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Monster Game Lifts Rays to Series Lead
Jon Lester gave up five runs in the first two innings, setting the stage for Tampa Bay's shocking 9-1 Game 3 rout at Fenway Park Monday afternoon.
(Jim Rogash - Getty)
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"We had a game plan, we stayed with it, and eventually we got pitches that we could handle," Rays Manager Joe Maddon said. "He is very good. Don't be deceived. He's very good. We just had a relatively good night. We had some good at-bats in crucial moments."
No moment was more crucial than B.J. Upton's at-bat in the third inning. The Rays were already up by a run, and had runners at second and third with nobody out, following Jason Bartlett's single and Akinori Iwamura perfectly played double high off the Green Monster.
On a 2-1 pitch from Lester, a fastball that was supposed to get inside on the batter but did not, Upton connected -- the ball sailing over the wall, over the seats, and landing on the street below. Fenway Park heaved with a collective gasp from 38,031 fans. No one had seen it coming. They had scarcely recovered when, two batters later, Evan Longoria, added a solo homer. It was 5-0, Rays.
"The combination of their swinging and us making some errors in [pitch] selection," Varitek said, trying to explain what had gone wrong. "I'll take the blame for that."
Things were occurring against Lester that never occur. When Longoria drew a walk to lead off the second -- after first getting a tiny piece of a 3-2 pitch that Varitek could not hold on to -- it marked the first time all postseason Lester had allowed a leadoff batter to reach.
When Francona decided to pull the plug on Lester, after he issued a two-out walk in the sixth, he opted for long man Paul Byrd, rather than starting a parade of his more trusted setup men -- perhaps a bit of a white flag being waved by Francona in the interest of saving his bullpen for Game 4. And still the onslaught continued. Rocco Baldelli struck a three-run blast in the eighth, and Carlos Peña a solo homer in the ninth, as Byrd took one for the team.
Finally, the relentless attack was over, and the Red Sox retreated to survey their wounds and their challenges, which are many. They couldn't count on their best hitter. They couldn't count on their best pitcher. They couldn't even count on the Green Monster to protect them.
