Stephen King - Faithful

Hey, it’s good enough for me.

I had a big day yesterday. The sixth of my Dark Tower novels, Song of Susannah, was officially published, and I was in New York to do promotion (mostly those morning-radio drive-time shows—not glamorous, and grueling as hell when you pile them up, but they seem to work). The original idea was to fly in from Maine on the evening of the 7th, get a night’s sleep, get up early, do my thing, and fly back late the next afternoon. Instead, I rearranged things on the spur of the moment so I could go to Boston instead. The attraction wasn’t so much the opening night of interleague play—this year the San Diego Padres are in Fenway for the first time—or Pedro Martinez, who has been less than stellar this year, as it was the bruited return of Nomar Garciaparra.

Funny thing about that bruiting. Not only was Nomar not in the Red Sox lineup, he wasn’t even in Boston. He was in Rhode Island, where he played six innings for the PawSox and went 0 for 3. And no one seemed sure just how everyone got so sure he was going to make his major league debut last night in the first place. As I settled into my seat on the third-base line—call last night’s locale halfway between Kevin Youkilis and Manny Ramirez—I couldn’t even remember where I had gotten the idea. I even played with the notion of skipping the game altogether. I’m really, really glad I didn’t. Last night’s tilt would certainly have to go on my list of Steve’s Top Ten Games at Fenway Ever.

The thing is, you never know when you’re going to be reminded whyyou love this game, why it turns all your dials so vigorously to the right. I’ve been at Fenway for three 1–0 shutouts, and the Red Sox have won all three. Wes Gardner, an otherwise forgettable Sox righty, pitched the first under a gorgeous full summer moon one night in the eighties; Roger Clemens pitched the second on a sweltering weekend afternoon in the early nineties; Pedro Martinez and Keith Foulke (who worked a one-two-three ninth) combined on the third last night.

“The Pods,” as they are called (as in Pod-people, from The Invasion of the Body Snatchers ? one wonders), may be strangers to Fenway, but their starter, David Wells, knows it well…and we, the Fenway Faithful, know him. Never inarticulate, Boomer has often expressed his distaste for pitching in the Beantown venue. And with good reason. Until last night, fresh off the DL, I’d never seen him pitch well there. [20] Today’s newspapers described Wells’s latest stint on the DL only as resulting from an “off-field incident.” A guy I know who follows the game closely says Wells injured his wrist when he fell off a barstool. I assume that was a joke, but given Wells’s declared proclivities, one cannot be entirely sure.

He made up for that in his first start as a “Pod Person,” giving up just four hits, all singles, and working ahead of virtually every batter. This year’s Red Sox hitters are a patient bunch, and they usually wear pitchers out. Not Wells, last night; most of our guys just ended up getting in the hole 0-2 or 1-2, and slapping harmless grounders in consequence. If Wells hadn’t been lifted so as not to overuse him in his return, the game might still be going on.

I think he was better than Pedro over the first five, and given Pedro’s postgame comments (“I want to build on this”), Pedro may have thought so too. [21] Although he was clearly pleased (at one point during his postgame comments, Pedro called it a “dream game”), and given the outcome—no runs and just two hits in eight innings pitched—he had every right to be. Martinez certainly got great defensive backing from his teammates, who have at times this season been decidedly…shall we say iffy ?…in the field. Johnny Damon made a leaping catch in center, and Mark Bellhorn made a diving, dirt-eating stop between first and second. The stop was good, but what reminded me again—forcibly—of what makes these guys pros was how quickly he was back on his feet again. “Quick as a cat” ain’t in it, dear; “if you blinked you missed it” is more like it. But the defensive play of the night once again belonged to Pokey Reese,who has flashed divine leather all season long. I won’t bother describing it, other than saying he went to his left at a perfectly absurd speed, and maybe— maybe —got a helpful last-second bounce. I will tell you that I believe no other infielder except Ozzie Smith could have made the play, and relate two overheard comments from behind me, Charlestown accents and all:

“Do you think Nomah could play right field?” was the first.

“Nomah who? ” was the second.

And today I complete the experience by driving out of Boston on the first bona fide day of summer, temperatures in the mid-nineties, me in a Hertz Rent-A-Car I picked up at Logan Airport, driving up Route 1 as I have after so many games at Fenway Park, since my first one in 1959. There’s something just totally balls-to-the-wall about driving north past Kappy’s Liquors unhungover at 9:45 in the morning under a gunmetal sky; you’ve got that almost flawless two-hit, 1–0 win under your belt, and there are almost four more months of baseball to look forward to. I’ve got a cold Pepsi between my legs, the radio’s turned up all the way, there’s a U2 rock-block going on, and “Angel of Harlem” is pouring out of the speakers of my little Mercury Something-or-Other. Call me a dope if you want, but I think this is as good as it gets with your clothes on.

Last night was #5 Night at Fenway Park; the Return of Nomar. The crowd gave him a vast roar of a standing O, and Nomar, obviously moved, saluted them right back. He took the first baseball to come his way flawlessly, starting a 6-4-3 double play. In his first at-bat, he singled smartly into left field, to the crowd’s vast delight. The only problem was the Red Sox lost and the Yankees won, coming back from an early 4–0 deficit in their game with the Colorado Rockies. The Sox are now down three and a half games.

I find this out this morning, having given up on the Sox at 11 P.M., when a rain delay (it eventually clocked in at two hours and fifty minutes) progressed from the merely interminable to the outright absurd. The loss wasn’t entirely unexpected, as the Red Sox were down a bunch when the rains came, but the fact that the Yankees won yet again came as a rather nasty shock. They are starting to look more and more like those monolithic Yankee teams from the mid-to-late fifties that inspired the late DouglasWallop (a Washington Senators fan) to write The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant , which became the musical Damn Yankees.

A final note. In a move that may make sense to manager Terry Francona but seems incomprehensible to lowly fans like me, the Red Sox have sent Brian Daubach down to Pawtucket. Andy Dominique started for the Sox last night at first base. After blanking the Padres for four innings, a provisionally rejuvenated Bronson Arroyo found himself with two men on and two out. Brian Giles hit a grounder deep in the hole, which Garciaparra fielded, going to his right. He then made one of those patented across-the-body throws that have nailed so many surprised runners at first. Not last night. The throw was accurate enough, but a little short. The ball bounced first off the dirt, then off the heel of Dominique’s glove. My opinion? Maybe Ortiz doesn’t make that play, but David McCarty almost certainly does…and so does The Dauber. My question?