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MANNY ARRIVES AS THE
YAWKEY ERA CRASHES & BURNS
Tek's walk-off delivers for
the Sox
May 13, 2001 ... An
inning after Oakland A's manager Art Howe ordered Manny Ramirez to be
intentionally walked with one out and the bases empty in extra
innings, the switch-hitting Jason Varitek hit his first home run in
47 games dating back to last Sept. 13th to give the Red
Sox a 5-4 win in 11 innings before a Mother's Day crowd of 31,926.
The Red Sox
salvaged a split of this six-game homestand by winning the last two games
against the A's. They also returned to first place in the American League East,
a half-game ahead of the Yankees.
No one could
possibly do more than Ramirez, who came to the plate in the eighth inning after
a triple by Jose Offerman and RBI single by John Valentin to deliver a tying
two-run homer that was caught in the Sox bullpen by reliever Rod Beck. Ramirez's
home run, which came off A's reliever Jim Mecir, was his 13th of the season,
fourth of the homestand, and eighth in 22 games at Fenway Park. Thirty-five of
his league-leading 46 RBIs, including a dozen on this homestand, have come on
Yawkey Way.
The A’s
exploited a wild Hideo Nomo (six walks in four innings plus four batters) to
take a 4-1 lead into the eighth behind lefthander Mark Mulder, but couldn't
escape the magnitude of Manny.
Derek Lowe,
brought back into a pressure chamber for the first time since blowing a save two
Sundays ago here against the Royals, survived a two-out error by shortstop John
Valentin to strike out Johnny Damon with the bases loaded to end the 10th, and
left two runners on in the 11th, which began with a leadoff double by Frank
Menechino.
Valentin,
who in addition to his eighth-inning single walked and scored the first Sox run
on Dante Bichette's single in the first and made a diving stop to take away a
hit from Sal Fasano in the sixth, was relieved that the Lowe he saw was the one
he remembered from the last two seasons. |
