Empyreal Environs

Game 154: September 21, 2007
Red Sox	8	W: Josh Beckett (20-6) H: Manny Delcarmen (10) H: Javier Lopez (12)	91-63, 1 game winning streak 31-14-5 series record Divisional magic number: 7 Postseason magic number: 2
Devil Rays	1	L: Scott Kazmir (13-9)	63-91, 4 game losing streak 15-29-6 series record
Highlights: The one thing old school about Tropicana is that the bullpens sit in foul territory without heed to safety or common sense. In the fifth, Jacoby Ellsbury hurtled his body into the Red Sox bullpen at full speed, blithely maneuvering over pitchers’ mounds, training equipment, and chairs. As he slid over the hills the ball precariously peeked out of his glove. He lay supine near the left field wall surrounded by relievers; the rookie outfielder was seemingly in shock over the rashness of his decision to pursue Greg Norton’s fly ball regardless of consequences. A few of the pitchers made the out sign; Ellsbury had held on for the second out.

Josh Beckett became the 27th man to win 20 or more regular season games for the Red Sox in a season. Early in the game it didn’t seem likely that Beckett would endure for the required innings for a decision. He threw 34 pitches in the first, eight of which were to Delmon Young for an epic standoff that resulted in a game-tying double to right.

It wasn’t one of his longest outings of the year, but it may have been one of the most pivotal collectively and individually. The Red Sox ended their four-game schneid and Beckett tallied his first 20-win season. The worries over his chronic blister problem and disappointing inaugural Boston season have dissipated and reformed into a Cy Young-caliber year.

The Red Sox bats that were silenced in Toronto made a statement in this contest, although Dioner Navarro amplified the noise with his two errors. Jacoby Ellsbury, who had doubled to lead off and advanced to third on a sacrifice bunt, so unnerved Tampa Bay’s backstop with his feints to home that Navarro threw galley-west to third. By the time Akinori Iwamura caught up with the ball Ellsbury had crossed home for the first score of the evening.

Scott Kazmir struck out David Ortiz and Mike Lowell to finish off the first, proving Navarro should have just kept the ball in his pocket. Navarro also hurled badly to the keystone sack in the second in an effort to stop Coco Crisp’s steal, but instead the ball pranced into shallow center. No runs would come of that error, but in the next inning Kazmir unraveled.

The bounty on Red Sox first basemen must be high. Eric Hinske was hit by Kazmir’s first pitch of the third inning. Dustin Pedroia walked without swinging while Ortiz took the opposite tack; the designated hitter was all over the first pitch he saw, lining it far enough into right to plate Hinske. Young missed the cutoff man and Pedroia advanced to third.

Given Bobby Kielty’s splits Kazmir was cautious, but overly so. He pitched wildly, allowing Pedroia to score and Ortiz to proceed to second.

That was all the breathing room Beckett and the relief trio of Manny Delcarmen, Javier Lopez, and even Eric Gagne needed, but Jason Varitek, Ortiz, and Lowell homered in the late innings for more cushion.

There could stand to be more cushion in the AL East division race, but at last the Yankees provided some padding with their 14-inning defeat by the Toronto Blue Jays last night.

Every milestone a member of this year’s club attains leads inevitably to an appreciation of Red Sox history. The highest ERA+ of any Red Sox pitcher with 20 or more wins was Pedro Martinez’s 1999 campaign of 245, and that wasn’t even his career high ERA+. In 2000 Martinez’s racked up an inhuman 285, the highest in history.

Wins are a misleading statistic to gauge starters, but in the context of his team’s recent woes and the playoff drive, the importance of Beckett’s win cannot be diminished to simple numbers. This is a mere “W” as Ellsbury’s catch was “FO7.”