outing. Tpnight they relied on pitching with 7 1/3 solid innings by Wes Gardner
(4-1), a perfect inning by southpaw Tom Bolton (against lefties Harold Baines,
Dan Pasqua and Greg Walker) and Lee Smith's 14th save, with the tying run on
first in the ninth.
Gardner wasn't supposed to have been on the mound after turning up limping in
the clubhouse Thursday. An injection seemed to take care of tendinitis behind
the right knee. Once he survived a wobbly first inning (two runs on four hits,
including a Steve Lyons double), Gardner got the next dozen White Sox on the way
to his longest outing of the season.
The charm held until two were out in the fifth, when Gardner got Daryl Boston
down, 0-2. but walked him. Then Lyons doubled again, off The Wall this time, and
it was 3-1.
There was a time when that would have signaled the end for this group of Hose.
Instead, Benzinger boomed his double. Once Perez lost Reed on a full count, the
Sox had a chance to do some damage. Parrish, who's already hit more balls hard
in one week than Jim Rice has all year, promptly obliged, crushing a double to
the 379-mark in center field to make it 3-3.
All Parrish has done since he's been here, is go 6 for 14 with two homers and
six RBIs. He knocked in the game-winner Monday, went 3 for 3 with a homer
Tuesday and 2 for 3 Wednesday.
Greenwell, who's taken Rice's job in the field, went 2 for 3, knocking in Dwight
Evans (who ended an 0-for-14 slump with a double) for the first Sox run. He's
now reached base in 85 of 91 games. And Parrish is spraying the ball all over
the park.
Suddenly, a lifeless ball club is in the middle of a pennant race, and
once-buried men like Benzinger and Reed (now amid an eight-game hitting streak)
have been reborn. For the first time since the end of 1986, the Red Sox are 10
games over .500. Games are being won in strange and wondrous ways. And Joe
Morgan's salvation show goes on. |
