Empyreal Environs

Game 27: May 3, 2007
Mariners	7	L: Chris Reitsma (0-1)	12-11, 1 game losing streak 6-3-1 series record
Red Sox	8	W: Brendan Donnelly (1-1) S: J.C. Romero (1)	18-9, 2 game winning streak 7-2-2 series record
Highlights: A bullpen pitcher not named Hideki Okajima (who was named April’s AL Rookie of the Month) pitched well and a reliever who doesn’t take the field to “Wild Thing” notched a save. Kyle Snyder, Brendan Donnelly, and J.C. Romero took the mound on a night where Daisuke Matsuzaka expended his arsenal early. “Nakasugi” means “middle relief pitching,” one of the keys to the Red Sox capturing this one-game series win. (Ah, quirky baseball, only you would have the temerity purposefully create an oxymoron such as “one-game series.”) Manny Ramirez was the other; his two circuit blasts salvaged what would have been a disappointing end to this brief homestand.

Joanna attended the game with Jose Melendez of Keys to the Game fame. Inspired by the meeting, Joanna decided on a one-time only foray into the jaunty realm of referring to herself in third person for this game post. It’s time for Joanna’s EEs TO THE GAME.

1. Joanna had been a fan of Jose since he posted on the ezboard incarnation of SoSH. While many celebrity encounters are disappointing, Joanna is pleased to report that Mr. Melendez was much like his blogsonality with the added benefit of expletives peppering his speech and the skill to execute a decipherable scorecard, although neither of us could determine how to express David Ortiz and Yuniesky Betancourt’s inning-ending embrace in the sixth. Coco Crisp gloved nine total putouts, just three shy of the single game record for a center fielder. In scoring script, center fielders are represented by “8,” a harmonious and lucky number in Chinese culture. Over a billion people would be extremely impressed by Jose’s scorecard.


2. Joanna mentioned to Jose that Daisuke Matsuzaka’s problems happened in the fourth inning and that the pronunciation of four in Japanese sounds exactly the same as their word for death. Jose recalled that when changing from long sleeves to short the rookie hurler would reassert his dominance. After Matsuzaka’s first inning meltdown, both Jose and Joanna hoped that a wardrobe change was in order or that the pitcher had decided to have his traditional inning of difficulty early. Matsuzaka settled into a groove and pitched innings two through four unscathed. After the game Joanna talked with Jere and he showed her how the first five innings’ line score was like a mirror image of each other. She and Jere commiserated over Matsuzaka’s performance and how the K-Men had so little to do all game but were encouraged by Ortiz’s increasing tendency to hit to the opposite field and Manny Ramirez’s dominance to all fields. Joanna urges any visitors she may receive to visit Jere’s site; he has discovered digital zoom and has great photos to share. For once Joanna had seats in foul ball territory so she was more concerned with preserving her bodily integrity than getting photos. Fortunately her computer problems have been resolved and pictures from the past three games will be posted shortly.


3. Julio Lugo (who, Joanna learned later, was miked for the game) had an inferior day on the field. In the first the shortstop bungled what should have been a room service double play ball off the bat of Kenji Johjima. The very next play a Yuniesky Betancourt blooper glanced off Lugo’s glove as he pursued it into shallow center; this play was first called an error then converted into a hit. Jose noted there were many Lugos (Lugii? Lugae?) in the crowd; one just three rows in front of us a fan botched an easy fly and an entire section was labeled Lugo for their inability to catch a ball lobbed by the ball girl, who was herself a Lugette. This Lugo section, the ultra-exclusive first rows of a field box just to the side of the visitors’s dugout, jostled one other like bamboos stirred by the breeze for the orb and still the souvenir trickled back onto the field. Foie gras does make one’s fingers slick. As an aside, Joanna is in the midst of writing a strongly-worded letter to NESN management, with a carbon copy to the Red Sox front office, which expresses her extreme opprobrium of the miking of players. It lists in excruciating detail the reasons why such a programming tactic is pandering to the lowest denominator of baseball audiences (clearly not the target demographic that the majority of Red Sox fans inhabit) and that this gimmick obviously compromises on-field play. Rest assured that Joanna also mentioned that the verb “to mike” and its conjugations make her skin crawl.

I’m Joanna and those are my EEs TO THE GAME.