Rays Knock Sox Over by Jared Carrabis
Lester Finally Has Rough Start While Sox Offense Catches Some ZzZzZ's

If you’re reading this I bet you’re really aggravated right about now. I bet you’re in one of those moods where you just want to punch a door or something. Actually, why don’t you go do that…I’ll wait right here…just get that out of your system…I’ll wait right here…feel better now? Okay good, I’ll resume. Let’s get right down to it. This game was a disgrace. I don’t know how else to describe Game 3 of the 2008 American League Championship Series. But before I go into the game itself, let me just say do not, and I repeat, do NOT let the idiotic commentators of this series on TBS brainwash you into believing that the Rays are this big team of destiny and that the Red Sox are now without a prayer in this series because they actually managed to beat Jon Lester. If you believe that then you are sadly misguided and I feel very badly for you.

Since when does TBS stand for “Tampa Bay Supporters”? The commentators all game long praised the every little thing about the Rays and harped on how Red Sox fans weren’t loud enough, how they were leaving early when the park was still full, enough already. We understand that the Rays are a “feel good story”, but after losing Game 3 to fall behind two games to one with two games to be played at Fenway Park for them to be bringing up comparisons to the 2004 ALCS like the Red Sox need some kind of miracle to win this series is absolutely absurd. The Red Sox are down in the series right now sure, but they are one Tim Wakefield flip of a coin outing away from being eye-to-eye with this Tampa Bay Rays team that is being described as having this monster lead of the Red Sox in this series.

I for one will not be having the volume on my television on for the remainder of these games. I’ll stick with Joe Castiglione on WEEI regardless of the fact that I can hear what happens before I see it. That’s just an annoyance that I will gladly make the trade for so that I do not have to listen to these biased announcers on TBS. There was not one mention about how Jon Lester may have just had an off night. I mean for God sakes the man hasn’t lost a game at Fenway Park since his first start back in April and all they had to say was how great the Rays offense was. This man has not let up a run the entire postseason and has pitched amazingly down the stretch for this club, sooner or later he was due for a hiccup of a game. Unfortunately that game came in a pivotal game in this best of seven series. Does that mean that the Red Sox are out of it? Not even close.

However, I will say that if this Red Sox team wants to retake the lead in this series, the bats of Jacoby Ellsbury, Jason Varitek and David Ortiz have some serious waking up to do. TBS can talk all night and day about how long David Ortiz has gone without a postseason home run, but all we want is a base hit. As soon as Boston fell behind 5-0, the Sox were swinging out of their shoes. It only takes one big inning to get back in the game and from there you can chip away. Those big innings are started by taking pitches, seeing pitches and getting on base any way you possibly can. Once you’re on base you don’t wait for opportunities, you create them with the running game. You can’t create opportunities when you don’t put men on base and you can’t make anything happen when you finally do get those men on base and all the offense can manage are a dozen pop outs.

The Red Sox certainly have a lot of areas that need a lot of attention drawn to before the start of Game 4 Tuesday night, but there’s no taking away from the performance of Matt Garza in Game 3. The Tampa Bay Rays starter that was traded from the Minnesota Twins along with Jason Bartlett in exchange for Delmon Young and both Bartlett and Garza have been key pieces to this Rays puzzle. The Red Sox left eight men on base throughout the course of the game and just could not get a big hit against Garza when they needed it. The right-hander pitched six solid innings against Boston with just one earned run that crossed home plate as an inherited runner to JP Howell. Garza gave up six hits in his outing walking three and striking out five to earn his first postseason victory.

Jon Lester was not Jon Lester in his start in Game 3. Lester had previously gone 24.2 innings without giving up a run in postseason play dating back to 2007 but that all came to an end against the Tampa Bay Rays. The scoreless innings streak for Lester ended in the top of the second inning when Evan Longoria came in from the back door to score on a groundout by Dioner Navarro. The one run would not have meant the end of the world for Jon Lester and the Red Sox but the biggest blow came in the very next inning when the Rays put a four spot on the board. The four runs came on a blast of a 3-run home run off the bat of BJ Upton and after a strikeout to Carlos Pena, Evan Longoria continued the fireworks show with a solo blast into the Monster seats to put the Rays on top 5-0.

A lead the Red Sox would not be able to overcome and a lead that the Rays would later add onto with a 3-run home run by Rocco Baldelli that came off of Paul Byrd (for those of you that would have rather seen Byrd than Timlin in Game 2, either way it was the back end of the bullpen, not much you can do there). In a very ugly and almost unbearable game to watch, we’re all just glad the punishment is over and like any great closer would, you just have to shake this one off and come back firing tomorrow. Any great closer can have a blown save and any great team can have a bad loss. Does that make them a bad closer? No. Does that make the Rays a better team than the Red Sox? No. The heart of this team will be on display for the entire baseball world to see within the games to come.

Lifetime against Tampa Bay we all know how well Tim Wakefield has handled the Tampa Bay Rays posting a 19-5 record with an ERA of 3.32 but this of course is a whole different team of Rays. Division Champions or not, Tim Wakefield has pitched successfully at home where he is 7-4 with a 3.10 ERA. We’re not asking for an eight inning shutout, we’ll be happy with even six innings and something under four runs. The Red Sox need to get Tim Wakefield the run support that he needs in this game and to do so they will have to go through Andy Sonnanstine. Sonnanstine has a 1-1 record against the Boston Red Sox lifetime with an ERA of 5.40. Tim Wakefield has been on the ALCS stage before and has performed well with a 5-2 record, Sonnanstine has never been. It’s time for experience to prevail and tie this series at two games apiece.

ALCS Game 3: Rays 9, Red Sox 1

Published on October 13, 2008

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