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A TEAM "FIT TO BE TIED"
The Sox clinch
the wild card
October 2, 2005
...
It was only the bottom of the fifth inning at Fenway, but Grady
Sizemore had just grounded out in Chicago, drawing the curtain on
Cleveland's epic collapse, and the Red Sox were going back to the
playoffs. The defending World Champions open their best-of-five
Division Series in Chicago.
The
mega-hyped final weekend of the regular season didn't unfold exactly the way New
England hoped. The Red Sox beat the Yankees two times in three tries, qualified
for the playoffs, stripped the Yankees of home-field advantage in the first
round of the playoffs, and finished with the exact same record as the Evil
Empire, but a rarely invoked tiebreaker rule and the implosion of the Indians
made the Sox the wild-card playoff team and sucked the drama out of the final
two games.
It was
Boston's turn to spray the bubbly. Manager Terry Francona lifted his stars
midway through a thoroughly lifeless drubbing of the Bronx Bombers and there
were thousands of empty seats in the ancient yard when Mike Timlin punched out
the immortal Bubba Crosby to end it at 5:47. Some of those who left early no
doubt spent hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars anticipating that Game 162
might have been a winner-take-all classic played on the same date between the
same teams 27 Bucky Dent years ago.
Not now.
This is the wild-card era and for the third straight season, the Sox and Yankees
are both going to the playoffs. They have met 71 times over the last three
seasons with each winning one American League pennant at the other's expense.
This is the first time in club history the Sox have made the playoffs in three
straight seasons.
Ortiz got
all the MVP hype, but Manny Ramirez is on a tear as he enters the playoffs.
Ramirez hit his 45th home run yesterday, his ninth in the last 12 games.
Meanwhile, Sox fans were buoyed by a strong performance from Curt Schilling, who
went six innings, allowing eight hits and one run while improving his record to
8-8.
Kevin Millar
and Damon were among Sox players who wore goggles for the wild-card celebration.
In 2003 and again last year, the Sox were criticized by some for overdoing their
wild-card clinch parties. These Red Sox have been there before. We all remember.
And now they are back on the stage where they do their best work. |
