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Author: Neil Keefe

BlogsYankeesYankees Offseason

Dellin Betances Deserved to Be a Yankee

The Yankees didn’t bring Dellin Betances back and it sucks.

I was in a cab on Lexington on Christmas Eve when I saw the news: Dellin Betances signed with the Mets. I had just regrettably paid for a $15 Christmas cocktail and I could feel it coming back up. My favorite Yankee in a post-Derek Jeter world had once again been screwed over by the only team he had ever known, and the New York native, homegrown superstar and best reliever in baseball for five straight seasons was no longer a Yankee. It didn’t matter that it was the Mets. It could have been the Dodgers or Nationals or Braves and I would have felt sick. The fact it was the Mets only made it worse.

As a Betances fan and someone who wants the Yankees to win the World Series for the first time in more than a decade, the decision to let Betances walk makes no sense. As someone who has watched the franchise treat Betances like crap in the past, the decision to let the team’s only bright spot between the 2012 ALCS and Gary Sanchez’s call-up in 2016 walk makes complete sense.

I will never understand why the Yankees decided to treat Betances like crap. After beating him in arbitration and taking a victory lap in the media following their saving of $2 million, Betances is the latest in a long line of homegrown Yankees who the Yankees have treated poorly when it comes time for a new contract. Maybe he was too accountable as a major league pitcher and too good of a person for their liking. Or maybe the Yankees could never get over Betances trying to receive $2 million he had more than earned when the team needed that money to put toward one of their failed free-agent signings.

It was easy for the Yankees to give A.J. Burnett a five-year, $82.5 million contract, eventually paying him to pitch for Pittsburgh for the final two years of the deal. They didn’t even blink when they bid against themselves in handing Jacoby Ellsbury a seven-year, $153 million contract, for which he only played in games in four of the seven years before being released. Brian McCann? Here’s five years and $85 million, and we’ll pay you to play for the Astros for the final two. Carlos Beltran? How about $45 million for three years, and you can finish the contract in Texas. Right now, the Yankees are trying to get salary relief on the $17 million they owe J.A. Happ for 2020. It’s always been easy for the Yankees to overpay and hand out ill-advised free-agent contracts for other team’s free agents. But when it comes to paying their own, homegrown free agents, they have been nickel-and-diming for years.

Bernie Williams was seconds away from signing with the Red Sox and rewriting baseball history before George Steinbrenner to his modest salary demand. Mariano Rivera was allowed to meet with the Red Sox as a free agent despite being the best relief pitcher of all time. Derek Jeter was told to test the market as the team’s captain and everyday shortstop of 15 seasons. If the organization could treat 51, 42 and 2 so poorly, it should come as no surprise that Betances is no longer a Yankee. He didn’t have his best years with another team and he has been nothing but a model professional on and off the field.

Yes, Betances missed nearly all of last season due to a shoulder injury suffered while trying to rush through spring training. And yes, he suffered a freak Achilles injury in his only appearance of 2019, and there’s some cause for concern about paying a 32-year-old reliever who throws as hard as Betances and has for as long as he has and is coming off a lost season. But the Yankees’ finances allow for them to take these kinds of risks. The Yankees can afford to gamble that Betances is still the 2014-18 version of himself. Many, many times over the last two decades have the Yankees taken risks on injured pitchers with must less talent and nowhere near the track record of Betances. But those were always other pitchers from other teams whether it was Gabe White, Mark Prior or Pedro Feliciano. Rather than give Betances an extremely affordable deal and make what’s already the best bullpen in baseball even better, the Yankees allowed him to walk. And now, someone with the talent level of Jonathan Holder, Ben Heller, Stephen Tarpley or Luis Cessa will be in the Yankees’ bullpen because Betances isn’t.

