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“DIARY OF A WINNER”
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THE CURSE OF THE BAMBINO, PART 6 ... June 28, 1967 ... The Red Sox lost the game when their "Gold Glove" firstbaseman, George Scott, made an error which the Minnesota Twins turned into the winning run of a 3 to 2 victory. Scott's costly error in the seventh inning, was the difference in a fine pitching duel between Lee Stange and Dave Boswell. Boswell, who struck out 12 batters and gave up only four hits, had just one rough inning. That was in the fifth when Reggie Smith and Jerry Adair hit bases empty home runs for the Red Sox only runs. After that happened, he allowed just one hit the rest of the game. The young right-hander had a great curve ball, but was known to have spells where he was wild. But in the early innings, Boswell had a great curve and was putting it exactly where he wanted. In the first four innings, he struck out 10 batters, including six in a row. Carl Yastrzemski's first inning single was the only hit Boswell gave up during the stretch. The hit extended Yaz's latest hitting streak to 12 games. Stange, who yielded only four hits himself, all singles, was almost as good but not good enough. He had the job of trying to match Boswell's performance, and for three innings was almost as effective. However, in the fourth inning, the Twins broke the scoring ice with two runs to take the lead. After two were out, the bases were loaded on a single by Tony Oliva and walks to Bob Allison and Zoilo Versalles. A sharp single by Russ Nixon to left-center chased home the two runs. The Sox bounced back in the fifth for two runs that tied the game. Jerry Adair led off the inning with his first home run of the season, just inside the left-field foul pole. Boswell struck out his 11th batter, Bob Tillman, before Reggie Smith slammed him for another home run. Reggie's home runs had all been right-handed. This was the first one he had hit left-handed, just inside the right-field foul pole, to tie the score at 2 to 2. Both Stange and Boswell settled down after that and battled each other into the seventh when the Twins again regained the lead. George Scott, who may make just one error a month, made two in the inning. He had booted a ground ball by Oliva, but Stange got out of it without any trouble. In the seventh, however, he bobbled a tricky roller by Nixon that put him on first base. Nixon was forced at second by Ted Uhlaender, but Boswell sacrificed Uhlaender to second and he scored on a single to center by Cesar Tovar, making it 3 to 2 in favor of Minnesota. This marked the 16th one run loss for the Sox out of their 34 defeats. Every one of their last seven losses in total, as been by just one run. Dalton Jones left the club for two weeks active military duty, and the Red Sox brought up Ken Paulson from their Winston-Salem farm club. |
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