BOSTON - David Ortiz's Game 2 home run that turned around the American League Championship Series is indelibly memorable. But for the image of Detroit's Torii Hunter going headfirst into the Boston bullpen to become absolutely symbolic, the Red Sox needed one more victory against the Tigers this weekend to advance to their third World Series in 10 years.
Where, in all likelihood, something equally remarkable could still happen.
Lasting greatness typically requires a continuum of events, a chain reaction. Had the Yankees followed up Derek Jeter's classic flip play in 2001 by losing Games 4 or 5 to the Oakland A's in that division series, his nailing of Jeremy Giambi at the plate would have been a nice addition to Captain Jeter's video scrapbook, not much more.
The Yankees did not win the World Series that year, but that's not the point. Playing for a scarred city in the aftermath of 9/11, they went the distance. More amazing things proceeded to happen on baseball's biggest stage, including successive late-night comebacks at Yankee Stadium before the final-inning Game 7 victory against Mariano Rivera by the Diamondbacks in Arizona.
In the 1986 World Series, Bill Buckner could have laughed off Mookie Wilson's Game-6-ending ground ball through the wickets had the Red Sox preserved an early lead and won Game 7 against the Mets. Instead, Buckner was consigned to infamy when Jesse Orosco closed out the Sox and thrust his arms skyward - the inverse imagery of Hunter's futile leap over Fenway's short fence in right-center to catch Ortiz's grand slam off Joaquin Benoit.
Poor Benoit. Had Tigers Manager Jim Leyland asked his likely Cy Young Award winner, Max Scherzer, to extend (beyond 108 pitches) into the eighth inning for that special occasion, Benoit and Hunter might not have been on the threshold of becoming lasting characters in happy Red Sox lore.
The series might have been claimed by the Tigers, who instead placed their hopes back on Scherzer in Game 6 Saturday night at Fenway Park.
As I had given up on a Red Sox comeback last Sunday and gone to bed, my first viewing of the Ortiz-Hunter spectacle was an online photo of the result the next morning. I couldn't take my eyes off it, so spectacular was the juxtaposition of Hunter's belted waist and his legs spread in a V as the bullpen police officer behind him raised his arms in triumph.
In one of those look-back quirks of fate, Hunter had made an appearance that night in the pregame interview room and spoke of his respect for Ortiz, his former teammate with the Minnesota Twins.
'Day to day, always wanted to hit,' Hunter said. 'That's it. He didn't care about his defense; forget that. He was, I thought, the best hitter in 2002 on our ball club. And he missed six, seven weeks, and we nontendered him, and the Red Sox picked up a gold mine. And he's been one of the best postseason performers in the history of the game.'
Hunter went on to say: 'We're like brothers. I love him. We're enemies, but I love him to death, I'd do anything for him.'
Perhaps not what he wound up doing, but his words were eerily prophetic. You can envision the interview as part of a documentary about the night Ortiz one-upped a stirring comeback hours earlier in nearby Foxborough by Tom Brady and the New England Patriots against the New Orleans Saints by sending a Benoit changeup out in the direction of his old pal Hunter.
It was quite the experience for the bullpen police officer, Steve Horgan, 50, of South Walpole, Mass., a 27-year veteran of the Boston force. Bearded in support of the hirsute Sox, he became an instant celebrity, having his picture taken with John Henry, the team's owner, and telling
ESPNBoston.com that his cellphone buzzed with text messages deep into New England night.
If the Red Sox do advance, history is not likely to forget Horgan after the carnage near the finish line of the Boston Marathon last spring. Many of the city's finest were first responders. Terror in Ye Olde Towne remains part of the Red Sox season's narrative.
Weeks after the marathon, in the visitors' clubhouse at Citizens Bank Ballpark in Philadelphia, Jon Lester struck the proper balance between baseball and the bombing.
'I don't like tying it to the tragedy because winning a baseball game doesn't bring back what people lost,' he told me. 'It can be a nice three-hour distraction.'
The way Jeter's flip provided New York those distractions into early November 12 years ago, that's how Ortiz's smoked liner off Benoit might best serve Boston.
Hunter's upside-down pose reminded me of another classic and much-viewed baseball postseason dive - Mickey Mantle's belly slide back into first base under the tag of Rocky Nelson that allowed the Yankees to tie Game 7 of the 1960 World Series against the Pittsburgh Pirates in the top of the ninth.
They did not win, but Mantle's theatrics set the stage for Bill Mazeroski's home run off Ralph Terry. Those ninth-inning memories are the earliest I have from any professional sport, and they remain connected in the way the Ortiz home run will be part of what happens next if the Red Sox move on to play the Cardinals.
St. Louis, of course, was the team Boston swept in 2004 to break its championship drought since 1918. This baseball continuum, it can be catchy.
Posted by Unknown on Saturday, October 19, 2013 - Rating: 4.5
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