There was no reason for the Yankees to not sign Betances. Believing they don’t need him because they have Aroldis Chapman, whose declining velocity and control and inability to put away hitters is frightening, Zack Britton, whose control is a real problem and isn’t who he once was, Adam Ottavino, who helped ruin the ALCS, Tommy Kahnle, who is a year removed from spending the season in the minors, or Chad Green, who was demoted last season for the worst stretch of relief appearances possibly ever, is more than risky. The Yankees might not need their excessive abundance of elite relievers on days when Cole pitches, but they’re still going to need them when James Paxton (less than 5 1/3 innings per start in 2019), Masahiro Tanaka (just over 5 2/3 innings per start in 2019), Luis Severino (will be coming off season-long shoulder and lat injuries) and Jordan Montgomery (will be returning from Tommy John surgery) pitch. (Or Happ if they’re unable to move him). The Yankees’ bullpen is deeper, better and more stable than any other bullpen in baseball, but that’s even more of a reason to make a strength stronger. They might not need their bullpen to win the division and beat up on what will once again be a mostly non-competitive league, but they will need it to win in October, as we once again just saw. Having to watch someone Tyler Lyons or Luis Cessa enter a playoff game because the Yankees are one elite reliever too short to get 27 outs in the postseason isn’t something I want to see.

I hate the Mets. But when Betances is called on to get the Mets out of a jam or hold a runner at third with less than two outs or protect a lead or nail down a save, I will be a Mets fan because I’m a Betances fan. Betances deserved better and he deserved to be part of what will be a championship-or-bust season. Trying to achieve the former and trying to avoid the latter for a 12th straight season is going to be that much harder without him.

***

My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

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PodcastsYankeesYankees Offseason

Yankees Podcast: New Year, New Season

Scott Reinen of Bronx Pinstripes joined me to talk about the Yankees’ offseason and if they’re done spending.

We are at about the halfway point of Game 6 of the ALCS and Opening Day 2020. It’s been a while since the last Yankees podcast, which came right after the Jose Altuve season-ending home run, but it’s back and will be back every Monday and Thursday through at least the end of the season, which shouldn’t be until the end of October.

Scott Reinen of Bronx Pinstripes joined me for the first time since the end of last season to talk about the Gerrit Cole signing and Brett Gardner re-signing, the regrettable decision to not bring back Dellin Betances, the still right-handed heavy lineup and if the Yankees are done spending this offseason.

***

My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

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BlogsGiantsNFL

My Super Bowl LIV Dilemma

In what is becoming a recurring theme, the Giants aren’t going to win the Super Bowl this year since they once again didn’t reach the playoffs. Now I need to figure out which teams to root for this postseason.

Someone will win Super Bowl LIV, but it won’t be the Giants. Unfortunately, this blog is becoming an annual thing because of the Giants’ inability to reach the postseason.

Here’s the list of playoff teams in order of who I want to see win the Super Bowl to who I don’t want to see win the Super Bowl.

1. Vikings
Do I want Kirk Cousins to be a champion? No. But I do want my wife to be happy and since her Dodgers aren’t going to win the World Series anytime soon now that the Yankees have the best rotation and bullpen in baseball, she should at least have her football team win a championship. Unfortunately, the Vikings’ inability to win within their division cost them the NFC North title and a home playoff game, and they will open the postseason in New Orleans in the Superdome, which has once again become the worst place for any opposing team to play. Sorry, Brittni, but your NFL postseason is going to last one week.

2. Titans
The Titans only getting five points in a playoff game in New England is ridiculous. This isn’t Patrick Mahomes or Lamar Jackson playing outside in the cold in January. It’s Ryan Tannehill. I don’t care about what he’s done this season in taking over the starting job from Marcus Mariota or him finally realizing his potential as a former franchise quarterback. Hey, I want nothing more than for the Titans to upset the Patriots and knock them out of the playoffs as quickly as possible, but I’m a realist, and it’s going to take an actual miracle for that to happen.

3. Bills
I think the Bills can win this weekend in Houston. But then they will have to win at either Baltimore or Kansas City and then most likely at whichever of those two teams they don’t play in the divisional round. The Bills are a nice story, and easy to root for, but trying to win three road games just to get to the Super Bowl is way too much to ask of this Bills team.

4. Texans
The Texans aren’t going to win the Super Bowl. To me, it’s the Texans and the Bills who have the lowest odds of winning a championship, even if the Vikings have the hardest first-round matchup. If the Texans beat the Bills, they’re most likely going to have to go to Kansas City, and if they were to win there, they would win then most likely have to win at either Baltimore or New England. That’s not happening.

5. Chiefs
If the Chiefs win the Super Bowl, it means the Patriots didn’t.

6. Ravens
Last postseason, I bet on the Ravens to beat the Chargers. I still have no idea how John Harbaugh sat there and let a winnable postseason game fade away as Joe Flacco stood on the sideline while Lamar Jackson couldn’t register a first down. I also have no idea Jackson went from the quarterback in that game to the one who is now the league MVP. But as has always been the case with the Ravens, unless they are playing the Patriots, I don’t want to see them win.

