Rocket schools Beckett, Stanks win again

New York 4, Sox 3
WP: Clemens (6-5)
LP: Beckett (16-6)
SV: Rivera (22)
HRs: BOS-Youk (14), Papi (25); NYY-ARod (44)

"Hey Boston, you can't close shit, so hits the bricks! What, you think this is verbal abuse? Ask my daughter about verbal abuse, pal!"

SUMMARY
Josh Beckett allowed a career-high 13 hits while his idol Roidger Clemens surrendered just two in his six innings of work, and Beckett's final pitch of the night, a two-out solo home run by Alex Gonzalez in the seventh, wound up being the difference in the game.

#1 STUNNER Clemens 6IP, 2H, 1ER, 5BB, 2K, HR
For the second night in a row a former member of the Sox came back to bite his old team in the ass, and although Clemens wasn't dominant, he was plenty good enough as the gigantic jackass didn't allow a hit until Papi's moonshot with one out in the sixth.

PAN's FAUN Beckett 6.1IP, 13H, 4ER, 1BB, 6K, 1HR
Squaring off against his boyhood idol on the mound where he recorded his Series-clinching victory with the Marlins, Josh Beckett came up with a performance reminiscent of Miss Tenn South Carolina--erratic, incoherent, and painful to watch in many spots.

RECAP
Raise your hand if your surprised the game turned out like this.

Wait a minute, let me rephrase that: raise your hand if you're surprised Clemens didn't get the no-hitter.

Because the way things have gone for Boston in these two games with the Stankees, a no-no by the man who has been the cause of so much adulation, ridicule and hatred for Boston fans would have made perfect sense.

The only thing missing was Bucky bleepin Dent at short and Aaron bleepin Boone at third and the ghosts of Red Sox past would have engulfed the souls of Red Sox present.

Fortunately for Boston and its ever-fragile Nation it didn't get as ugly as that this evening, but for 6+ innings the game was going about as bad as it possibly could for the boys from Beantown.

Clemens was making his first start against the team he began his career with since October 2003, after Boone torched Wakefield to send Clemens & New York back to the World Series, and the irony of who his mound opponent was tonight was twofold, as Josh Beckett not only grew up idolizing Clemens, but went on to defeat Rocket's Stanks on this field in Game 7 of that 2003 Series.

It's like the six degrees of Red Sox Nation.

It was quickly evident what type of game this was going to be when Clemens nailed Dustin Pedroia with his 5th pitch of the game, to get all the "this is for the Japanese dude nailing Baby Blue Lips the last couple of games" shit out of the way early, followed by Giambi robbing Lugo of extra bases on a "look what I found" snag.

In the bottom of the first, after retiring Judas Demon on a groundout, Beckett allowed a deep shot by Jeter that skied over the head of J.D. Drew for a one-out double and served notice that the Bronx rottweilers were not going to let up in their pursuit of the superior Sox.

Beckett would escape that jam, and Clemens one of his own when he walked Drew and Varitek with two outs in the second then got Coco to tap out to first, but in the bottom of the second the rank sight of the Stanks taking another lead would rear its ugly head again.

Jorgie Posada lined a one-out single past Pedroia into center field, and after Giambi fouled out to Youk, Robinson Cano drew a walk to set up a scoring situation for underrated Melky Cabrera (3-4, R, BI).

After running the count to 2-2 Cabrera pushed a slow roller past Pedroia and into right center that scored Posada from second with the first run of the game and who was up next but the hairless wonder, Judas Demon.

A wild pitch by Beckett moved both runners into scoring position, and Demon battled Becks for seven pitches before squirting a single to left that scored both runners, and once again the little cocksucker had succeeded in twisting the dagger he stuck in the Nation's heart a little bit further.

Saddled with a 3-0 lead the Rocket turned on the wayback machine and pretended it was 2003 all over again, when he had a 17-9 record, a 98-mph heater, and pitching as if the playoff hopes of his team were riding on his shoulders.

Mind you this was definitely not vintage Rocket, as the five walks and 91 mph fastball can attest to, but the desire and competitive fire was still alive and kicking inside the battered 45-year-old body, and it was on full display for much of the night.

