Stephen King - Faithful

SK:My last bit in the August section is about Manny—Manny at the bat and Manny in the field, and how his bad fielding is a misperception. I think you’ll be amused.

SO:I’m sure it’ll be a hoot. Wonder if we’ll agree. Manny’s about style, and I can dig that, but sometimes that feigned nonchalance leads to real goofs, like not running out pops down the line that end up falling fair, or forgetting how many outs there are. He’s got a good arm, but he loves to do that cool no-look throw from the corner so much that often he doesn’t get enough zip on the ball and ends up rainbowing one in. And of course my favorite was when he forgot to call time after a double, stepped off second and got tagged out. But hey, it’s all part of being Manny.

SK:In the Times piece about the Yankees’ lost weekend, there is, so help me God, this line: “Meanwhile, the Red Sox loom.” So take that, Chip McGrath.

Curt Schilling calls the Lincoln, Rhode Island, Little League team to give them a pep talk before their game tonight. The kids and their coaches are gathered around a speakerphone on a table. Everyone’s pumped.

“Are you gonna win it?” Schill asks.

“Yeah!” everyone says.

And then one kid—a skinny little joker—leans over the phone and asks, “Are you?”

Just as the room busts up (there’s no more explosive laughter than nervous laughter—Vincent Price Masque of the Red Death laughter), the ESPN crawl at the bottom of the screen reads: GARCIAPARRA (CHI-NL) OUT WITH STRAINED WRIST.

The advantage we have in the wild card is that with the unbalanced schedule the teams in the West will be facing one another while we feast on scrubs like the Jays and D-Rays. Tonight we plan to cash in, throwing Pedro against Ted Lilly in the mostly empty SkyDome. Reed Johnson leads off the Toronto first with a home run. Orlando Hudson follows with a triple. Again, Pedro’s come out like his brother Ramon, as if he’s not warmed up to game speed. He settles down after that and throws a great game, only giving up two more hits, but Lilly’s on, and with our lack of righty power (and Tek serving his suspension for shoving A-Rod), he shuts us down, 3–0, a three-hit complete game—only the second shutout against us (Jason Schmidt’s is the other). The Yanks beat Cleveland on a Sterry Sheffield home run, and the Angels won to pull even with us. And the kids from Rhode Island lost.

This is a true adventure in surrealism: I’m in Boston (exploring possibilities for a musical play with John Mellencamp) and the Red Sox are in Toronto (exploring possibilities for extending their season into October). Tim Wakefield, the pitcher who’s closest to the center of this Red Sox fan’s heart, is on the hill, and I keep running out to check with Ray, my long-time limo driver, who’s parked in a loading zone and listening to the game on the radio. At first things don’t go well; for most of the season Wakefield’s had problems with the gopher ball, and he gives up another in the first. The Jays keep pecking and are leading 3–0 when the Red Sox begin to crawl back, courtesy of Manny “We gotta jus’ keep goin’, man” Ramirez, who plates a couple with a base hit to center. Then Doug Mirabelli, who regularly catches Wakefield (and will be standing in for Jason Varitek this week while Tek finishes serving his four-game suspensionfor the brawl with Alex Rodriguez), hits a monster three-run homer to left center, putting the Sox up, 5–3.

I’m headed back to my hotel with Ray when Wake leaves the game. At that point the Red Sox still lead by two, but the Blue Jays have loaded the bases with nobody out. Enter Mike Timlin, who strikes out two…and then we lose WEEI’s AM signal amid the tall buildings. Ray and I sit, not speaking, at a seemingly endless red light, listening to static. When we get rolling again and the static finally clears, I hear the merry voices of the Giant Glass singers (“Who do you call when your windshield’s bus -ted?”), and know that Timlin either gave up a disastrous multibase hit and is being replaced—the barn door securely locked by Terry Francona after the horse has been stolen—or he actually wriggled out of it. When the game comes back on, the Red Sox are batting. It turns out that Timlin coaxed Alex Rios, the third batter to face him, into hitting a mild ground ball. Ray and I slap hands, and we’re back at the Boston Harbor Hotel before the Red Sox have finished batting.

I rush upstairs, ready to watch the final inning of what turns out to be another one-run nail-biter on TV…only to discover that the Boston Harbor may be the only hotel in the Boston metro area that doesn’t carry NESN. No Red Sox on TV, in other words. I try the radio. Nothing on the FM but opera and Aerosmith, nothing on the AM band but one constant blat of static. I do the only reasonable thing, under the circumstances; I call my son in New Hampshire and have him call the final three batters Joe Castiglione–style over the phone. It feels like bad mojo—the Red Sox always seem to lose when I watch or listen with my kids—but this time the Sox hold on, and I go to bed happy even though the Yankees have turned relentless again. We’re now 7-2 over the last nine games, and it’s hard to be unhappy with that.

Top of the sixth, down 3–2 with two on and one out for Doug Mirabelli against a tiring Miguel Batista. Doug’s the slowest guy on the team, a real double-play threat. The book here is to pinch-hit a lefty, and we’ve got a whole bench full. Problem is, with Tek still out, and Theo and Francona not wanting to waste a roster spot on Andy Dominique, our backup catcher is Doug Mientkiewicz. Mirabelli stands in and crashes a three-run bomb off the scoreboard in left-center. How does that proverb go: some have greatness thrust upon them?

Same thing in the bottom of the inning, when the Jays load the bases with none out. Embree’s arm is dead from overwork, and Leskanic and Adams have had control problems. Mike Timlin’s thrown way too many innings lately, but Francona’s got no one else. Timlin goes to the slider and whiffs Reed Johnson and Orlando Hudson, then gets Alex Rios on a force-out. He gives one back in the seventh, but Mendoza (another unlikely hero) gets two outs in the eighth, and Foulke handles things from there. So, thanks to some clutch play from the shallow end of the depth chart, we keep pace.

With Nomar gone and Trot possibly lost for the season, we don’t have a true number five hitter to protect Manny and David. Francona’s tried a number of guys there lately—just as he tried Dauber and Tek early in the season. When he posts the lineup for our nineteenth and final game of the season against Toronto, Bellhorn sees that Bill Mueller’s in the number five slot and jokes, “Are we trying tonight?”

Dave Wallace likes to say that if your eight best pitchers throw 80% of your innings, you’ll be in good shape. That’s great if you have eight good pitchers. Toronto has two. Kid righty Josh Towers implodes in the fifth, giving up back-to-back jobs to Manny and David, and then, two batters later, a two-run shot to Cabrera on a hanging curve. Schilling goes 6 1/3 and leaves with the score a comfortable 10–1, giving Francona a chance to use some of our worst arms (Terry Adams, Mike Myers, Mendoza—who actually throws well) and rest the real pen for one night.

The Yanks and Rangers lose, but the Angels put up 21 runs against the Royals to stay even in the wild card. Next Tuesday we start a nine-game stretch against the Angels, Rangers and A’s. If we can go 6-3 or better, we’re looking at the playoffs.