7. Packers
Until the Patriots are eliminated, I need NFC teams in the playoffs that can beat them should they reach the Super Bowl. The Packers needed a time-expiring field goal to beat the David Blough Lions with a first-round bye on the line in Week 17, and needed a time-expiring field goal to beat the Lions in their first game of the season. I don’t care what the Packers’ record is, if the Patriots do their usual playoff thing, I can’t have the Packers as the last line of defense to prevent another Patriots championship.

8. Saints
Last season, in this blog, I wrote this about the Saints:

I will be rooting for the Saints on Super Bowl Sunday when they play the Patriots in Atlanta. I don’t want to root for Drew Brees to win another championship after he single-handedly depleted my bank account over the last few weeks, but I’m going to have to. The Superdome Saints aren’t going to lose in the NFC playoffs and then it’s off to Atlanta, another dome for the Saints to hopefully prevent the Patriots from winning another championship.

After blowing an early 13-0 lead in the NFC Championship Game, the Saints got screwed over on the non-pass interference call which changed league rules and then lost in overtime on a Drew Brees interception. The Saints’ loss cost me a two-team parlay with the Patriots that day and the Saints’ loss gave the Patriots a sixth Super Bowl win after getting to play the inferior Rams. The only reason the Saints aren’t lower on this list is because there are much worse options to win the Super Bowl.

9. 49ers
When the Falcons blew a 28-3 third-quarter lead to the Patriots in Super Bowl LI, it was 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan calling the playoffs that led to turnovers and three-and-outs as the Falcons completely abandoned the run. Had the Falcons just run the ball for no gain and then punted on fourth down with the 25-point lead, they would have won the game. Shanahan deserves to never experience a Super Bowl win as a head coach after that.

10. Seahawks
I will never get over what Pete Carroll did in Super Bowl XLIX. Never. I will also never root for him unless I absolutely have to because of it. And the only way I will have to is if there’s a Super Bowl XLIX rematch.

11. Eagles
I never thought I would root for the Eagles, let alone with a Super Bowl on the line, but playing the Patriots will do that. But one championship is enough for the Eagles and their fans. There’s only way I’m rooting for the Eagles, and it’s if there’s a Super Bowl LII rematch.

12. Patriots
My hatred for the Patriots forced me to root for the Giants’ No. 1 rival in the Eagles in the Super Bowl. If I’m willing to root for the Eagles to win a championship, I’m willing to root for anyone other than the Patriots to win the Super Bowl.

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BlogsYankeesYankees Offseason

My New Year’s Resolution: Don’t Get Upset with Aaron Boone

I understand these resolutions are rather meaningless since I can easily see myself breaking at least one or possibly all three within the first week of the season.

I try to come up with a New Year’s resolution every year that will help my life. Whether it’s cutting out unhealthy foods or working on being on time for dinner reservations, I try to pick something reasonable and achievable. This year, I have three resolutions. Reasonable? Not so much. Achievable? Unlikely. But if I’m somehow able to follow through on them, they will help my life and my overall health.

The three resolutions all revolve around Aaron Boone. I can’t control the decisions of the Yankees manager though I can control how I react to them. They’re not going to be easy to keep up, but in order to prevent me melting down on Twitter and tossing and turning in the early hours of the morning, I think I have to at least try to keep them.

Resolution 1: Don’t Get Upset Over the Lineup
After two full seasons of Boone as manager, we have enough data to know he (or whoever actually fills out the lineup card) has no idea how to build the best possible lineup. It’s why in the postseason, Brett Gardner was batting third, Gleyber Torres was batting fifth and the automatic out that was Edwin Encarnacion continued to bat fourth. The nonsensical lineup decisions from the regular season carried over into October and they will be there again in 2020.

I need to take a deep breath when I see Gardner batting in the middle of the order or when Mike Tauchman is batting third to separate Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton. Thankfully, Didi Gregorius is no longer an option to bat third or ahead of Gary Sanchez. Boone has managed the Yankees for 324 regular-season games and 14 postseason games and I shouldn’t expect him to suddenly create lineups that make sense.

