The Sox’ season continued to spiral out of control Saturday, when Josh Beckett set career highs by allowing nine earned runs and nine walks—the most walks issued by a Sox pitcher in more than 30 years—before the Yankees piled on an overworked and inefficient bullpen on their way to a 13-5 win in front of a sellout crowd of 35,738.
The Sox, who were 3 ½ games ahead of the Yankees on July 21, fell 4 ½ games behind the Yankees in the AL East—their largest deficit since Sept. 30, 2004—and four games behind the White Sox in the wild card race. They have given up 12 or more runs in each of the first three games of the series—the first time in team history the Sox have surrendered a dozen or more runs in three straight games—and have been outscored by the Yankees 39-20. Sox pitchers have issued 28 walks and allowed 44 hits in 27 innings.
Boston Massacre II, anyone?
“We’ve dug ourselves a pretty good hole and we’re going to have to find a way to dig out of it,” Terry Francona said. “It gets frustrating. We played a lot of baseball the last couple days and it seems like we’ve been on the field a lot more than we’ve been in the dugout. It wears on everybody.”
After the taxing doubleheader Friday, the Sox needed efficiency and length from Beckett. But he got himself in immediate trouble by walking the bases loaded in the first inning, when he threw just six of his 19 pitches for strikes and managed to escape unscathed only when Alex Rodriguez hit into an inning-ending double play.
He was not as fortunate in subsequent innings. Beckett enjoyed only one 1-2-3 frame, threw just 58 of his season-high 121 pitches for strikes and threw a first-pitch strike to just 11 of the 32 batters he faced. In addition, seven of the nine runs he allowed scored with two outs.
“Against a team like that you’ve got to get ahead and I couldn’t get ahead or put anybody away,” Beckett said. “It was brutal.”
Yet just as they did Friday, the Sox survived the Yankees’ initial assault and mounted a comeback in the middle innings. Randy Johnson didn’t allow a hit Saturday until Manny Ramirez’ game-tying three-run homer in the fourth inning, and three straight subsequent singles gave the Sox a 4-3 lead.
But unlike Friday—when set-up men Craig Hansen and Mike Timlin blew a three-run lead in the seventh—the lead didn’t last long enough for Francona to hand it over to the bullpen. Beckett had a chance to get out of the sixth inning with the game still tied 5-5, and with the bases loaded, two outs and Alex Rodriguez at the plate, Francona sprinted to the mound to ask Beckett if he had enough left in the tank to retire Rodriguez.
“If he was out of gas, I was going to take him out,” Francona said. “If he wasn’t, I wanted to give him a chance to get him.”
But Beckett walked Rodriguez on four pitches—including two that sailed away from Javy Lopez—to force home the go-ahead run. “Tito came out there and had faith in me and I blew that up,” Beckett said.
“I know our bullpen is tired and for me to make them go into the well in the sixth inning again is just unacceptable.”
Manny Delcarmen relieved Beckett and walked Robinson Cano on four pitches before Jorge Posada crushed a three-run triple to the deepest part of centerfield to cap the five-run inning and basically bury the Sox, who had just one hit—Mike Lowell’s eighth-inning single against Jaret Wright—the rest of the way.
“We’ve just got to pitch or you’re fighting uphill the whole way,” Francona said. “Today’s a good example: We’re down, we fight back and we give it right back again. That’s a tough way to play.”
The Sox can take some solace in having their two most experienced big game pitchers, Curt Schilling and David Wells, going tonight and Monday as they try to salvage something out of this five-game series. But the biggest question is whether or not the Sox can salvage Beckett, who was acquired from the Marlins last November to serve as a co-ace with Schilling and signed a three-year, $30 million extension last month.
But in six starts since his contract was announced, Beckett is 1-3 with a 7.32 ERA. Overall, Beckett has a 5.35 ERA—the fourth-highest figure in the AL among pitchers with enough innings to qualify for the ERA title ahead of only Rodrigo Lopez, Carlos Silva and Joel Pineiro.
“I think in the end, when he puts it together,” Francona said, “I think it’s going to be real good.”
It can’t get much worse—for Beckett or the Sox.
Right?
Diehard managing editor Jerry Beach can be reached at diehardmag@yahoo.com. To receive a free issue of Diehard, call 888-979-0979.
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