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Spartacus
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BOSTON -- And, so, they fool us again. Just when we thought the Yankees and Red Sox had given us all they could, they found another level.
And this is it. The ultimate series, for the ultimate prize. Three games in Fenway Park, where either the Yankees will deliver the ultimate payback or the Red Sox the ultimate encore.
A year after the Red Sox danced in Yankee Stadium, the Bombers could turn The Fens into their mosh pit, needing only two out of three to celebrate their eighth straight division title.
Or, the Red Sox could do the two-step, dealing the Bombers another final blow.
Or, neither happens, and they're left in a pretzel to be undone in Game No. 163, on Monday in the Bronx.
The Yankees soared here on their strong second wind -- 15 wins in their last 18 games -- and the Red Sox await them just plain winded -- a mediocre 11-10 in their last 21 -- but relieved to steal one from Toronto.
So not much will be decided in the next three days. Only a division championship, a Wild Card pass into the postseason, and an MVP Award.
Alex Rodriguez will try to pick the pockets of David Ortiz, the Big Papi who virtually wrapped his Big Paws around the trophy with another pressure performance Thursday night.
Cataclysmic, or merely seismic, this series under the multicolored New England fall foliage?
These are noble teams, dignified by the resolve with which they have run the race. They are not sleek, but dinged. Teams buckling under the weight of their cities' expectations, pulled down by their own flaws.
But they have refused to give in or give up until they cross the finish line, like a couple of aging marathon runners stretching on bowed legs for the tape.
The collapse can wait until Monday ... or Tuesday ... or next Sunday ... or whenever a last out sends them into winter.
The champion of the American League East Division and the AL Wild Card will be determined by pitching matchups no one could have conceived six months ago -- not even under the influence of strong hallucinogens.
Friday night, someone named Chien-Ming Wang will go for the Yankees opposite the old Yankee, David Wells.
Wells owns two of Boston's three wins over New York since Memorial Day -- 7-2 on May 29 in Yankee Stadium, 17-1 on July 15 here.
Saturday will pair Randy Johnson and Tim Wakefield, 81 years of contrasting aces. The two are as compatible as P. Diddy and Pavarotti. Two of Wakefield's right-handed knuckleballs equal one of the Big Unit's flames. But Johnson hasn't lost since Aug. 21 and Wakefield has allowed nine runs all month.
Yankees Coverage
• Yanks, Sox set to decide AL East
• 'Cinderella' Small secures Yanks' lead
• Singer: Here they go again
• The Nation and the Empire duel on FOX
Red Sox Coverage
• Epic battle set to begin at Fenway
• Big Papi helps Sox keep pace
• Yanks-Sox rivalry in second century
Season Series
• 09/11: Yankees 1, Red Sox 0
• 09/10: Red Sox 9, Yankees 2
• 09/09: Yankees 8, Red Sox 4
• 07/17: Yankees 5, Red Sox 3
• 07/16: Yankees 7, Red Sox 4
• 07/15: Red Sox 17, Yankees 1
• 07/14: Yankees 8, Red Sox 6
• 05/29: Red Sox 7, Yankees 2
• 05/28: Red Sox 17, Yankees 1
• 05/27: Yankees 6, Red Sox 3
• 04/14: Red Sox 8, Yankees 5
• 04/13: Yankees 5, Red Sox 2
• 04/11: Red Sox 8, Yankees 1
• 04/06: Red Sox 7, Yankees 3
• 04/05: Yankees 4, Red Sox 3
• 04/03: Yankees 9, Red Sox 2
Scheduled to lower the regular-season curtain on Sunday are two veteran right-handers who are accurate reflections of their teams' seasons. It will be a poetically just finale.
Mike Mussina, who alternately looked prime or like he was pitching a cannonball, is due to meet Curt Schilling, who got phat off the World Series triumph but ultimately didn't have two good legs to stand on.
A three-game sweep would give Boston its first division title since 1995. You wouldn't want to bet on that, but you could hope for the Red Sox to win the first two and leave the next step up to Sunday -- remembering the mastery Schilling conjured only three weeks ago in Yankee Stadium, where he stepped totally out of 2005 character with eight innings of five-hit ball.
The Red Sox shed one major haunt last year, but have set themselves up for a new one. If they hit a postseason roadblock, Terry Francona's crew would have a hard time letting this one go.
Not because they blew a big lead over the Yankees -- the biggest they had was 5 1/2 games, on Aug. 10.
But because they blew the chance to build a big lead. While the Yankees were regaining their bearings from a blown-up rotation and were panicked into overhauling a third of their lineup, the Red Sox never took advantage.
They know this, and it gnaws at them.
"This was the season for us to be 10 games up on the Yankees," Ortiz said a few days ago. "They can't play worse than they did at the beginning of the season."
The Red Sox didn't even make as much of that as did the Baltimore Orioles, who led the division until June 23.
By the time the Sox cut the cord to '04 and started to focus on the present, so did the Yankees. The race was on, one of the best races in their long history.
Seldom in 105 seasons have they never been separated by more than 5 1/2 games.
It has taken a lot out of both of them.
The Yankees have a beat-up pitching staff, a soft-tossing center fielder and a sore-legged right fielder.
The Red Sox have a one-armed center fielder, a shelved closer and a gasping offense too often reduced to its two-headed monster, Manny Ramirez and Ortiz.
They each deserve this shot. They deserve each other. We deserve them both.