Resolution 2: Don’t Get Upset About Scheduled Off Days
The 2019 Yankees played their last game on October 19. Opening Day 2020 is on March 26. There will be five months and a week between the end of the 2019 season and the beginning of the 2020 season. The Yankees have March 27 off then they play six games and have April 3 off. There is a 100 percent chance non-catcher position players will have days off within the first week of the season.

The Yankees proved last season when they set the single-season record for the most players placed on the injured list that there’s no way to prevent or avoid injuries. Even after setting the all-time record, the Yankees continued to manage their roster and lineup as if they had somehow solved injury prevention, all while not playing a single game in 2019 with their expected everyday lineup. The Yankees’ scheduled days off and extra and unnecessary rest for their position players is out of control, and unfortunately, it’s not about to change. If anything, it’s only going to get worse.

I’m prepared for the scheduled rest to increase and be even more comical than it was last year, and when it is, I need to remember it’s not worth getting upset over.

Resolution 3: Don’t Get Upset About Bullpen Usage
It took Chad Green putting together the worst single-month performance of any reliever I can ever remember for him to finally be taken out of high-leverage situations and sent down to get straighened out last season. It took Jonathan Holder pissing away every late-game tie or lead for the few months of 2019 before the Yankees decided enough was enough. When the Yankees were battling every day in September for home-field advantage in the ALCS, it was September call-ups getting the ball in close games.

The Yankees’ regrettable decision not to bring back Dellin Betances means one less elite arm in the bullpen and one more spot that’s going to go to someone like Holder or Ben Heller or Luis Cessa or some other AAAA pitcher who Boone will gladly go to try to steal some outs or give one of his “A” relievers the day off only to end up using them later in the game anyway. It’s going to happen. It’s not just about the result, it’s about the decision. I can live with the right pitcher giving it up, it’s the wrong pitcher giving it up that is the problem. It’s not a matter of if but when for Boone ruining a game with his in-game managing. He might have gotten better from 2018 to 2019, but there’s still a lot of room for improvement and too much to think he will always make the right the decision.

I understand these resolutions are rather meaningless since I can easily see myself breaking at least one or possibly all three within the first week of the season. I’m really going to try to achieve them, but I know Boone will make it hard to.

***

My book The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers is now available as an ebook!

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Blogs

Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS

Here’s an excerpt from my book, The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers. *** On the morning of Oct. 18, 2004, I woke up in my Beacon Hill dorm

Here’s an excerpt from my book, The Next Yankees Era: My Transition from the Core Four to the Baby Bombers.

***

On the morning of Oct. 18, 2004, I woke up in my Beacon Hill dorm in Boston and didn’t really care and certainly wasn’t worried about what had unfolded just a few hours earlier.

The Yankees had come back in Game 4 of the 2004 ALCS, erasing a 3-2 deficit in the sixth inning. Tanyon Sturtze pitched a perfect sixth and seventh to hand the ball to Mariano Rivera for a two-inning save. The Yankees were six outs away from sweeping the Red Sox and returning to the World Series for the seventh times in nine years.

Rivera worked around a Manny Ramirez leadoff single in the eighth, striking out David Ortiz and getting Jason Varitek and Trot Nixon to ground out. Rivera threw 15 pitches in the inning and had moved the Yankees to within three outs of the pennant.

In the ninth, holding on to a 4-3 lead, Rivera walked Kevin Millar to begin the inning, and Dave Roberts pinch ran for Millar. After three straight throws to first, Roberts took off on the first pitch to Mueller, successfully stealing second. Two pitches later, Mueller singled to center and Roberts came around to score to tie the game at 4.

Sure, it sucked. To be three outs away from the World Series and to have that happen wasn’t ideal. But I wasn’t threatened by it. The Red Sox had extended a game they still might lose, and if they were to win, they would still be trailing 3-1 in the series. At worst, I thought this was just a minor nuisance in what would be an eventual series win.

In the 11th, still tied at 4, the Yankees missed out on their best chance to take the lead. Miguel Cairo singled off Alan Embree to lead off the inning, and Derek Jeter bunted him over to second for the first out. Alex Rodriguez, who had hit a two-run home run in the third, jumped on Embree’s 0-1 pitch and hit a line drive that Orlando Cabrera had to dive to his right to make an incredible catch on. (After his third-inning home run, if Cabrera doesn’t come up with an amazing catch, Rodriguez’s entire career and legacy are different.) The Red Sox intentionally walked Gary Sheffield and Hideki Matsui walked to load the bases for Bernie Williams, but Williams would fly out to end the inning.