While the Stanks pecked at Beckett by putting batters on base in every inning (the only time he had a 1-2-3 inning was when Rodriguez grounded into a double play in the fifth), he somehow managed to evade further run damage; trouble was, Clemens' bend-but-don't-break gameplan was working as well.

Boston's fortunes finally changed when David Ortiz, needing to take up the slack with Manny out of the lineup, blasted a 1-0 pitch from Clemens in the sixth high and deep into the New York night, ultimately landing a few rows up in the third deck, putting an emphatic end to the no hitter and the shutout with one swing of the bat.

The opportunity was there to get tie the game up when one out later Youk (1-3, R, 2BI) walked and Drew singled, but Clemens got Varitek to ground harmlessly to second, ending his evening and what looked like any chance of Boston getting back in this game.

Beckett pulled another Houdini act in the bottom of the inning when he allowed three hits, including New York's fourth infield single of the game, yet got out of the inning unscathed when he beat Demon to the bag on a slow roller to Youk, a play he failed to make just two innings earlier.

Poetically, Tito then channeled Grady Little when he let his struggling ace come out for the seventh, a move he had to regret when Rodriguez reached down for a slider in the dirt and popped it over the wall in left for his 44th longball of the season and what would turn out to be a very important run.

As Rodriguez (2-4, R, BI) took his curtain call Francona removed Beckett, and even though Javier Lopez and Mike Timlin finished the inning, after Youk jacked a two-run homer to left off Kyle Farnsworth in the eighth the damage A Rod's homer had done became painfully more apparent.

When the embattled Farnsworth walked Tek one out later, and with coddled phenom Joba Chamberlain unavailable to pitch tonight, Joe Torre called on his weathered closer, Mariano Rivera, to get the rare four-out save.

Of course he did, retiring all four batters on harmless infield grounders, including Pedroia to A Rod to end the game with Big Papi praying he would get a shot to go retro himself and tie the game with a titanic ninth inning blast.

But alas this was the Stankees nights to relive the past, as Beckett crumbled on the site of his greatest glory in the face of his greatest idol, Demon continued to tear into his old team like Survivorman on a squirrel, and Roidger Clemens showed that eleven years after his initial departure, he's still creating moments for Red Sox fans to remember.

The bastard's just making sure they all suck.

NOTES:

--Injury to insult: Manny's injury could keep him out of the lineup for possibly a week or more, he was quoted as saying today; Kielty's doesn't seem as serious but he could be out a few games. Luckily the rosters expand on Saturday.

--Silent bats: after mashing 52 hits and 46 runs in four games in Chicago, Boston batters have mustered just 11 hits and six runs in two games here, including a measly four base knocks tonight

--Star gazing: the game was so unwatchable for a while that ESPN entertained viewers with the always fun 'spot the celebrity' game. Some of the luminaries on hand included Paul McCartney, Lorne Michaels & Alec Baldwin, who must have been shooting an episode of 30 Rock; Penny Marshall; Billy Crystal (Stanks this week, huh Billy?) and John Madden.

I know, it was that bad.

QUOTES:

--"Stupid pitch, stupid spot." --Beckett on the pitch ARod hit out

--"I wasn't facing him. My guys were facing him."--Beckett on the matchup with
Clemens

--"Everything's in our grasp, the wild card and the division."--Farnsworth, hopefully providing bullpen material for Schill & the Sox tomorrow

RECORD: 80-53
AL EAST: Up 6 on NYY
STREAK: L-2
LAST 10: 6-4
UP NEXT: Thu @ NYY 105

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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.

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Surprise, surprise: cold Stanks knock off hot Sox

New York 5, Sox 3
WP: Pettitte (12-7)
LP: Matsuzaka (13-11)
SV: Rivera (21)
HRs: BOS-Varitek (12), Manny (20); NYY- Jeter (9), Demon (9)

SUMMARY
To the surprise of absolutely no one on either side of this storied rivalry, the Stankees, coming off their worst road shutout loss in franchise history, defeated the Red Sox, who were coming off an historic 4-game sweep of the White Sox.

Non-surprise #2: Former Sox idiot Judas Demon hit the game-winning homer.

