From a possible sweep at Fenway Park, the lowest of all possible Red Sox lows, we ended at Yankee Stadium with the lowest October nadir of any team from any town in the entire history of baseball. And the New York media was so predictably generous in its Thursday morning banner headlines. "The Choke's On Us." "Monumental Collapse." "They're History." "Damned Yankees."
Frame 'em. Send 'em to friends. They make great holiday gifts.
Ultimately, the crux of this Red Sox-Yankees affair was not one game or hero, but rather a succession of interlocking events that began at precisely midnight on Monday and ended three days and one minute later at 12:01 a.m. on Thursday. Those 72 hours encompassed four excruciatingly tense games that took 5:02, 5:49, 3:50 and 3:31 to play, plus travel time between cities. Each event built on itself, game by game, until this series accumulated the largest mass of momentum the sport has ever seen.
"When these teams play," said Torre, "every game is a series."
So, imagine the building psychological weight of losing one game after another, each feeling like the loss of a whole series.
Sports miracles are always a mix of good luck and great labor. Both, for once, aligned in the Red Sox' corner and refused to leave. Game 4 was actually won by Boston General Manager Theo Epstein, 30, the architect of this team. The Yankees have always been famous for depth. Epstein built deeper. Pinch runner Dave Roberts, 38 steals in 41 attempts, was acquired as a designated Rivera Rattler.
The great reliever knew if he allowed even one base runner, Roberts would immediately come in and steal second base to reach scoring position. Talk about seeing your margin for error shrink. In Game 4, Rivera walked Kevin Millar to start the ninth, Roberts pinch-ran, stole second and scored the tying run on Bill Mueller's line drive that missed Mariano's glove by inches (luck).
That turned the tide.
In Game 5, the Yankees might've won in nine if a ground-rule double hadn't hopped over the right field fence. I say Ruben Sierra probably wouldn't have scored from first. But the Yankees think so. Which matters. Because that "break" spooked 'em more.
After that, it was only natural that the umps would reverse two calls in Game 6 -- going against the Yankees twice in their own stadium just for the sake of getting the play correct. What next, Kerry carries Florida by one hanging chad?
Finally, as midnight tolled over Game 7 and the "ghosts" did not arrive, the final place for this ALCS in our pantheon became clear. You think I'll say that what the Red Sox accomplished was the best comeback in the history of baseball. Because Boston had to win four straight sudden-death games, the last two at Yankee Stadium. Because, except for poor clutch hitting, the poised Yankees barely made a single fundamental mistake in any of their four losses. And because Boston won two of those games with a starter -- Derek Lowe -- who the front office had taken out of the rotation as a total-loss late-season head case.
However, the Red Sox stealing the pennant from the Yankees not once but four times within 72 heart-stopping hours was something more than just the greatest last-gasp comeback in history.
More than that, it was a partial squaring of accounts, a down payment on simple fairness. With due respect to Brian Cashman, Torre and their classy players, the Yankees cannot escape the fact that their franchise has used its wealth to tilt the supposedly level playing field of sport by a larger margin and over a far longer period of time than any other team in our national history. If somebody should have the biggest flop on record in our national pastime, it should be the Yankees; and it should be while George Steinbrenner III owns them at a moment when he has, yet again, broken his own gluttonous payroll record with a $182 million team.
If any club deserved the right to administer these dishonors to the Yankees, it was the Red Sox, crownless for 86 years. The true distinction of this fabulous week was that this ALCS was the most fun -- the most unadulterated, disbelieving, decades-overdue fun -- that baseball has experienced in our time. And maybe, if you like a pinch of malice with your meat, ever.
