I normally try to stay away from re-posting something that I've written here before, mostly because I figure it's good to try to force a little creativity out of my feeble brain. In this case, though, I'm posting something I wrote originally this past March.
The Jimmy Fund is the long-time charity of the Boston Red Sox, dedicated to fighting cancer in children. Today and tomorrow, Boston sports radio station WEEI and television network NESN, the New England SportsNetwork, are holding their seventh annual Jimmy Fund Radio-Telethon, hoping to raise millions of dollars to fund cancer research.
Here is the post I wrote last March dedicated to the subject:
Between fans of the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees, even over the winter the sniping never really ends, it just becomes a little more muted than during the regular season.
This year in particular, the offseason seemed more bombastic than usual, what with members of both organizations getting involved and ratcheting up the noise. First, A-Rod stepped on Red Sox toes with the ill-timed World Series announcement that he was opting out of his contract. He says it was his agent's idea and that he regrets the timing, but that was just the first volley anyway.
After that came Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon's remark to a reporter that the Series-clinching ball, the one he supposedly had in his possession, had been eaten by his dog. The dog's name? "Boss," of course, what else?
Move on to spring training, where Hank Steinbrenner railed against Boston's "Red Sox Nation," much to the delight of Red Sox fans everywhere. Steinbrenner promised to restore order to the universe by beating the Sox, and everyone else, and earning a Yankee World Championship.
Finally, Boston management responded by enrolling Mr. Steinbrenner in Red Sox Nation and sending him a David Ortiz autographed hat as a peace offering. Needless to say, that peace offering went unaccepted.
From a Red Sox perspective, then, the Yankees are the hated enemy, the thorn in their side, the bane of their existence. As a kid born and raised outside Boston, I can testify to the truth of that statement, and undoubtedly the same thing is true of Yankee fans everywhere, who used to say, "You have to win once in a while for it to be a rivalry," in a not-so-subtle nod to the fact that while the Red Sox were going 86 years without a championship, the Yankees were racking them up with regularity. Well, now that the Sox have won a couple, it seems the rivalry has become invigorated and reached a renewed intensity.
But here's the dirty little secret that Hank Steinbrenner surely doesn't want you to know, whether you are a Boston fan or a New York supporter: The Steinbrenner family has been incredibly generous to the charity the Red Sox organization adopted 55 years ago and has supported ever since, the Jimmy Fund.
Established in 1948, the Jimmy Fund of Boston's Dana-Farber Cancer Institute is dedicated to raising money and awareness in the fight against cancer in children. In the 60 years since it's inception, the Jimmy Fund has raised over $400 million dollars, with more than 90 cents out of every dollar raised going directly toward research dedicated to "eradicating cancer and related diseases."
For the past seven years, Boston sports radio station WEEI, and NESN, the New England Sports Network, have teamed up with the Red Sox organization to run a weekend radio/telethon in support of the Jimmy Fund. Each of the first six telethons have raised a larger amount of money than the one the previous year, culminating in last year's total of $3.74 million, with a grand total in the six-year history of the event of nearly $12 million raised.
What does all this have to do with the Steinbrenner family? Since it's inception in 2002, George Steinbrenner has supported the fundraising weekend with an annual donation of $10,000, which he upped last year to $25,000. He is not by any means the only celebrity/rich guy making a donation - Dodgers owner Frank McCourt and MLB Commissioner Bud Selig are two others who have opened their wallets generously - but the others aren't the owners and public faces of the supposed sworn enemies of the franchise.
Rivaries are great for sports. They add drama and excitement to the season and give fans and media something to talk about. But some things are more important in life, and it's nice to see that The Boss and the entire Steinbrenner family have an appreciation for that fact.
This year's 7th Annual Red Sox WEEI/NESN Jimmy Fund Radio/Telethon takes place the weekend of August 14-15, and for the seventh straight year will attempt to break the previous season's record for money raised. Undoubtedly the Steinbrenner family and thus the New York Yankees will again be a big part of the fundraising effort.
