Boston 8, Chicago 5
WP: Wakefield (11-9)
LP: Garland (7-7)
SV: Papelbon (22)
HRs: BOS-Manny (15), Lowell (15)
SUMMARY
After jumping out to an 8-1 lead on the strength of two 3-run homers, the Sox had to hang on for dear life as Chicago trimmed the lead to three, then loaded the bases with no outs in the ninth before Jonathan Papelbon slammed the door shut.
#1 STUNNER: Manny 2-2, 2R, 3BB, 4RBI, HR
This is the version of MannyBeingManny that all Sox fans know, love and have been waiting all season for.
Manny hit his third homer in the last week and drove in his 12th, 13th, 14th & 15th runs of the month, and it was his three-run bomb in the first inning that set the tone for the day.
PAN's FAUN John Garland 4.2IP, 6H, 6ER, 5BB, 3K, 2HR
The back-to-back 18-game winner and 2005 postseason hero for Chicago looks like a shell of his former self.
When he did get the ball over the plate the Sox batters hammered him like chopped meat, and when he couldn't find the strike zone he just walked 'em, including two batters before each Boston home run.
RECAP
Whhhheeeeeewwwwww!
That's what the entire Nation exclaimed after Paul Konerko's ninth inning grounder was flipped from Mike Lowell to Alex Cora on to Youk at first to complete an around-the-horn double play that gave Boston its first series win in two and a half weeks.
Despite blasting a pair of three run homers and amassing 10 hits and eight walks, the Sox still had to sweat out the win thanks to some (rare) sloppy relief work by Manny Delcarmen and a pesky bunch of Chicago hitters who refused to go down quietly.
But now that all the sweating is over with, the Sox can look back and take many positives out of this contest and the series in general as they head off for a seven-game roadie to Cleveland and then down here to the greater Tampa Bay area.
Which reminds me, I've got third base box seats for next Sunday's game at the Trop (as of now Dice is scheduled to throw, but shhhh, I don't want to jinx it.)
Anyway, the most obvious thing atop the list of positives is the fact that the previously ineffective Sox offense got its groove back against the putrid ChiSox staff; Boston rang up 31 runs in four games and topped all that scoring off today with a staple of a bygone BoSox era: the three run homer.
(Quick history lesson for any bandwagon jumpers/non-Sox fan readers)
See kids, used to be back in the day the Boston offense was predicated around that very powerful but sporadic weapon, as was much of the offense in the AL during the early years of the DH. And Boston, forever without any speedy base stealers or prototypical leadoff men, used to hope guys like Remy, Marty Barrett, Jody Reed and Spike Owen would get on base and then wait for the guys like Rice, Armas, Dewey, Brunansky or Big Mo to launch a moon shot and drive them in.
It was a quick, easy and above all lazy way to grab a three-run lead.
But now, with players the size of Youk toting +.400 OBPs and the Coco Crisps of the world able to steal or crank one out, obviously those days are gone.
Sure at times this Boston team can still bash with the best of them, but with the team ranking a modest 8th in the AL in longballs and the threeleader on the squad, Big Papi, totalling a pedestrian (by AL standars) 16 taters on the season, it's safe to say that the days of getting two men on base and praying for a home run are, pardon the expression, long gone at Fenway.
Well, at least they were until today.
Boston reprised that fan favorite at the old ballyard this afternoon, with former White Sox ace Jon Garland the unfortunate victim of the retro craze, and it kicked off in the very first inning.
Julio Lugo, who reached base three more times and extended his hitting streak to 12 games with an eighth inning single, walked to lead off the inning. After Alex Cora grounded into a fielder's choice to force Lugo at second, Kevin Youkilis worked a walk to set up Manny's theatrics.
It didn't take long for Ramirez to produce them, either, as he took a 1-1 offering from Garland and deposited it into the Boston bullpen for a lightning-quick 3-0 Boston lead.
Ah, just like the old days of 1984.
Things stayed pretty quiet for a while from there, as Tim Wakefield (6.1IP, 6H, 4ER, 2BB, 2K) held the ChiSox scoreless for the first four innings, allowing just a pair of walks and a single, before Chicago scratched out a single run in the fifth on doubles by Jermaine Dye and the impressive Josh Fields.
But the Sox batters responded to that small uprising with another Earl Weaver special, but this time it was the team leader in RBIs, Mike Lowell, playing the part of Chief Long Stick with Manny & J.D. Drew playing the parts of Johnny Tablesetters.
