October 19,
2007 ...
No game scheduled ...
There were puddles on the plastic tarp covering the infield. A tour
group occupied a few rows of seats in the back of the deserted
grandstand. A handful of maintenance workers walked along the muddy
clay track between the dugouts. Pitching coach John Farrell played
catch with his son, long and lean. Daisuke Matsuzaka stood alone in
center field, throwing long toss with Alex Martinez, the bullpen
catcher, standing on the right-field foul line. The clubhouse had
long since been cleared of reporters and most of the players who had
come in and hit in the batting cages underneath the stands had
scattered.
It was quiet
on a damp Yawkey Way, on a day that was more late August sticky than mid-October
crisp. Fenway Park had the feel of an old-time amusement park drawing to the end
of another long summer, just before the cars on the Ferris wheel are taken down,
the cotton candy stands are boarded up, and the roller coaster is shuttered.
But the
ancient ballpark is not yet ready to call it quits for the season, and neither
are its primary occupants. The funhouse will be packed to overflowing, when the
Red Sox, given a reprieve when Josh Beckett pitched a game for the ages Thursday
night in Cleveland, attempt to stave off winter one more time against the
Indians in Game 6 of the American League Championship Series.
Sox PR man
John Blake notes that Boston has a record of 22-11 in games in which it could
have been eliminated from a postseason series. In that situation, the Red Sox
have gone 3-0 or better in five series: 4-0 in the 2004 American League
Championship Series vs. New York and 3-0 in the 1903 World Series vs.
Pittsburgh, the 1986 ALCS vs. California, the 1999 Division Series vs.
Cleveland, and the 2003 Division Series vs. Oakland
