Dan
Shaughnessy Sucks –
Dan Shaughnessy took some time out
of his busy schedule being lanky & ugly to weigh in on Saturday’s Sox-Yanks
tilt. Let’s enjoy, shall we?
Strange Day Has Us Dazed
This sounds like a shitty Phish song. I mean a Phish song.
It's not every day you get the
world's fastest human, the world's oldest bat boy, and the world's
greatest sports rivalry all in the same theater.
What the heck were
Tony Danza & Wilford Brimley doing at a Toronto Raptors-Milwaukee Bucks
game?
This is what we had at Fenway
yesterday afternoon/last night and the mix produced a second consecutive Red
Sox victory over New York and a second instance of the Sox and Yanks playing for 4 hours 21 minutes.
421, man. Groovy.
Gold medal sprinter Usain Bolt threw the ceremonial
first pitch
They let that reefer-head in the
park?
(to
Jamaican-born Justin Masterson),
Ya, mon.
and before the night was through, Yankees
manager Joe Girardi wished Bolt were available in his bullpen.
He throws a mean fastball!
Alright, I’m done..
(Sad Trumpet)
Ninety-nine-year-old Arthur
Giddon served as ceremonial bat boy. His 100th birthday is today and there were
moments when we all wondered if the Sox and Yanks might still be playing when
Arthur hit the century mark.
There were moments I thought that
geezer kicked the proverbial bucket during that game..
LITERALLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!
The Sox won this one despite
trailing A.J. Burnett, 6-0, after 3 1/2 innings. They won it because Jason Varitek hit a grand slam
and Mike Lowell knocked in six runs and the
By ‘raging’ do you mean ‘sucks’?
If so, your thesaurus is raging.
In two games, the Sox and Yanks
have used 24 pitchers who have given up 55 hits and 28 walks. There have been
eight blown leads.
Some call it brutal. Some call
it beautiful. Everyone calls it time-consuming.
Like a Dan Shaughnessy article.
"Long games," Sox manager Terry Francona said after looking at his
watch at the start of his postgame news conference. "A lot of pitching
changes. A lot of runs. A lot of
commercials. This will certainly age you."
Just ask Mr. Giddon, who went
the distance from a box seat by the Yankees dugout.
Boooo!
He was on his feet with the
rest of the 37,699 when Jonathan Papelbon
retired Robinson Cano for the final out.
He still couldn’t figure out who
let all the negroes in the park.
Nobody ever leaves these games.
If you do, you might miss Jason Bay's two-run,
two-out tying homer Friday night. Or you might miss a comeback from 6-0.
Or you might miss a ninety-nine
year-old man poop himself.
But it was tempting. When the
Yankees blew out to that 6-0 lead against Josh Beckett
(what's up with him?), a few of us were ready to bolt Fenway for the
ever-annoying CBS Scene
What?
and some old-fashioned war room/on-the-clock NFL draft talk.
But naturally that was only the beginning. The Red Sox came back. And back. And
back. Folks from Fox must have been thrilled.
Kiefer Sutherland was so pumped he
drank a fifth of vodka and pissed himself.
A 302-foot, two-run shot off
the Pesky Pole by Cano gave the Yankees a 4-0 lead in the third. Cano struck
again with a two-run double in the fourth and it was 6-zip when the Sox came out
to face Burnett in the fourth. The air had been sucked out of Fenway.
That seems dangerous. Did they
have oxygen masks?
Friday night's game for the
ages felt like part of the 1975 World Series.
Back when Mr. Giddon was just a
spry retiree.
Then we got some life in the
ancient yard.
Did the Local Nine give it the ‘ol
twenty-three skidoo?
Moments after Bay's
bases-loaded single put the Sox on the board, Varitek hit a first-pitch grand
slam (from the left side, thank you very much)
You’re welcome very much.
and it was 6-5.
Varitek hadn't hit a grand slam
in three seasons, but he clearly likes making things happen here on Saturday
afternoons against the Yankees. You might remember the Rawlings facial
Whoa Nellie!
he gave Alex Rodriguez in
July of 2004. That was a special time, no?
Twas.
When Jacoby
Ellsbury homered to open the fifth, it was 6-6. Once again, this proved
that you can throw out all the record books when a couple of former
What a couple of overrated
blowhards.
Turning things over to the
bullpen was risky business after Friday night's 11-inning marathon.
A sacrifice fly by David Ortiz (who is still waiting for his first home
run of the Obama Administration)
So that’s why he was stumping for
McCain.
BARACK OBAMA HATES DOMINICANS!
gave the Sox a 9-8 lead after six. The Sox appeared to be out
of a jam in the seventh, but a hard two-out grounder skipped between the legs
of Dustin Pedroia for a two-run error to put the
visitors back ahead, 10-9.
No problem. In the bottom of
the inning,
A-Rod thinks he’s a mouthful.
and drove it into the first row of the Monster seats to make it 12-10. It was the third lead
change in three innings and we hadn't even heard "Sweet
Caroline" yet.
Oh darn, ‘cause
that’s my jam.
The Sox never trailed again,
piling on with a three-run double by
"It drains you,"
admitted Francona. "A lot of walks. Every pitch
it seems like something might happen. It's a long day. Four and a half hours, a
lot of things happen."
"It's not the first time
we've had 4 1/2-hour games against these guys," said Varitek.
He's right, of course. Back in
2004, when men were men,
Crap, what are we now? Robots? Antelopes?
the Sox played back-to-back playoff games of
Nope. Doesn’t
ring a bell.
"It could be a 2-1
game," said Varitek. "With us, it would still be four hours."
Hard to believe they've got 16
more of these between now and October.
Actually, it’s quite easy to
believe. Did you not get a schedule?
Dan Shaughnessy is a Globe
columnist. He can be reached at dshaughnessy@globe.com. 
~~~
Dan
Shaughnessy enjoys him some hyperbole. I’m surprised the whole thing wasn’t a
character story on the ninety-nine year-old. That would’ve been right up his
alley.
Just
another in a long line of Baseball – What a Crazy Game! articles
we’ll be seeing this season. Sit back and enjoy. Literally.