Monster Game Lifts Rays to Series Lead
Rays 9, Red Sox 1

By Dave Sheinin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 14, 2008

BOSTON, Oct. 13 -- The Green Monster, Fenway Park's iconic left field wall, had never before been so blatantly breached by invaders.

In the late afternoon twilight Monday, the Tampa Bay Rays brazenly took aim, battering its face with rocket-blasts and repeatedly clearing its upper reaches with high, arcing moon shots. There was nothing intimidating about this great wall. By the end of Game 3 of the American League Championship Series, it still stood, but the Boston Red Sox had scurried off the field and into their clubhouse, lest it collapse on them.

The Red Sox' mauling at the hands of the visiting Rays was at once stunning, swift and complete, a 9-1 loss that left them exposed and reeling, while giving the surging Rays a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven series, which continues Tuesday night.

Four times, Tampa Bay batters crushed home runs over the Green Monster, two of them coming during a pivotal four-run attack in the third inning off Red Sox ace Jon Lester. One landed in the expensive seats atop the wall. One slammed into an advertising sign. One nearly struck a light stanchion. And one cleared everything, landing with a smack on Landsdowne Street.

"They kicked our butts tonight," Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia said. "They played great; we didn't. We've got to play better."

The winner was Matt Garza, a 24-year-old right-hander with a 97-mph fastball and a devastating curve. As the national media focused on Lester in the lead-up to Game 3 -- on top of everything else he has accomplished in his brief career, he is also a cancer survivor -- the mostly overlooked Garza quietly voiced an additional point-of-view on Sunday's workout day, telling reporters, "My year wasn't that bad either, you know?"

As if to drive home the point, Garza carried a shutout into the seventh inning and thoroughly outpitched his more heralded counterpart. In this endeavor, however, he was aided by a Red Sox lineup full of easy outs in places where you typically would not imagine.

Designated hitter David Ortiz made four more outs, only one of which cleared the infield, punctuating some of them with howls of frustration. Leadoff hitter Jacoby Ellsbury remained hitless for the series, as did veteran catcher Jason Varitek.

"He's right smack in the middle," Red Sox Manager Terry Francona said of Ortiz, "and when he does get hot, it'll certainly be welcome."

Equally shocking was the sudden demise of Lester, who survived to pitch into the sixth inning but was hardly the same overpowering force he had been the rest of this postseason.

He was the most unbeatable pitcher in the modern history of the game, his .784 winning percentage (29-8, regular and postseason combined) entering the game ranking first all-time since 1900 among pitchers with at least 50 career starts. The Red Sox have come to regard his starts with the same sort of invincibility they felt about Josh Beckett a year ago.

Now, in successive games, the upstart Rays have conquered both Beckett and Lester in emphatic fashion.

"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.