For more information on the Jimmy Fund or to make a donation, just click this link. Or this one. Or this one. Anyone who has watched a relative or close friend suffer through cancer - and who hasn't? - knows how difficult it is to sit by as a loved one is ravaged by the disease. Now imagine that someone is a young child, maybe even your son or daughter. Take a moment to check out the Jimmy Fund, and if you have a few bucks, think about pledging something - you just might save a life today.
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If you love fiction and have a few spare minutes, check out my website, www.allanleverone.com
I didn't see last night's alleged baseball game between the Boston Red Sox and the Texas Rangers, but for fans of offense, it had to be right up there with the Run and Shoot in football and the Wayne Gretzky Edmonton Oilers in the 1980's NHL.
Check out some of these numbers, stats that would make you toss your Strat-O-Matic in the trash assuming it was irreparably broken, if it ever gave you a game like this when you were playing it as a kid:
- Red Sox score ten runs in the first inning, and have to rally after falling behind in the game, to win 19-17! It would have been closer, but the Rangers pulled their goaltender late in the game and Boston was able to score an empty-netter to give them a the two-goal win.
- 36 runswere scored in a nine-inning major league game. In the entire history of the American League, there have never been more runs scored in a game that didn't go extra innings, and the last time this many were scored was almost six decades ago!
- Runs were scored in every inning, with the exception of the fourth, when batters were so winded from running around the bases that they refused to run out anything. Manny Ramirez would have loved it.
- Ten runs were scored in an inning twice in the game - In the first inning, when Boston scored ten, and in the fifth, when Texas scored eight and Boston answered with two.
- Jonathan Papelbon, Boston's closer, earned his 32nd save, undoubtedly one of the few times in history a pitcher picked up a save in a game in which his team scored nineteen runs.
- For the game, Texas batted .426 (20-47), while Boston was slightly off the pace at .425 (17-40).
- David Ortiz, Red Sox - Two home runs, and six RBI, in the first inning!
- Two players went 5-6 in the game: Marlon Byrd for the Rangers, who drove in three runs and scored four, and Dustin Pedroia for the Red Sox, who drove in two and scored five.
It was not immediately known how many pitchers sought post-game medical attention for post-traumatic stress disorder. Details as they become available.
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If you love fiction and have a few minutes to spare, check out my website, www.allanleverone.com
Between fans of the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees, even over the winter the sniping never really ends, it just becomes a little more muted than during the regular season.
This year in particular, the offseason seemed more bombastic than usual, what with members of both organizations getting involved and ratcheting up the noise. First, A-Rod stepped on Red Sox toes with the ill-timed World Series announcement that he was opting out of his contract. He says it was his agent's idea and that he regrets the timing, but that was just the first volley anyway.
After that came Red Sox closer Jonathan Papelbon's remark to a reporter that the Series-clinching ball, the one he supposedly had in his possession, had been eaten by his dog. The dog's name? "Boss," of course, what else?
Move on to spring training, where Hank Steinbrenner railed against Boston's "Red Sox Nation," much to the delight of Red Sox fans everywhere. Steinbrenner promised to restore order to the universe by beating the Sox, and everyone else, and earning a Yankee World Championship.
Finally, Boston management responded by enrolling Mr. Steinbrenner in Red Sox Nation and sending him a David Ortiz autographed hat as a peace offering. Needless to say, that peace offering went unaccepted.
From a Red Sox perspective, then, the Yankees are the hated enemy, the thorn in their side, the bane of their existence. As a kid born and raised outside Boston, I can testify to the truth of that statement, and undoubtedly the same thing is true of Yankee fans everywhere, who used to say, "You have to win once in a while for it to be a rivalry," in a not-so-subtle nod to the fact that while the Red Sox were going 86 years without a championship, the Yankees were racking them up with regularity. Well, now that the Sox have won a couple, it seems the rivalry has become invigorated and reached a renewed intensity.
But here's the dirty little secret that Hank Steinbrenner surely doesn't want you to know, whether you are a Boston fan or a New York supporter: The Steinbrenner family has been incredibly generous to the charity the Red Sox organization adopted 55 years ago and has supported ever since, the Jimmy Fund.
