Faithful

of the sports year (football, basketball, hockey)? I think it goes back to the basic subtext of this book, that the Red Sox—like the Cubs—are the derelicts of major league baseball, ghost ships adrift and winless in the mythic horse latitudes of sports legend. That may sound sweet to the poets and to writers like John “lyric little bandbox” Updike,[33] but sportswriters want winners, sportswriters want their bylines under headlines like SOX TAKE SERIES IN 6, and this eighty-six-year dry spell just…makes…them… FURIOUS. They won’t admit it, not hardheaded Damon Runyon archetypes such as they, but underneath it all they’re hurt little boys who have been eating loserdust for much of their professional lives and they just…fucking…HATE IT. Can they take it out on management? On Theo Epstein and mild-mannered, bespectacled John Henry? They cannot. Those fellows do not put on uniforms and swing the lumber. Also—and more importantly—those fellows are responsible for who gets press-box credentials, field credentials, and who gets to belly up to the postgame buffet. So, by and large, management gets a pass.[34] Except, of course, for the poor unfortunate middle-management schmucks who fill out the lineup cards, guys like Terry Francona, Grady Little, Jimy (family so poor they could only afford a single ‘m’ in his first name) Williams, “Daddy” Butch Hobson, and “Tollway” Joe Morgan.

And Nomar. Him, too.

That selfish guy.

That downer.

That liar.

That guy who took the money, ran off to Chicago, and left the kids crying.

It’s all bullshit, of course, and in their ink-smudged hearts, the Knights of the Keyboard know it. But Boston sportswriters are for the most part mangy, distempered, sunstruck dogs that can do nothing but bite and bite and bite. In a way you can’t even blame them. They are as much at the mercy of the long losing streak as the fans who buy their tickets at the window or pony up for NESN on cable TV. Sooner or later—maybe even this year, I haven’t given up hope, even yet I am still faithful—the Sox will win it all, and this infected boil will burst. I think all of us will be happier when it does. Certainly we will be more rational.

Later, after a quiet 4–3 loss to the Tigers:

SK: I admit it: after the third Detroit base runner reached with none out, I left the room. Simply could no longer bear to watch. And—between me and you?—a lot of this really is just daffy-horrible luck. Derek Lowe hasn’t been the only recipient, but he has surely gotten the biggest helping. Last year, the second two batters are harmless ground outs, and we’re up 1–0, Detroit batting with a runner on first and two out.

Oh, this is maddening.

Why why why did I ever let you talk me into this?

SO: I watched every dribbling, seeing-eye single. That third base runner was a ball Cabrera couldn’t get a handle on. Thank you, Defense Minister Theo. I also have no idea why Francona’s got O-Cab batting third. He’s hitting something like .100.

You’ve got to have some luck to win the close ones (and some defense, some speed, a bullpen…). In answer to your earlier query as to how we’ve done in one-run games: we’re now 7-15. Wasted a great game from Tek—an honest triple, a mammoth tater and then gunning down Carlos Pena to bail out new guy Mike Myers (really, that’s his name) in the eighth. Three runs against Detroit? That’s anemic. Come back, Big Papi!

It’s worse than maddening, and I apologize for dragging you to the death prom. My lament, as a citizen of the Nation—like an injured lover—is: why why WHY are they doing this to us?

August 7th

I’ve suggested that the team needed to play .750 ball in its twelve-game stretch against losing opponents; Boston is playing the same old so-so wake-me-when-it’s-over road baseball instead. After three matches in Tampa Bay and one in Detroit, the Yankees have sailed over the horizon and even the wild card looks…well, it still looks perfectly possible, but we look less deserving of it, okay? We look about a run short, and I’m not talking about the run we lost by last night, or not just that one. I’m talking about the game we lost to Tampa Bay by a run, and the two we lost to the Twins—each also by a single run. That’s four one-run losses in a row. This team has played an amazing number of games this season that have been decided by one run: twenty-two so far. The only number more amazing is the number of them we’ve lost: fifteen. Let me write that in bold strokes so we can both be sure of it: 15 GAMES LOST BY A SINGLE RUN. At least two of those one-run losses were to the league-leading Yankees.

And we had another one of those bases-loaded-with-two-out night-mares last night. Again and again this year the Red Sox have failed to produce in that situation. Versus the Tigers, Kevin Youkilis did manage to snare a walk (he is, after all, the Greek…aw, never mind), temporarily tying the score for the tragickal Mr. Lowe. That brought up Orlando Cabrera, one-half of Theo Epstein’s replacement for Nomar Garciaparra. Cabrera, who is pressing at the plate and looking more and more like a Stepford Cesar Crespo clone, struck out on three pitches, two of them well out of the strike zone, and that was the end of our one big chance. The Sox went meekly in the top of the ninth, as they have all too often this year, and now taking eight out of twelve means taking six out of eight. It can be done, but I doubt it can be done by this team.

SK: The game is looking very shaky into the seventh. I hate the way this season is going.

SO: We did finally pull away from the Tigers tonight, but you’re right. The way the season’s going seems to be lose, Pedro, lose, Schill, lose. Except when Tim-may throws in the Trop or Arroyo faces the Yanks. Or Lowe’s every third start. When are we going to put together a decent streak? At least El Jefe’s back (and don’t you know, Manny comes down with the flu).

August 9th

It was a good weekend for the Faithful. Pedro Martinez won pretty on Saturday and Tim Wakefield won ugly on Sunday.[35] In their current important twelve-game stretch against underachieving clubs, Boston now stands at 4-2. Only a churl would point out that they could be 6-0. (I am, of course, that churl.) We have moved into a three-way tie for the wild card with two of the AL Western Division clubs (the Angels and the Rangers), and that is a marked improvement over where we were a week ago. I’ll take it.

But any longtime follower of the Red Sox will tell you that when the team’s cheek grows rosy, the almost automatic response is for someone, either in the media or in the organization itself, to slap a leech on it. In this case the leeching has to do with Kevin Millar’s comments about his playing time and the constantly shifting nature of the team’s makeup.

Millar’s pique over not being in the lineup for the August 7th game against the Tigers (“Here I am, riding the old benchola”) is just silly, especially since he ended up being a last-minute add to Francona’s card. But pro athletes aren’t known for their statesmanlike qualities, and in other baseball markets such comments usually go unpublished. If they are published, they’re apt to be—can you believe this?—snickered at.