Sox 7, Stankees 6
WP: Matsuzaka (2-2)
LP: Proctor (0-2)
SV: Papelbon (6)
HRs: BOS- Manny (2), Drew (2), Lowell, 2 (2), Tek (2); NYY- Jeter (1)
Sox box
How's this for a Murderer's Row, motherf**kers?!
It was a fantastic finish to a historic series for the Sox as they used a record-setting homer barrage to sweep the Stanks at home for the first time since 1990.
Trailing 3-0 in the 3rd inning, Boston got back-to-back-to-back-to-back home runs from Manny, J.D. Drew, Mike Lowell and Cap'n Tek to take the lead; but it still took a late 3-run shot from Lowell and another save by Papelbon to seal the sweep.
HEROES:
1.) Lowell: 2-4, 2R, 4RBI, 2HRs- the defensive/double specialist let everyone know he can still get it over the wall, too
2.) Pedroia: 2-4, 1 great catch- the two hits were nice, but it was his diving snag of a liner to end the 8th and preserve the lead that everyone will be taalking about
3.) Papelbon: 1IP, 0H, 1BB, 1K, SV- without Paps slamming the door, all these comebacks & offensive heroics would be for naught
GOATS:
1.) Dice-K: 7IP, 8H, 6ER, 1BB, 7K, 2HBP- how do you say "disappointment" in Japanese?
2.)Willy Mo: 0-3, 1BB, 3Ks- all the offensive fireworks and WMP wore the Silver Sombrero (3Ks)
3.) Brian Cashman- all that money & clout and this is the bullpen you construct? Nice work.
KEY MOMENT: Top 8th, 2 on, 2 out
With the game in the balance (Boston leading 7-6 with a runner on 3rd), pinch hitter Josh Phelps hit a screaming line drive off of Brendan Donnelly; without thinking Pedroia dove to his right and snagged the hot shot to end the inning and possibly save the game
RECAP:
-Sox make history, but Matsuzaka still a mystery
-Redemption Song
-Sox come back-to-back-to-back-to-back to sweep Stanks
-Boston Massacre III
-Pedroia, Oh-boya!
Okay, by that time I was running out of ideas, but you get the point.
The first two games of this series were offense-filled appetizers, but the third game was a downright feast. Boston used the strength of a rarely-seen home run explosion to push past the pitching-poor Stankees and earn a hard-fought sweep in the team's first meeting of the season.
The night started off as the game the day before had, with a Boston starter giving up two quick runs to the Stankees in the first inning. After retiring Demon & Jeter, Matsuzaka, making his Sox/Stanks debut, walked Bobby Abreu and then plunked A-Rod with the first pitch he'd ever thrown to Old Blue Lips. Jason Giambi then blooped a double into the center field gap to score both runners, and just like that Dice-K had been baptized into the ancient rivalry.
The theme for Boston early was missed opportunities; the Sox left 2 men on in both the 1st, when Lugo & Youk walked only to be stranded, and the 2nd, when a two-out walk by WMP and double by Pedroia went to waste. While Boston was squandering opportunities to get to rookie starter Chase Wright, also making his rivalry debut, New York would make Boston pay for those mistakes.
In the 3rd inning Giambi got his 3rd RBI of the night when he knocked in Demon, who had led off with a single. The frustrating part was that Dice-K had almost escaped the jam- after Demon's single he hit Jeter, but then he fanned Abreu & A-Rod looking, only to get burned by Giambi (on another blooper) again.
By this time things were looking bleak-again-for the Fenway faithful: Dice-K was not living up to his billing-again-, Boston was trailing the Stanks-again- and it would take a small miracle to pull out another come-from-behind win-again. Luckily for those of us who love the Sox, the miracles seemed to keep on coming this weekend.
The historic third inning started innocently enough, as Youk and Ortiz harmlessly flied out to the corners.
Then the fun began.
Manny stepped in batting under .190, with just 1 homer and 2 extra base hits all season. But as is often the case when Manny is Being Manny, don't judge the book by his numbers. On the fourth pitch from Wright, Manny launched a shot that looked like something out of a Hollywood movie set. The ball shot from Manny's bat like a supersonic projectile (which it was), hurtling through the atmosphere and climbing into the night sky until it had disappeared from sight over the deepest and tallest part of the center field Monstah seats.
It was, as the kids like to say, an epic blast.
But as everyone in the park was buzzing and Manny was displaying his array of celebratory dances/hugs in the dugout, something else happened that would set the crowd off again. J.D. Drew came up and matched Manny's longball, sending a 1-2 offering from Wright over the Sox bullpen and into the drunks in the bleachers. Suddenly it was 3-2 New York, and old Uncle Mo was swinging Boston's way.
As the hysteria in the stadium was just starting to subside, and even stranger thing happened. Mike Lowell, he of the Gold Glove and 50-double seasons, showed that he still has some pop left in his bat by crushing Wright's 3rd pitch over the Monstah seats as well for an incredible 3rd consecutive home run by Boston. Tie game, 3-3.
Now full-fledged pandemonium had set in, at the park as well as in living rooms and taverns all across Red Sox Nation, as we all realized we had just witnessed something special.
Only the best was yet to come.
The joint was still jumping and the noise still deafening when Jason Varitek came to the plate. The Captain had started to come out of his funk against this minor league Yankee pitching staff, and what would happen next could be considered the ultimate slump buster. After taking Wright's first pitch for ball 1, Tek took hold of the next pitch and deposited it in the Monstah seats for a miraculous, fantabulous, heroic, historic 4th straight home run for the Sox, something that had never been done in the long & storied history of the franchise on Yawkey Way.
As it turns out, it's only the 5th time it's been done in major league history, the first time in the AL since 1964. Wow.
But soon after I had picked my son up and danced around the living room, something awful happened that almost made the feeling of unadulterated euphoria die away- Matsuzaka gave New York the lead back.
Quicker than you can say "bad sushi", the Stanks had taken the lead back, 5-4, thanks to a Jeter leadoff home run in the 5th and an RBI groundout in the 6th; talk about a buzzkill! More depressing was the fact that Boston had let 2 more scoring opportunities go to waste, stranding 2 runners again in both the 4th & 5th innings. The Sox left 12 men on base in the game.
I could go on & on about this game (which I already have), but to wrap it up the Sox chased a shell shocked Wright after the 3rd, then it was just a matter of tearing into that awful bullpen. In the 7th inning the Sox got a single from Manny and a double from Drew off of Scott Proctor, and then the overworked reliever surrendered a shot to Lowell that just cleared the top of the Monstah for a 3-run homer that put Boston in control for good, 7-5.
The win wouldn't come easy, though, and when New York scraped out a run in the 8th ro cut it to one run, you just knew it was going to come down to Papelbon facing A-Rod to end this series. 
Sure enough in the 9th Paps allowed Abreu to reach on a walk after retiring Demon & Jeter, and A-Rod came up with a chance to be a game-saving hero again. Only this time Mr. April would ground out weakly to, appropriately enough, Lowell, and the Sox had put the wraps on an epic sweep.
Whew. I'm just as spent from writing this as I was from watching that game.
But the best part about the whole thing wasn't the win, or the homers, or the look on A-Rod's dejected, smug mug. No, it was when my son said to me with wide eyes and a beaming smile "now I can tell my son that I saw the Sox make history when I was watching this game with my dad."
And that, my friends, is priceless.
NOTES:
- Boston scored 7 runs in each of the 3 games
-J.D. Drew (2-4, 2B, HR) extended his on base streak to all 17 games
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