Established in 1948, the Jimmy Fund of Boston's Dana-Farber Cancer Institute is dedicated to raising money and awareness in the fight against cancer in children. In the 60 years since it's inception, the Jimmy Fund has raised over $400 million dollars, with more than 90 cents out of every dollar raised going directly toward research dedicated to "eradicating cancer and related diseases."
For the past seven years, Boston sports radio station WEEI, and NESN, the New England Sports Network, have teamed up with the Red Sox organization to run a weekend radio/telethon in support of the Jimmy Fund. Each of the first six telethons have raised a larger amount of money than the one the previous year, culminating in last year's total of $3.74 million, with a grand total in the six-year history of the event of nearly $12 million raised.
What does all this have to do with the Steinbrenner family? Since it's inception in 2002, George Steinbrenner has supported the fundraising weekend with an annual donation of $10,000, which he upped last year to $25,000. He is not by any means the only celebrity/rich guy making a donation - Dodgers owner Frank McCourt and MLB Commissioner Bud Selig are two others who have opened their wallets generously - but the others aren't the owners and public faces of the supposed sworn enemies of the franchise.
Rivaries are great for sports. They add drama and excitement to the season and give fans and media something to talk about. But some things are more important in life, and it's nice to see that The Boss and the entire Steinbrenner family have an appreciation for that fact.
This year's 7th Annual Red Sox WEEI/NESN Jimmy Fund Radio/Telethon takes place the weekend of August 14-15, and for the seventh straight year will attempt to break the previous season's record for money raised. Undoubtedly the Steinbrenner family and thus the New York Yankees will again be a big part of the fundraising effort.
For more information on the Jimmy Fund or to make a donation, just click this link. Anyone who has watched a relative or close friend suffer through cancer - and who hasn't? - knows how difficult it is to sit by as a loved one is ravaged by the disease. Now imagine that someone is a young child, maybe even your son or daughter. Take a moment to check out the Jimmy Fund, and thanks for reading.
Who would have ever guessed that George Steinbrenner would turn out to be the sane one in the family? That the man who alternately fired and rehired the same guy for the same job five times in a span of twelve years (Billy Martin), and who paid superstar money for a free agent (Dave Winfield) who drove on 100 or more runs six out of the eight years he spent in the Bronx only to hang the humiliating nickname "Mr. May" on him, would end up, in retrospect, being the stable, thoughtful, wise man out of the bunch?
As unlikely a possibility as that seems, especially to those of us who remember the seventies, it does appear to be the case, at least based on the early returns from the Hank Steinbrenner regime.
First Hank washes his hands of Alex Rodriguez when he delares free agency last fall, swearing to the world and Yankee fans everywhere the man will never wear pinstripes again, only to change his mind and personally negotiate a $275 million (or more) contract extension for the slugging third baseman, establishing himself as a man of his word. Which word that is, nobody is quite sure.
Then the man whose team is implicated more than most in the Mitchell report, with 22 current and former Yankees being outed, went off in a kooky interview with the New York Post on February 19, blustering that Red Sox fans shouldn't be "hollering too loud at Andy (Pettite) up in Fenway," thereby assuring that is exactly what will happen, as if there was any doubt on that score to begin with.
Steinbrenner went on to assure Yankee fans that "We'll make sure we give Andy all the support he needs in Fenway and other ballparks," before turning his attention on his other big concern on that day, that baseball was being singled out at the expense of other sports, especially football, when it comes to criticism of players for using performance enhancing drugs.
Never mind that the Mitchell Report was requested by the Commissioner of Baseball, and that the NFL has had a rigorous testing program for performance enhancing drugs in place since the early 1990's and that the penalties for violating the policies in the NFL have been considerably more stringent than baseball's, at least until recently.
Baby Boss has also taken a number of verbal jabs at departed manager Joe Torre, including saying that new hire Joe Girardi has more fire in his belly, implying that the veteran of one major league season as a manager is more competitive than the man who won four World Series for his father back in the dark ages of 1996 to 2000.
