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THE "IDIOTS" REVERSE THE CURSE
Curt Schilling is magnificent in his 21st win
September 26, 2004 ... The Red Sox played their final home game of the regular season and their last
scheduled contest against their bitter rivals from the Bronx. Curt Schilling had treated a delighted 34,582 to one of the finest pitching performances of the season, allowing one hit to the Yankees over seven innings en route to an 11-4 victory.
With "Sweet Caroline" wafting through the little bandbox, Ellis Burks had just stepped from the dugout to bid the throng a graceful farewell as he approached retirement. And the rousing ovation for Burks hardly had subsided when the first pitch in the bottom of the eighth from Yankee mop-up
man Brad Halsey rocketed toward David Roberts's chin, renewing a familiar rite for the Sox and Yankees: a benches-clearing incident.
While no punches were thrown amid the latest rancor between the teams, the Sox scored a significant moral victory by roughing up the Yankees for a second straight game nearly as soundly as the Steinbrenner Nine spanked the Sox the previous weekend in the Bronx. The Sox, in thrashing the
Bombers, 12-5, Saturday and thumping them today, also showed signs of snapping out of a 6-7 run down the stretch.
Schilling took care of his game, allowing only a two-run, ground- ball single up the middle to Jorge Posada after he uncharacteristically walked the bases loaded in the fourth inning. Schilling was so enraged for the lapse of control and his inability to knock down Posada's grounder that he
spiked the ball in the dirt by first base after the final batter of the inning was retired.
Thanks to the Sox' offense, Schilling was sitting on a 7-0 lead during his brief lapse. The Sox annihilated Kevin Brown in his first start since he fractured his left hand punching a clubhouse wall after his last outing Sept. 3, routing him after he retired only two batters in the first
inning. After the Sox scored four runs against Brown, they tagged Esteban Loaiza for seven more (six earned), as every starter but Mientkiewicz either scored a run or knocked one in. David Ortiz, Jason Varitek, and Trot Nixon each drove in two runs, and Bill Mueller launched a solo homer.
The Sox held a team meeting before the game to discuss alternatives for reaching St. Petersburg, Fla., for a three-game series against the Devil Rays amid concerns about Hurricane Jeanne, which lashed Florida with fierce winds and five to 10 inches of rain. Much of the area lost power by
early in the day, roads were flooded, and schools were ordered closed today. |
