CLEVELAND – In Terry Francona’s lexicon, there is fun, funner and funnest. And when the Red Sox manager stops to reflect on Game 2 of the AL Championship Series, one of those words applies, even though his team lost to the Indians.
“It was one of the funnest games I’ve ever been a part of until the very end, and then it became a whole lot not of fun,” Francona said yesterday at Jacobs Field. “We lost in kind of an ugly fashion at the end.”
In a game that lasted 5 hours, 14 minutes and ended at 1:37 a.m. yesterday, the Red Sox surrendered seven runs in the 11th inning and lost 13-6 to the Tribe at Fenway Park, tying this best-of-seven series at a game apiece.
Yesterday was a most welcomed off day, as the Red Sox conducted an optional workout here – seven players from the active roster attended – and the Indians didn’t even bother.
Momentum has a way of swaying on a daily basis in the playoffs, and now it’s the Indians with the wind at their backs, on their own turf for three games, including tonight’s Game 3 that pits Jake Westbrook against Boston’s Daisuke Matsuzaka.
“I wouldn’t be sitting here crying about it if we lost last night, saying the momentum is with [Boston] and I’m not going to say we’re rolling because we won,” Indians manager Eric Wedge said.
The Red Sox didn’t get much from their postseason ace Curt Schilling on Saturday, but there is no mistaking the goat: Eric Gagne put two runners aboard in the 11th inning, starting an onslaught that left Fenway numb.
Former Red Sox outfielder Trot Nixon delivered the go-ahead run with a pinch-hit RBI single against Javier Lopez.
To that point, Boston’s bullpen had allowed only one run over 51/3 innings behind Schilling.
The Indians were just delighted to get a victory in Boston after watching co-aces C.C. Sabathia and Fausto Carmona struggle in the first two games.
“If you would have told us that neither C.C. nor Fausto would have made it to the fifth inning and we would have split, we all would have taken it,” Indians first baseman Ryan Garko said. “So it’s a pretty nice team effort.”
The Indians will be making their first appearance at the Jake since the infamous “Bugs Game” when they beat the Yankees in Game 2 of the ALDS on Travis Hafner’s RBI single in the 11th inning. Nobody is expecting a reappearance of the Lake Erie midges tonight – temperatures likely will be in the upper 40s and midges are hot-weather insects.
The Indians hope Westbrook can fare better than he did in Game 3 of the ALDS, when the Yankees waited on his sinker and took it to the opposite field. The right-hander allowed six earned runs over five innings that night to take the Indians’ only loss of the ALDS. Johnny Damon’s three-run blast in the fifth inning gave the Yankees a 5-3 lead.
“I didn’t feel like I pitched all that terrible in New York,” Westbrook said. “I started out well. I had a pretty good gameplan. I was just one pitch away from getting out of that inning, but I made a mistake to Damon that kind of cost us the ballgame.”
Matsuzaka was nearly as shaky for the Red Sox in his Game 2 start against the Angels in the ALDS. The Japanese right-hander lasted only 42/3 innings and allowed three earned runs on seven hits. The Red Sox need better tonight.
Francona doesn’t expect momentum to enter the equation.
“We lost a really tough game [Saturday], but we have a chance right now to play maybe the best team in baseball and we’re even up,” Francona said. “To be able to compete like that is what it’s all about.”
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Saturday’s defeat marked the first time the Red Sox lost an extra-inning postseason game at home. The Red Sox were previously 7-0-1 in such games – Game 2 of the 1912 World Series ended in a tie after 11 innings.
The Red Sox set an ALCS record by using eight pitchers on Saturday. The NLCS record is held by the Mets, who used nine pitchers in their 15-inning victory over the Braves on Oct. 17, 1999.