The latest Steinbrennerism once again involves his seemingly unhealthy preoccupation with his main rival in the American League East, the Boston Red Sox. Hank vents his frustration in an interview published March 2 in the New York Times Play magazine. In it, among other things, he says, "Red Sox Nation? What a bunch of [expletive] that is...This is a Yankee country."
He can hardly be blamed for defending the honor of his team, but the problem is, Red Sox Nation was never meant to imply that this nation is filled with Sox fans anyway. Most of us in The Nation realize and accept that our team is the second-most hated entity in baseball, behind....well....you know.
It's not "A Red Sox Nation," Mr. Steinbrenner, it's "Red Sox Nation," a group of fans intensely devoted to the club. A group cleverly designed, undoubtedly, to sell team gear and memorabilia. Perhaps it's time to have a little discussion with your marketing people and fire someone for not coming up with the idea for the Yankees.
In any event, all is right with the world, notwithstanding Hank's vow to "put the Yankees back on top and restore the universe to order." (By the way, if you vow to put the team back on top, isn't that kind of like admitting what you spent the rest of the interview denying?) In an effort to smooth things over, Boston's principal owner, John Henry, sent an official Red Sox Nation membership card to Steinbrenner as well as assorted other perks, including a David Oritz autographed cap.
Steinbrenner responded by saying he will never join Red Sox Nation, but we here in New England know that's just to mollify the New York press and Yankee fans everywhere. We rest easy in the knowledge Hank is probably wearing his Ortiz cap right now, admiring it's jaunty look in the mirror.
Now if we can only get Jason Varitek and A-Rod to go out to dinner together.
The expression "Hope springs eternal" may not have been coined with sports fans in mind, but it may as well have been. As spring training cranks up in Florida and Arizona, every major league team is undefeated and fans of all of them look at their lineups and try to convince themselves they will still be interested at the beginning of October.
For the defending World Series Champion Boston Red Sox, this means more or less maintaining the status quo. But questions still linger, as they do for every team, from the most successful to the least. Here are the Top Ten Questions for the Sox heading into spring training:
10) How will the Curt Schilling injury affect the rotation? Eight million dollars lies in the balance, as the Red Sox could void Schilling's contract if he opts for surgery, since the team's medical staff insists rest and rehabilition can have the 41 year old starter ready by the All-Star break. Schilling's long-time doctor, Craig Morgan, disagrees with the diagnosis and insists Schilling will never pitch again without surgery.
The most optimistic estimates don't have Schilling returning to the rotation until mid-July, and perhaps never, so the question becomes, how big of a hole will this leave in the Sox rotation?
The answer - Probably not much. Schilling was out for over seven weeks last year and his spot was filled with varying levels of effectiveness by Julian Tavarez. This year, Tavarez could get the nod again, or Boston could try rookie Clay Buchholz, he of the September no-hitter last year.
9) Will Tim Wakefield's back hold up for one more year? Wakefield will turn 41 this summer, and although the prevailing theory is that knuckleballers can pitch well into their forties and even beyond, the rest of their moving parts have to cooperate for them to do so. Wake has suffered from off-and-on back problems the last few years and if he misses any significant amout of time this season, the Sox could be forced to deal for pitching help to overcome the loss of forty percent of their rotation.
8) Does Manny Ramirez know it's his contract year? It sounds like a ridiculous question until you realized Manny lives in his own universe, which doesn't necessarily follow the same rules as ours. The Sox own a club option for 2009, but if they choose not to exercise it, Manny could find himself being Manny somewhere else next year. It would obviously be to his benefit to have a big year in 2008.
7) Will there be any lingering effects from the club's trip to the Far East in March? The Sox open the 2008 regular season against the Oakland A's in Japan in March, while all the other teams are still getting the kinks out and preparing for April. They play two games that count in Tokyo, then return to the States for three more exhibition games in Los Angeles against the Dodgers before the season re-starts for good.
Manager Terry Francona is doing his best to put a positive spin on the potentially exhausting trip, but it's obvious he doesn't relish the extensive travel and the distractions the team will face, while the rest of the A.L East will still be sitting around the hotel pool in Florida.