At 1:22 a.m. — five hours and two minutes after the game started — Ortiz crushed a 2-1 pitch from Paul Quantrill to give the Yankees their first loss of the series.

When I woke up, I had missed some of my classes and certainly wasn’t going to go to any that day. Game 5 was scheduled for a 5:05 start time, not even 16 hours after Game 4 ended and I had to focus on that. Instead of going to class I went on eBay and found two tickets to Game 5 down the first-base line. I decided I was going to go to Game 5. All it would cost me was nearly an entire summer of working for first-semester spending money. To get the tickets, I would need to meet the owner of the tickets down a side street near Fenway Park and exchange cash for the tickets shortly before the game. Certainly not an ideal situation to put yourself in, but this was Game 5 of the 2004 ALCS and a chance to see the Yankees win the pennant and eliminate the Red Sox at Fenway Park.

I left my dorm and walked to the Fleet Bank ATM outside the Park Street T stop and withdrew a summer’s worth of work and pushed every last bill into the left-chest pocket of my fleece. It was 58 degrees in Boston, but I thought a fleece over a Yankees T-shirt would be enough to feel comfortable for the night.

I got on a jam-packed Green Line train at Park Station headed for Kendall Square. Pushed up against the T door with more and more people trying to pack in at each stop, I folded my arms across my chest to hide the fact that there was a bulging wad of 20s as big as a baseball covering my heart.

When I got off the T, I called the number of the ticket owner and he directed me toward a side street not far off Beacon Street. I slowly walked down the street, which was more like an alley, and came upon a parked Ford Explorer. Best-case scenario, the ticket owner was a nice man, who was going to make a small fortune off me wanting to see the Yankees clinch the pennant on the Red Sox’ home field. Worst-case scenario, I was going to have my bank account taken from me, or the tickets I was given wouldn’t scan at the gate.

A large, Red Sox-hat wearing man, who looked like he was on his way to his job as a bouncer, emerged from the driver’s side of the Explorer.

“Neil?”

“Yeah.”

“Here you go.”

I took the baseball-sized roll of 20s out of my pocket and handed it over. I walked away looking down at the tickets, hoping they were real and imaging what my father, who had strongly disagreed with me paying that much to go the game, would say if they turned out not to be. The tickets were real and I walked into Fenway Park just as Hideki Matsui was flying out to center to end the top of the first.

When Jeter’s sixth-inning, bases-clearing, three-run double landed in front of me down the right-field line and rolled into the corner, I could feel the World Series. Like always, the Yankees had gotten to Pedro Martinez, and Jeter’s two-out double, gave them a 4-3 lead.

Beginning in the bottom of the sixth inning, with Mike Mussina on the mound, I started to count the outs remaining in the game, and in turn, the series.

Nixon lined out to center. Eleven.

Varitek grounded out to third. Ten.

Mueller flew out to left. Nine.

My counting came to an abbreviated halt in the seventh when Mussina allowed a leadoff double to Mark Bellhorn and was taken out of the game for Sturtze, who had pitched those two perfect innings in Game 4.

Sturtze got Johnny Damon to pop up to short. Eight.

Cabrera walked and Joe Torre went to Tom Gordon with Ramirez coming up. Gordon induced a 5-4-3 inning-ending, double play. Six.

Gordon returned for the eighth, and two pitches into the inning, he was greeted by an Ortiz home run to shrink the Yankees’ lead to 4-3. Millar walked, as he had done the night before, and Roberts pinch ran for him, as he had done the night before. Nixon singled to center, allowing Roberts to move to third. Gordon had faced three batters in the eighth and didn’t retire one, so Torre called on Rivera, who he should have called on to begin the inning.

Rivera got Varitek to fly out to center, but Roberts scored on the sacrifice, tying the game and handing Rivera a “blown save” to show how ridiculous and dumb that stat is. Mueller grounded out and Bellhorn struck out swinging. Rivera had retired all three batters he faced in the inning, but would be forever credited with “blowing” it. The Red Sox had scored twice, the two-run lead was gone and my counting the remaining outs had stopped.