"It's the master plan," Johnny Damon said. "God's way ... Yankees and Red Sox."
Amen.
And this is it. The ultimate series, for the ultimate prize. Three games in Fenway Park, where either the Yankees will deliver the ultimate payback or the Red Sox the ultimate encore.
A year after the Red Sox danced in Yankee Stadium, the Bombers could turn The Fens into their mosh pit, needing only two out of three to celebrate their eighth straight division title.
Or, the Red Sox could do the two-step, dealing the Bombers another final blow.
Or, neither happens, and they're left in a pretzel to be undone in Game No. 163, on Monday in the Bronx.
The Yankees soared here on their strong second wind -- 15 wins in their last 18 games -- and the Red Sox await them just plain winded -- a mediocre 11-10 in their last 21 -- but relieved to steal one from Toronto.
So not much will be decided in the next three days. Only a division championship, a Wild Card pass into the postseason, and an MVP Award.
Alex Rodriguez will try to pick the pockets of David Ortiz, the Big Papi who virtually wrapped his Big Paws around the trophy with another pressure performance Thursday night.
Cataclysmic, or merely seismic, this series under the multicolored New England fall foliage?
These are noble teams, dignified by the resolve with which they have run the race. They are not sleek, but dinged. Teams buckling under the weight of their cities' expectations, pulled down by their own flaws.
But they have refused to give in or give up until they cross the finish line, like a couple of aging marathon runners stretching on bowed legs for the tape.
The collapse can wait until Monday ... or Tuesday ... or next Sunday ... or whenever a last out sends them into winter.
The champion of the American League East Division and the AL Wild Card will be determined by pitching matchups no one could have conceived six months ago -- not even under the influence of strong hallucinogens.
Friday night, someone named Chien-Ming Wang will go for the Yankees opposite the old Yankee, David Wells.
Wells owns two of Boston's three wins over New York since Memorial Day -- 7-2 on May 29 in Yankee Stadium, 17-1 on July 15 here.
Saturday will pair Randy Johnson and Tim Wakefield, 81 years of contrasting aces. The two are as compatible as P. Diddy and Pavarotti. Two of Wakefield's right-handed knuckleballs equal one of the Big Unit's flames. But Johnson hasn't lost since Aug. 21 and Wakefield has allowed nine runs all month.
Yankees Coverage
• Yanks, Sox set to decide AL East
• 'Cinderella' Small secures Yanks' lead
• Singer: Here they go again
• The Nation and the Empire duel on FOX
Red Sox Coverage
• Epic battle set to begin at Fenway
• Big Papi helps Sox keep pace
• Yanks-Sox rivalry in second century
Season Series
• 09/11: Yankees 1, Red Sox 0
• 09/10: Red Sox 9, Yankees 2
• 09/09: Yankees 8, Red Sox 4
• 07/17: Yankees 5, Red Sox 3
• 07/16: Yankees 7, Red Sox 4
• 07/15: Red Sox 17, Yankees 1
• 07/14: Yankees 8, Red Sox 6
• 05/29: Red Sox 7, Yankees 2
• 05/28: Red Sox 17, Yankees 1
• 05/27: Yankees 6, Red Sox 3
• 04/14: Red Sox 8, Yankees 5
• 04/13: Yankees 5, Red Sox 2
• 04/11: Red Sox 8, Yankees 1
• 04/06: Red Sox 7, Yankees 3
• 04/05: Yankees 4, Red Sox 3
• 04/03: Yankees 9, Red Sox 2
Scheduled to lower the regular-season curtain on Sunday are two veteran right-handers who are accurate reflections of their teams' seasons. It will be a poetically just finale.
Mike Mussina, who alternately looked prime or like he was pitching a cannonball, is due to meet Curt Schilling, who got phat off the World Series triumph but ultimately didn't have two good legs to stand on.
A three-game sweep would give Boston its first division title since 1995. You wouldn't want to bet on that, but you could hope for the Red Sox to win the first two and leave the next step up to Sunday -- remembering the mastery Schilling conjured only three weeks ago in Yankee Stadium, where he stepped totally out of 2005 character with eight innings of five-hit ball.
The Red Sox shed one major haunt last year, but have set themselves up for a new one. If they hit a postseason roadblock, Terry Francona's crew would have a hard time letting this one go.
Not because they blew a big lead over the Yankees -- the biggest they had was 5 1/2 games, on Aug. 10.
But because they blew the chance to build a big lead. While the Yankees were regaining their bearings from a blown-up rotation and were panicked into overhauling a third of their lineup, the Red Sox never took advantage.
They know this, and it gnaws at them.
"This was the season for us to be 10 games up on the Yankees," Ortiz said a few days ago. "They can't play worse than they did at the beginning of the season."
The Red Sox didn't even make as much of that as did the Baltimore Orioles, who led the division until June 23.
By the time the Sox cut the cord to '04 and started to focus on the present, so did the Yankees. The race was on, one of the best races in their long history.
Seldom in 105 seasons have they never been separated by more than 5 1/2 games.
It has taken a lot out of both of them.
The Yankees have a beat-up pitching staff, a soft-tossing center fielder and a sore-legged right fielder.
The Red Sox have a one-armed center fielder, a shelved closer and a gasping offense too often reduced to its two-headed monster, Manny Ramirez and Ortiz.
They each deserve this shot. They deserve each other. We deserve them both.
"It's the master plan," Johnny Damon said. "God's way ... Yankees and Red Sox."
Amen.
