Dickens and Daisuke: twin faces of "the worst of times".
It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.
The Boston Red Sox rallied from instant deficits of 5-0 and 6-1 to take a 9-7 eighth-inning lead over the New York Yankees last night … and lost the game 11-9 in the ninth on the strength of two-run homers by Alex Rodriguez and the immortal Marcus Thames.
Sixth-starter-slash-bullpen-long-man Tim Wakefield pitched 2 1/3 scoreless innings and stood to notch his first win thanks to the stirring Sox comeback … but game starter Daisuke Matsuzaka again was immediately awful, suffering a five-run first inning and never looking comfortable before being lifted in the fifth.
J.D. Drew, David Ortiz, Kevin Youkilis, and Victor Martinez (2) all went yard for the Sox to bring the club all the way back from behind and then some … only to watch helplessly as closer Jonathan Papelbon – who hadn’t blown a save since last July 28 – abandon his newly-revived repertoire of pitches to toss fastball after fastball to take the loss.
Mitigating factors? Sure. Papelbon threw 2 1/3 innings in Detroit on Saturday night and perhaps didn’t have his best stuff as a result. And A-Rod is capable of hitting any pitch out of the ballpark at any time. But it is true that any big league hitter eventually will catch up with a fastball no matter how fast it is unless its location is varied or it is mixed in with other pitches. (See Beckett, Josh.) So it does make one wonder why it was all heat, all the time – especially to a .247 career hitter like Thames.
Just another twist in a dark storyline that would make Charles Dickens proud.
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