2004 ALCS: Red Sox

2004 ALCS: Red Sox

2004, Games 5 Through 7

When the dust cleared from Game 4 of the 2004 American League Championship Series, two things were immediately clear: the Boston Red Sox were still down three games to one, and they weren’t going to stop playing baseball until somebody made them.

Down but Not Out

Game 4 ended on a walk-off blast from David Ortiz that, by the time he hit it, felt almost preordained. The Yankees were good, but this was not their night. Not in Boston. If Mariano Rivera couldn’t seal the win in the 9th, then no one else was going to do it in the 12th.

Most of the country still assumed that the 2004 ALCS was over. Teams might win a game, or even two, once they were down three games to none. Teams did not win four in a row. The numbers were against you, and the pressure was enormous. It had literally never been done.

After the emotional rollercoaster of the past two days, getting bludgeoned in Game 3 and barely surviving Game 4, what could the Red Sox have left? Their only hope was to jump on the Yankees early, roll to an easy win, and give their psyches a day to recover.

Game 5: Another Marathon at Fenway

The Red Sox seemed prepared to do just that, taking a 2-0 lead in the first off Mike Mussina. The game was a back-and-forth affair, though, as Pedro Martinez was no longer the Pedro of a few years before. He had moments, but he wasn’t Pedro.

Worse, the Red Sox weren’t hitting. They were missing chances. Down 4-2 in the bottom of the 8th, the Red Sox would once again face the great Mariano Rivera, eager to atone for his failure the night before.

For the second night in a row, everyone knew the series was over, and that the futility in Boston would go on for another year (or forever). Tonight, though, everyone knew it with a little less certainty. Was that fear we saw in Mariano Rivera’s eyes? No. Probably not. I still don’t think the man has ever been afraid of a baseball game. It didn’t matter, though. Afraid or not, he blew another save, and the game went to extra innings again.

Game 4 had gone twelve innings and five hours before ending in a walk-off home run by David Ortiz. Game 5 went fourteen innings and almost six hours. The ending was almost the same, though. David Ortiz, again, had the chance to win it. David Ortiz, again, did. He didn’t homer. He didn’t have to. A looping single did the trick.

“Damon running to the plate! And he can keep on running to New York, for Game 6 tomorrow night!”

That broadcast call to end the game, strangely simple and strangely unemphatic, was the first moment a full-on comeback started to seem plausible. Now it was just a matter of winning two games. Sure, they would have to be won in New York, but it was just two games.

Game 6: Grinding It Out in the Bronx

Game 6 was a strange affair. It was tense and businesslike after the high drama of the previous nights. The Red Sox scraped out a 4-0 lead and let the Yankees scrape back to 4-2 before shutting the door. They seemed tense away from Fenway, though, as if the magic might be wearing off. The exception was Curt Schilling, who turned in a hero’s performance on a bum, bleeding ankle. That piece of lore deserves more space than I can offer it now.

No one had ever made it this far, and people were saying that even if the Red Sox lost Game 7 of the 2004 ALCS, it was an amazing achievement. It was, in other words, a moral victory.

Game 7: A Coronation in New York

Game 7, though, was a coronation. The Red Sox had paid their dues. The neighborhood bully had lost his power.

The Red Sox won 10-3. The comeback was complete.

Up next, the St. Louis Cardinals. Up next, the World Series.