Garland started the fifth by retiring Cora and Youk on just six pitches, but suddenly he lost his control again and walked Ramirez & Drew on his next eleven throws. Lowell was only to happy to accept Garland's generosity, and on the third pitch of the at bat Mike lined a tracer into the Monster seats that gave the Sox a seemingly insurmountable 6-1 lead.
So when the Sox tacked on a couple more runs in the sixth on a sac fly by Youk and a solid single to center by Manny that pushed the lead to 8-1, combined with the way Wake was tossing the knuckler, it looked like the game was all but over.
As Coach Corso would say, not so fast my friends.
The ChiSox exhibited the fire and fight exemplified by their manager, Ozzie Guillen, when they scratched and clawed their way back into the game thanks to a three-run seventh.
Wake wasted no time in letting them back in the game when A.J. Pierzynski singled, Dye doubled, Rob Mackowiak hit a sac fly and that pesky Fields (2-3, 2R, RBI) drilled an RBI single on the first eight pitches of the inning the to cut the lead to 8-3.
That brought Tito out to yank Wake, and as he left the field to a huge ovation, lights-out reliever Manny Delcarmen made his way in from the pen.
Almost as soon as Remy announced that Delcarmen hadn't allowed any of his 11 inherited runners to score on the season, he gave up a single and a walk that loaded the bases and then surrendered an RBI single to the immortal Alex Cintron that ended the impressive streak and cut Boston's lead to 8-4.
As if that weren't bad enough, Delcarmen walked Jim Thome on five pitches with the bases loaded to push Chicago's fifth run across the plate, and after Okajima came on and retired Pierzynski to end the rally, what had been a seven-run cushion was now down to three with two innings to go.
Uh-oh.
A golden scoring opportunity went by the wayside in the bottom of the inning when Lugo singled, went to second on a wild pitch and third on an error and then Manny was intentionally walked, but Fields made his third great snag at third base in the series on a hot shot down the line by Drew, and the lead remained at three runs.
But Papelbon was coming in for the ninth, so many of the Faithful filed out of the park to beat the traffic since thoughts of the White Sox coming back from three runs down against the All Star closer were out of the question.
Ah, not so fast my fleeing Fenway friends.
Paps, who has pitched just three times in the last 10 days, got into trouble immediately when he allowed a single to Uribe (3-4, R), a single to Jerry Owens and a walk to Cintron to load the bases with no outs.
Gulp.
With the tying run on base and Jim Thome at the plate, those fans who were filing out most likely stopped at a monitor on the concourse or at the Cask to witness what could have been a monumental collapse by Boston and its ace reliever.
Instead Paps remembered who he was and what team he was pitching to and promptly blew Thome away on four pitches flavored with 96-mph gas. He then got Konerko to tap out to Lowell, who went around the horn for the double play to retire the side and the Sox had swiped the win before it was swallowed by the jaws of defeat.
So it's off to C-Town with the 7 1/2 game lead intact (the Stanks bludgeoned the Rays 21-4) and with Jon Lester's debut tomorrow and then Boston's first trip to St. Pete, a.k.a. Boston South, next weekend, this is shaping up to be a big week for the Sox.
Who knows, maybe they'll even hit a few more three-run jacks.
NOTES:
- Papi got the day off to rest his injured shoulder, as expected. There is no structural damage and Ortiz said he should be able to play soon; as predicted, Manny was the DH again but Big Hit Hinske played left
- Coco still crispy: no matter where he hits in the lineup nowadays, Coco just hits. He grabbed three more knocks today, all singles to center, and now has hit safely in six straight games (10-24, .417) and has raised his average from .221 to .277 since June 13th
- Lugo (1-3, R, 2BB) also remained hot, extending his streak to 12 games (21-46, .457), but he has cooled off (2-8) since his re-insertion to the leadoff spot yesterday
- Cora got the start for Pedroia and went 0-5 to drop his aveaghe to .267; remember when everyone wanted him to start over Dusty? Me neither.
- Not only did Manny D allow his first inherited runner of the season to score, he also allowed his first runs since June 26th in Seattle, a span of 10 appearances; hey, he's only human
- Oki pitched his second straight scoreless inning after allowing his first homer since Opening Day on Friday night
- Wake became the first pitcher to have a decision in each of his first 20 starts since Houston's Shane Reynolds in 2001 and the first AL pitcher to accomplish the odd feat since Bret Saberhagen did it with the Royals way back in 1987.
"That was agonizing, but it's a heck of a lot better than losing."--Tito
RECORD: 59-39
AL EAST: Up 7.5 gms on NYY
STREAK: W-3
LAST 10: 6-4
UP NEXT: Mon @ CLE 705
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