6) Which Julio Lugo will show up this year? Will it be the man Boston signed a year ago to be an offensive upgrade at shortstop over slick-fielding Alex Gonzalez, or the stiff who was a near-automatic out for most of the season in 2007? A comparison of the numbers for Gonzalez from 2006 and Lugo from 2007 shows what a disappointing year the new Sox shortstop had:
While Lugo did drive in a relatively impressive number of runs, especially for a player with such a low batting average, that is mostly a factor of the players in front of him getting on base. A lot. The Sox expect more offensively from Lugo for their $36 million investment over four years.
5) What does Dustin Pedroia do for an encore? The reigning A.L. Rookie of the Year struggled mightily last April, finishing the month hitting well under .200, before bouncing back to hit line drives all over the yard the rest of the year. Was his .317 BA and .380 OBP a fluke or will he be a consistent .300 hitter in his career? For a little guy who swings like he's Ryan Howard, it's hard to picture such consistency, but he did it from May on last season. We'll see.
4) Where will Coco Crisp end up? And more importantly from a Boston perspective, what will he bring in return? It's clear the center field job is Jacoby Ellsbury's to lose, so whether Boston will go into the regular season using Crisp as a fourth outfielder or whether he's gone before the beginning of April, he will not finish the year in Boston.
It doesn't seem likely teams will offer a lot for Coco, as he never really fulfilled his promise offensively during the two years he roamed center field at Fenway. Defensively, though, he's magical, diving and using his outstanding speed to get to just about everything. His arm is a liability for a center fielder.
3) Will Hideki Okajima and Javier Lopez be the lights-out lefties they were in 2007 out of the bullpen? It's hard to imagine Okajima could duplicate his performance from last year, especially in the first half. Although he seemed to tire a bit toward the end of the season, his numbers were still eye-popping for a guy who was considered by many to be a throw-in, someone to keep Daisuke Matsuzaka company as he adjusted to life in the United States.
Okajima's 2007 numbers: 3-2, 5 saves, 2.22 ERA, 63K's in 69 IP, only 50 hits allowed.
2) Is this the year all those games behind home plate catch up with Jason Varitek? The all-time club leader in games caught, the Captain's numbers have declined the last couple of years. Compare his numbers from 2004 and 2005 with those from 2006 and 2007:
The man brings a lot more than offense to the park with him; his preparation and ability to handle the pitching staff is legendary. But the position of catcher is a physically demanding one and Tek will turn 36 in early April.
Varitek may require more days off in 2008, and backup Doug Mirabelli is on the roster mostly due to his uncanny ability to hold on to Tim Wakefield's knuckler. If the offense struggles, an unlikely possibility to be sure, the lack of punch from this position could become glaring.
1) Are the injuries to David Ortiz fully healed? Knee and hip problems prevented Big Papi from generating the kind of power he was able to produce in 2006. Although Ortiz posted career highs in 2007 in batting average (.332), doubles (52), and hits (182), his home runs dropped from 52 in '06 to 35 last year, and his RBI total dropped as well, from 137 in 2006 to 117 last year.
Assuming the physical problems are a thing of the past, look for a big year powerwise from the Big Man in the Sox lineup.
In a scene more than a little symbolic of how the 2006 season has played out for the Boston Red Sox, David Ortiz watched his teammates play, and lose, another game from the dugout while wearing a heart monitor. In a midday press conference, Ortiz claimed that he felt fine and that he felt like he could pinch-hit during the afternoon game, if necessary. Doctors and team management disagreed with his sel####iagnosis, however, and wouldn't commit to a timetable for the slugger's return.
His recurring symptoms of heart palpitations can't be too much different than what is being felt all over New England. Another player went down during last night's 2-1 win over Toronto when rookie closer Jonathan Papelbon clutched at his shoulder after delivering a pitch in the ninth inning. He was immediately taken out and hopes to be back in a week or so, if and when his shoulder tightness eases.
Meanwhile, you have to wonder how many of his teammates Ortiz actually recognized while he was watching from the dugout. Kevin Jarvis, the latest pitcher to be taken out of the stands, I mean off the waiver wire, started for the Sox and actually fared relatively well, going five innings and giving up just two earned runs.
