Ortiz: Another delivery
BOSTON – Just like the game that seemed it would never end, Boston’s season just won’t end.
David Ortiz’s RBI single on the 471st pitch of the game with two outs in the 14th inning capped a second amazing comeback in less than 24 hours Monday night and gave the Red Sox a 5-4 victory over the New York Yankees in the A.L. Championship Series.
The Red Sox, one inning away from elimination Sunday night, now are one game away from climbing out of a 3-0 deficit and forcing an anything-can-happen Game 7.
“The last two nights shows the depth, the character, the heart, the guts of our ballclub,” winning pitcher Tim Wakefield said. “It took every ounce of whatever we had left to win tonight’s game and to win last night’s game.”
This time, Boston was six outs from elimination before Ortiz’s leadoff homer off Tom Gordon and Jason Varitek’s sacrifice fly off Mariano Rivera tied it 4-4 in the eighth.
The next six innings were agonizingly tense, filled with a double play, three passed balls in the same inning, two Red Sox runners thrown out trying to steal second and 10 runners left on base.
The teams played back-to-back marathons that totaled 26 innings and almost 11 hours – 5 hours, 2 minutes Sunday and 5 hours, 49 minutes Monday – the longest by time in postseason history.
The Yankees had taken a 4-2 lead off Pedro Martinez in the sixth inning, but were shut out the last eight innings by Mike Timlin, Keith Foulke, Bronson Arroyo, Mike Myers, Alan Embree and Wakefield. Boston’s bullpen has gone 14 1/3 innings without allowing a run.
In one pass through the Yankees lineup, Boston pitchers struck out Alex Rodriguez, Gary Sheffield, Hideki Matsui, Jorge Posada, Ruben Sierra and Tony Clark.
Sheffield struck out leading off the 13th but reached on a passed ball, and two more passed balls by Varitek on Wakefield’s knuckler left runners on second and third.
But after the ball nearly got away from Varitek again, popping out of the catcher’s glove but staying near the plate, Wakefield struck out Sierra on a 70 mph knuckler, leaving the Yankees 1 for 13 with runners in scoring position.
Wakefield, the loser in Game 7 last year, followed with a 1-2-3 14th.
“In the last inning, he was on fumes,” Boston manager Terry Francona said. “He pitched the last inning on heart.”
Johnny Damon started the winning rally by drawing a one-out walk, and Manny Ramirez walked with two outs. Ortiz, who won Game 4 with a two-run homer in the bottom of the 12th inning, then fouled off eight two-strike pitches, including one that just missed being a home run down the right-field line, before dumping a soft single into center.
Half the Red Sox ran to greet Damon coming home; the others mobbed Ortiz halfway to second.
“I was thinking I’d better get it done right here,” Ortiz said. “They’ve got too many hitters that can change the game with one swing.”
Injured ace Curt Schilling is slated to start for the Red Sox in Game 6 against Jon Lieber, but there could be a holdup: Rain is forecast for New York tonight.
Both teams could surely use the rest after three games in Boston that saw 1,973 pitches, 82 hits and 29 pitching changes over 35 innings.
“Schilling’s pitch count might be 180,” Francona said.
The Yankees are just glad to get out of Boston.
“I think it will be good to go back home and gain some energy from the home crowd,” Rodriguez said. “Three days here, it feels like we’ve been here a month.”
None of the other 25 teams that fell behind 3-0 in a postseason series has ever come back to win – and only two of them pushed it to six games.
Yankees first baseman John Olerud, on crutches Sunday after injuring a foot in Game 3, was walking Monday but was not available.