#1 STUNNER Demon 2-4, 2R, 2BI, HR
As much as it pains me to bestow the shaved rat with this honor, the guy had a whale of a game; he played excellent defense in left field, scored the first run of the game after a leadoff single, and then provided the winning margin with a 2-run homer of Daisuke Matsuzaka in the 7th.

PAN's FAUN Matsuzaka 6.1IP, 6H, 5ER, 3BB, 2K, 2HR
The backsliding rookie lost his third straight start when he twice allowed New York to score after Boston clawed back to tie the game. He's now surrendered 20 homers on the season and it appears that the heavy US workload might be getting to the Japanese hurler.

RECAP
This is what we get for feeling so giddy.

Riding high on the strength of that Chitown beatdown and a cushy 8-game division lead, the Sox strolled into the Bronx with all the confidence of Brad Pitt on the Dating Game, secure in the knowledge that even a sweep by New York would still leave them in solid shape to win the AL East.

And then the game began.

Before most of the late-arriving Stadium crowd had finished swilling its pregame meal, the Stanks had put two runs on the board, the chants of Boston sucks were already in full throat, and Nation members were mumbling "all we have to do is win one of these games and we'll be alright."

The trouble is, whenever these two meet with anything on the line (with the exception of 2004), Boston shrivels up quicker than George Costanza at an icy lake, and no matter who's in first or how poorly or well the other team is playing, a large percentage of people involved on both sides know that somehow, some way the Stanks are going to get over on the Sox again.

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not whining or complaining or asking fans of any other lesser teams to feel sorry for us, but merely stating an obvious fact: everyone in the Nation knew, in the back of their minds, that Boston was not going to sweep this series, and in fact might get swept themselves.

But the benefit of jumping out to that ginormous division lead early in the year gave us the luxury of not having to worry too much about it (for a change.)

Lose three here, they're still up five, move on and continue the march to the division title like nothing's happened.

And I was prepared to handle it that way.

In fact during the 6th inning, with Boston trailing 3-2 and looking as lively as one of Mike Vick's pets, I thought to myself, "even if they lose this game it's no so bad, it's not a horrible painful loss, just another loss in a season full of them."

And then, wouldn't ya know, it got painful.

Matsuzaka started the night by loading the bases in the first inning on a single by Demon, a one-out walk to Bobby Abreu and then plunking A Rod with his first pitch he threw him.

Hideki Matsui then hit a hard grounder to second to nab A-Rod, but Demon crossed the plate with the first run just minutes into the game, and Jorgie Posada followed with a double to left that plated Abreu with the second run before Robinson Cano launched a fly ball to deep center to end the frame.

Manny Ramirez (2-3, R, BI) would slice that lead in half when he led off the second inning with an opposite field homer off Andy Pettitte, his 20th of the season and 52nd against New York in his career, but his night would come to an unexpected early conclusion just a few innings later.

After Dice-K tossed a 1-2-3 third inning, Boston tied the game in the top of the third when Julio Lugo led off with a triple to the wall in left center, then came home on a sac fly by David Ortiz (0-3, BI) two batters later.

Handed a new lease on the game Matsuzaka, who was behind hitters all evening and did not look sharp despite retiring 12 of 13 batters at one point, could not hold the Stanks, who had lost 5 of 7 on its last road trip including 3 of 4 in Detroit, at bay.

In the fifth Dice retired the first two batters before Derek Jeter ripped an opposite field homer of his own, his first longball in 87 at bats and second of his nine this year off Matsuzaka, and the momentum had swung back to New York's favor with the 3-2 lead.

That's when I said to myself "hey, it's been a good game, nothing too horrible to bemoan, if it ends like this I'm okay with it."

Unfortunately it was about to get much, much worse.

Ramirez led off the sixth with a solid single off the pitchers mound, but as he left the box he grimaced and briefly grabbed at his side, then trotted to first. J.D. Drew (0-4, 2K), who had a horrid evening, ended the frame with a double play, and Manny came out to the field for the bottom of the inning.

Dice-K recorded two quick outs before Posada lofted a soft fly ball to left, and as Manny gingerly jogged in to retrieve the ball it casually slipped under his glove as Posada took second on the left fielder's error.

Another incident of Manny Being Manny?

Hardly.