In right field, making his major league debut, was David Murphy, who picked up his first big league hit in three at-bats. Another rookie, who made his major league debut in the disastrous last road trip for the Sox, Dustin Pedroia, was on the bench today and didn't play. Carlos Pena, another new addition to the Sox since Ortiz left the road trip, played first base and batted eighth, going 0 for three.
All told, the only positions being manned by players you would have expected to see in the lineup for Boston as of a couple of months ago, were center field (Coco Crisp) and third base (Mike Lowell). Every other position was being played either by a regular not at his normal position (Kevin Youkilis in left field), a backup not expected to play every day (Alex Cora at shortstop), or a warm body picked up by the Sox to avoid having to forfeit the last month of the season due to a lack of players: Javy Lopez behind the plate, Carlos Pena at first base, and the aforementioned Murphy in right field.
Someone in the Foxsports.com blogging community, it may have been Cuzzifer, said in a comment a few weeks ago that the Red Sox had made a bargain with the devil in 2004 to make their miraculous comeback in the ALCS against New York and then sweep St. Louis to win the World Series. If that's the case, the devil is letting loose with both barrels on the Sox this year.
Oh, and by the way, Boston announced today that Curt Schilling will miss his scheduled Monday start due to tightness in his shoulder. The devil has no sense of humor whatsoever.
Roller coaster riders know that no matter how many ups and downs and twists and turns the ride has, it always ends at its lowest point. This season's ride may be over for the Boston Red Sox, as they stumble and bumble their way through a west-coast road trip, losing five of seven thus far, after underwhelming everyone at Fenway in their five game sweep at the hands of the hated Yankees.
After cruising through the first half of the season with the third-best record in the majors, the Sox may have suffered a precursor to their second half woes in the final game before the All-Star break. In Chicago for a three game series against the defending world champs, Boston missed out on sweeping the White Sox by losing the last game of the series in eighteen innings, 6-5.
It's been more of the same since the break. Injuries and illnesses have piled up, to regulars as well as pitchers, and Boston has often looked lethargic and uninterested, losing in lots of interesting and original ways. The pitching has been extremely inconsistent, especially out of the bullpen, and the offense, which has been a constant over the last four years or so, has sputtered as well.
At the All-Star break, the Red Sox boasted a record of 53-33, for a winning percentage of .616, with a three game lead over New York in the division. Only Detroit and Chicago had better records. In the nearly month-and-a-half since, the Sox have gone just 18-28, and lost 10 games in the standings to New York, which has played consistent baseball.
Since the break, only three of the thirty big league teams have compiled a record worse than Boston - Kansas City (which swept the Sox earlier this month), Tampa Bay (which took two of three from Boston earlier this month), and Colorado (which hasn't had the good fortune of playing Boston this month).
There's a sports cliche that goes something like this: A team is never as good as it looks when it's playing well, or as bad as it looks when it's playing poorly. This holds especially true for the 2006 edition of the Red Sox. Everything fell into place the first half of the year, allowing Boston to pile up wins even as the pitchers fell by the wayside. But when regulars started going down as well, it has proven too much to overcome.
At one point earlier in the current road trip, the starting lineup was minus the regulars at the following positions due to either injury or illness: catcher, first base, second base, shortstop, left field, and right field. The bad news? At this point, the wild card as well as the division titles may be out of reach. The good news? This club, when everyone gets healthy, could still be a contender for a championship, even if it's not until next year.
Of course, any good roller coaster has plenty of thrills and chills. Hang on tight, because we may still be in for more bumps and bruises. David Ortiz, the heart and soul of Red Sox Nation, not to mention a good portion of its' muscle, has flown back to Boston from Oakland to be examined for some sort of heart problem. Depending on what the specialists determine is Ortiz' problem, the Red Sox season could go from disappointing to disastrous in, well, a heartbeat.
You know "The Book" that baseball managers everywhere are supposed to use to guide their decison-making processes during game situations? The one that dictates actions that are supposed to maximize your chances to win a game?
