Sox Drawer: It had to be him, didn't it?

Judas Demon keeps up his end of his deal with the devil by burning his former mates once again

Ah, Judas, we remember when...

For six innings last night the Sox and Stanks engaged in an entertaining if uneventful game of chess, using small moves and sweeping shots to try and defeat their opponent, and with not a whole lot at stake, and judging by the sound of the half-interested crowd, it was one of the more harmless games in the history of the rivalry.

New York jumped out to an early 2-0 lead thanks to a couple of hits, a walk, a sac bunt and a hit batter, but NY starter Andy Pettitte coughed it up thanks to a homer run by Yankee killer Manny Ramirez and a triple by Julio Lugo who came around on a Big Papi sac fly.

Not exactly the stuff of glowing Bill Simmons articles.

With the crowd somewhat muted save for occasional "Red Sox suck" chant thanks to the Bostonians owning a gaping 8-game advantage in the standings coupled with the fact that neither Pettitte nor Daisuke Matsuzaka were tossing gems, the game had all the excitement of a VH1 reality show--somewhat manufactured and somehow uninspiring.

And then things got epic.

Down 3-2 heading into the 7th after Matsuzaka allowed power-impaired Derek Jeter to untie the game with a solo shot in thr 5th, the Red Sox Captan did something he has been doing all season: come up with a big hit in the clutch.

Tek's 12th longball of the season barely cleared the right field wall, barely eluding the ill-timed leap of Judas Demon, who has been shifted to left field due to his noodle arm and Jurassic gait, and tied the game at three, and that's when things entered into nail-biting, classic Sox/Stanks territory, large East lead be damned.

And Nations members far and wide had another belly laugh at the expense of the shaved idiot.

Who knew minutes later he would get the last laugh at our expense again.

It doesn't take a Red Sox historian to recall last August's epic collapse in a five game series at Fenway, forever dubbed the Boston Massacre II.

In those five games over four days, New York lit up the Sox like Boston did to Chicago this past weekend, and the man leading the way was none other than the exiled former playoff hero, Judas Demon.

Demon went nuts on his former club in that series, batting .435 (10-23) with 4 doubles, a triple, 2 homers, 6 runs scored and 8 batted in in the first four games, then sat out the finale, presumably to rest on his laurels.

The pesky centerfielder was all over the basepaths in those games, and his presence in the lineup proved to be a constant thorn in the side of the team that refused to meet his salary demands and let him walk as a free agent to the despised Stankees following the 2005 season.

And now he's at it again.

Mired in the midst of a miserable season in which injuries have slowed his foot speed and robbed him of bat speed, Judas has recently been rejuvenated, batting .350 since the end of July and finding his way in left after conceded his center position to the younger, stronger, faster Melky Cabrera.

All it would take was a late August rematch with his old team to take his game to a ho...nuva...level.

Demon's two-run blast was a mirror image of his former teammate Tek's, a high, floating wall-scraper that barley cleared the wall in right, but it still had the effect of a jackhammer to the heart.

Throw in the back injuries suffered by Manny Ramirez and Bobby Kielty, the dominance of fireballing phenom Joba Chamberlain and the familiar 9th inning stinginess of Marioan Methuselah Rivera, and the game suddenly and unexpectedly veered into memorable territory as far as the Rivalry goes.

Too bad the positive memories will be for the wrong team, created by the worst man possible in the eyes of a Nation.