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Baseball Today: Thursday, September 13 »

Red Sox Post-Game Fun

The Red Sox enjoyed one of those walk-off, pulsating wins tonight that had to remind fans of the many close shaves in 2004. David Ortiz smacked his second home run of the game (31st of the season) in the bottom of the ninth inning to beat the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, 5-4.
The walk-off hit was the first of this season for Ortiz and 16th of his career with the Red Sox. Ten of the 16 hits have been home runs. Last night's barely settled into the first row of the right field bleachers.
``It was a good pitch by my boy Reyes but I put a good swing on it,'' Ortiz said. ``It worked out.''
In the Boston dugout, players rolled over the front rail and flooded the field. One of the leaders was Jonathan Papelbon, the closer who pitched a perfect ninth inning and earned his first win of the season.
``I thought as soon as he hit it that it had enough legs,'' Papelbon said. ``I knew it had enough room.''
The Sox easily could have lost the last two nights. Wednesday, the Rays built a 8-1 lead only to see their pitching collapse and lose, 16-10. Last night the Rays scored four times in the first inning off Jon Lester but a 3-run Ortiz homer in the third made it 4-3. The game stayed that score thanks to good pitching from both bullpens.
Then came Ortiz and some ninth inning drama.
``I had no angle. I was too busy blowing on it,'' said Terry Francona. ``I actually didn;t know it was a home run when it was a home run. I saw the ball but I thought maybe it hit the wall. You don;t see it. You just hope.''

Kevin McNamara

Posted by Kevin  at 11:53 PM | Permalink