Cleveland Indians Manager Eric Wedge knows "The Book." Wedge used it to guide his actions in the ninth inning o####ame his club was leading at Fenway Park against the Boston Red Sox last night, and is probably still tearing pages out of it in frustration.
Here's the situation: Bottom of the ninth, Cleveland leading 8-6. The front office has just traded his closer, Bob Wickman, to Atlanta, so Wedge is left with a bullpen that incredibly, on the last day of July, has not one pitcher in it with a major league save this season. Somehow, whether through drawing straws, throwing darts, or picking names out of a hat, the manager has made the decision to use 22-year-old Fausto Carmona as his closer du jour.
Fausto is one day removed from a game in which he gave up four runs in one inning to Seattle in a Cleveland loss, but obviously someone has to be on the mound, and Wedge apparently felt Carmona was as good an option as any.
Alex Cora leads off the inning for Boston by slapping a hit past the drawn-in third baseman Andy Marte. Tying run comes to the plate in the person of Kevin Youkilis, who does what he normally does - look at lots of pitches and foul off a few. The man who statistically sees the most pitches per at bat in the American League finally walks on a 3-2 pitch. Tying run at first with nobody out.
Next batter for Boston is Mark Loretta, who, on a 1-0 pitch, pops up a high fastball to shortstop Jhonny Peralta, bringing "Big Papi," David Ortiz to the plate. According to "The Book," you never, ever walk Ortiz in this situation. A double-play is already set up, since Loretta wasn't able to move the runners over, and the last thing you want to do if you're the Indians manager is put the winning run on base and the tying run into scoring position. Eric Wedge followed the dictates of "The Book," and at this moment is probably still flushing pages of it down the toilet in his hotel room. Ortiz watched two breaking pitches dip outside the zone for balls, then launched a majestic line drive into the deepest part of Fenway, the centerfield bleachers, to do what everyone in New England has come to expect - win another game.
Wedge was faced with situations National League managers had become familiar with over the last several years with Barry Bonds. The dictates of "The Book" do not apply, because the moment that hitter steps into the box, he, and everyone on base in front of him, is already in scoring position by virtue of his special abilities at the plate.
The risky play for Wedge would have been to walk Ortiz and try to induce the next batter, Manny Ramirez, into hitting a ground ball for a double play. Obviously only a marginally better choice, since Ramirez had already homered once in the game and is also one of the most dangerous hitters in baseball. However, Manny does have the propensity for hitting into an occasional ground ball double-play, plus his "Manny moments," when he fails to hustle, also have the possibility of coming into play.
"The Book" says that statistically, the batter is more likely to fail than succeed in any given situation. Thus, even a batter who hits .400 is failing sixty percent of the time. The problem with ths chapter of "The Book" is that it doesn't take human factors into account.
Factors like the young age of Carmona and the obvious fact that he was put into a situation he was not ready for. He was fidgety and uncertain, uncomfortable from the first pitch of the inning. Factors like the Fenway crowd, which was as loud as it has been at any time this season, sensing Carmona's discomfort. Factors like Ortiz's otherworldly calm, and his ablilty to focus on just the task at hand and what needs to be accomplished. Two days prior, he had won a game in the eleventh inning by slapping a ground ball to the shortstop position, which was unmanned due to the shift the Angels were employing, to drive in the winning run in that game.
The point here is not to say that Eric Wedge managed poorly. Ultimately the manager is only as successful as his players. Plus, "The Book" became "The Book" through the thousands of situations in baseball games that make up probabilities. It is quite possible, maybe even probable, that had the Indians walked Ortiz, Ramirez would have won the game instead. But if the same situation arises tonight, what will Wedge do this time, since his copy of "The Book" is probably now floating in the Boston sewage system?
Hey everyone, I know it must seem like I've dropped off the face of the earth, but it's nothing like that.
I've been busy writing - two full-length novels so far, plus over a dozen short stories - and working hard to try to get an agent. If you are curious and have a few minutes, check out my website, www.allanleve rone.com.
If you're a literary agent or if you know one, by all means contact me! In the meantime, I'll be here when I can - love this forum - and as always, thank you for checking out my blog, especially considering how many great ones you could be reading instead....