Matsuzaka got Cano to strike out to end the inning, and when Jason Varitek, a.k.a Captain Clutch, lifted a solo shot that barely eluded Demon's mistimed leap and landed in the first row of seats in the left field stands, it seemed as if things were looking up for the Boston boys.

I repeat, hardly.

When Boston took the field for the bottom of the seventh, Bobby Kielty had replaced Manny in left. It appears that the "minor" back spasms that plagued Ramirez in Chitown flared up again, and he had to be removed from the game.

Gulp.

It was as if a karmic shift had occurred on the club, and just to confirm this eerie, all-too-familiar feeling, Andy Phillips led off with a single to left and after he was replaced by pinch runner Wilson Betemit, Melky Cabrera sacrificed him over to second and the wheels were in motion for an awful ending to this entertaining game.

One pitch later the wheel spun like a friggin top as Demon placed a blast just fair and just over the fence in right for a soul-crushing, crowd-erupting, in-your-shaved face 2-run homer that earned him a curtain call from the suddenly ignited crowd and sent millions of heads into millions of pairs of hands all across the Nation.

Why oh why did it have to be him who did us in -AGAIN!?

Pettitte (7IP, 6H, 3ER, 2BB, 6K) was removed for rookie sensation set up man Joba Chamberlain to start the eighth, and although the beefy flamethrower allowed a pair of baserunners on a walk and a single, he also blew away Eric Hinske, who had to pinch hit for Kielty as he suffered a back injury as well, on three pitches, then froze Drew on a wicked breaker after blazing a 99 mph heater past him on two other pitches.

From there it was all over but the crying as Mariano Fossil Rivera retired all three batters in the ninth including two strikeouts, and a game that began with such high hopes ended in a depressing, injury-plagued loss that gave the Stankees some much-needed hope in the race for the playoffs.

So ends another chapter in Red Sox/Stankees lore, one in which Boston's heralded rookie hurler could not come up big when we needed him to but New York's did, two of Boston's players were lost with injuries that could prove costly, and a player who used to be a beloved hero but is now a reviled zero caused more heartache and pain for a Nation that has already seen its fair share.

We can only pray that Josh Beckett can best Roidger Clemens on national TV tomorrow night, or else this seemingly insurmountable lead could suddenly appear very slim.

And the chants of 1978 & 2006 will be ringing in our ears until the teams meet again next month in Fenway.

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SOX NOTES: and Judas Demon wonders why The Nation despises him?

Just checked out this piece from Boston Metro, via Globe Sports Online, which is an interview between BM reporter David Sandora and former Commonwealth Idiot, Judas Demon.

In the brief piece Damon gushes about his playing for the Yankees and living in the Big Apple in general, things he would have been loathe to do just two short years ago. A few of the comments struck me as quite amusing, if not for their idiocy then their sheer assholeishness (I can use that word here):

-On his first year living in New York, Captain Caveman says "It was incredible. After a night game, you’re able to go and find something to eat. Every other place I’ve played, you couldn’t do that."

Ah, I know I've been a Floridian for 14 years now, but last time I was home I remember that most restaurants/bars/clubs were open until at least 2:00 a.m., and after that everyone knew where to go for after hours carousing. Night games are over by 10-10:30, plus an hour & a half for post-game bullshit still leaves you on Yawkey Way by midnight with a smorgasbord of options for your wining & dining pleasure. In other words, what the hell is he talking about?

-Asked if there was anything that surprised him about playing for the Stanks, CC replied "I think just the way they do stuff, it’s incredible. How the simplest things — having two buses before a game on the road, two buses after the game — we’re the only people who did that."

Note the disgusting use of the word "we", and also chuckle at how a former self-proclaimed idiot who enjoyed long hair, Jack Daniels and sluts thinks so highly of the fact that his new team has two buses for the players' royal pampered asses.

-But the kicker had to be his response to the inevitable query about his long-lost shaggy mane; did he miss his hirsute visage? "No. Actually, the hair was going to come off regardless of what team I signed with."

And that's why we hate you, you f-ing traitor. Keep your shorn locks and double-bussed ass in the Big Apple, and may an enraged former fan serve you an extra "special" pot of cold tea next time you're looking for a late night snack in Chinatown.

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