Empyreal Environs

Rather than Josh Beckett’s dominant start (6 innings pitched, 4 hits, no runs, 2 walks, 9 strikeouts) the soap opera around Jorge Posada’s absence from the lineup was the hot topic in the Fox booth. While the Red Sox threatened to score in the first with runners on first and third and none out Joe Buck and Tim McCarver tittered like grandmothers over tea about the Yankees.

The Red Sox hitters didn’t get on the basepaths again until the fifth inning. Perhaps they were spurred on by Sarah Silverman’s fourth inning visit with Buck and McCarver. The comedian talked about how she as a Red Sox fan isn’t used to being anything but a lovable loser. Silverman was as coherent as an LSD-addled Doc Ellis, exclaiming that steroids are wrong but lysergic acid is good once in a while as a treat.

The real treat was Jacoby Ellsbury coming through with ducks on the pond in the fifth. Ellsbury’s two-RBI double somehow eluded Brett Gardner’s glove as it glided through the left-center gap. Were it not Jason Varitek at first it could have been a bases-clearing double.

The real treat was Jacoby Ellsbury coming through with ducks on the pond in the fifth. Ellsbury’s two-RBI double somehow eluded Brett Gardner’s glove as it glided through the left-center gap. Were it not Jason Varitek at first it could have been a bases-clearing double.

With two on and two out Adrian Gonzalez gave it “a little Ichiro.” To avoid rolling over on a pitch inside the slugger opened up earlier than his usual swing and took a step towards the mound. The result was a three-run homer to right neatly deposited into a roiling sea of dismayed Yankee fans.

It’s easy to gripe about the deference the Red Sox front office gives to players seemingly past their prime such as Varitek and Tim Wakefield. But watching the Yankees drama unfold via in-game interviews with Brian Cashman, reports from Ken Rosenfeld, and tweets by Posada’s wife Laura, prompted me to give both organizations a non-Bronx cheer. Tips of the cap to the Red Sox for generally being able to defuse such situations and to the Yankees for exacerbating what could have been a minor situation. Hip hip, Jorge!

Game 39: May 14, 2011
Boston Red Sox 19-20	6	W: Josh Beckett (3-1)
		2B: Jacoby Ellsbury (12) HR: Adrian Gonzalez (9)
New York Yankees 20-17	0	L: CC Sabathia (3-3)
		2B: Nick Swisher (6)