The Yankees didn’t score in the ninth, but they should have. Ruben Sierra drew a two-out walk and Tony Clark hammered a 1-2 pitch from Keith Foulke to right field. In nearly any other stadium or park in the league, Sierra scores, the Yankees take a 5-4 lead, and once again, move within three outs of the World Series. But at Fenway Park, where the right-field wall comes up to only the waist of most grown men, the ball bounced into the stands, and Sierra was forced to hold up at third on the ground-rule double. Cairo popped up to first in foul territory and that was that.

Up until a few seasons ago, there was a scoreboard to the right of the Green Monster at Fenway Park that would display both team’s lineups and it would place an asterisk next to the batter that was up in the game and an asterisk next to the batter that would be up next inning for the team currently in the field. Beginning in the bottom of the ninth, I became obsessed with that scoreboard, counting how many names the asterisk had to go before reaching “Manny Ramirez” and “David Ortiz”.

Rivera worked around a Damon infield single in the ninth after Damon was caught stealing second, Cabrera grounded out and Ramirez flew out. If Torre was willing to pitch Rivera two innings — and why wouldn’t he be with the pennant on the line — then why didn’t Rivera start the eighth with a plan for him to pitch the eighth and ninth? He would have entered the game with a clean inning and a two-run lead, and by this time, I would be celebrating an AL championship.

The game was headed to extra innings, and with the Red Sox facing elimination for the second straight night, every arm would be available, including Game 6 starter Curt Schilling. So before the 10th inning began, Schilling along with the other members of the pitching staff that hadn’t been used in the game, walked from the Red Sox’ dugout to the bullpen as “Lose Yourself” blared throughout Fenway Park. I don’t know if I will ever see an ovation like that or hear a stadium as loud as that ever again.

Bronson Arroyo pitched a perfect 10th, getting Jeter to fly out, and striking out Rodriguez and Sheffield swinging. Felix Heredia replaced Rivera and struck out Ortiz swinging, which gave me a a sense of relief, knowing it would be at least a few innings of that asterisk making its way through the rest of the Red Sox’ order. A Doug Mientkiewicz one-out double chased Heredia and Game 4 loser Quantrill came in to get the last two outs of the inning.

The Yankees didn’t score in the 11th and neither did the Red Sox. The 12th went the same way. In the 13th, things got interesting for the Yankees.

Tim Wakefield, on for his second inning of work, struck out Sheffield to begin the 13th, but Sheffield reached first on a passed ball. Then Matsui hit a ground ball to Bellhorn that forced Sheffield out and Williams flew out. A passed ball with Posada at the plate sent Matsui to second and led to Posada being intentionally walked. With Sierra at the plate, a  third passed ball in the inning moved Matsui to third and Posada to second. The Yankees had the go-ahead run 90 feet away and a much-needed insurance run in scoring position. This was it. Wakefield would be the losing pitcher in the Yankees’ pennant clinching win for the second straight season.

On the seventh pitch of the at-bat in a full count, Sierra struck out swinging.

The Red Sox went down in order in the bottom of the 13th and the Yankees did the same in the top of the 14th.

In the bottom of the 14th, Bellhorn struck out, Damon walked, Cabrera struck out and Ramirez walked. With two on and two outs, the asterisk had found Ortiz.

Ortiz immediately fell behind 1-2, fouled away the next two pitches, took a ball to even the count at 2, and fouled away three more pitches. On the 10th pitch of the at-bat, he hit a line drive back up the middle, and sometimes when I close my eyes, I can still see it hanging in the air, wondering if Williams is going to get to it in time. He never does get to in time, just like he didn’t that night, and as Damon rounded third and headed for home, my heart sank.

Damon touched home at 11:00 p.m — five hours and 49 minutes after first pitch — in what was the longest postseason game in history at the time. I looked to my right where a fellow Yankees fan wearing a “1918” shirt stared out at the field in disbelief. I walked out of Fenway Park where Red Sox fans kindly let me know the result of the game as my emotional state was given away by my Yankees hat.

I headed back to my dorm, regretting my decision to blow through a semester of spending money on a baseball game, in which the worst possible outcome had occurred. The Yankees didn’t just lose. They had blown a late lead for the second time in 22 hours with some bad managing, poor pitching and an inability to add on to their lead or score in extra innings. Somewhere in Boston, that large bouncer-looking man was enjoying my summer of working or planning a vacation on my dime. Meanwhile, I was in my dorm room trying to fall asleep, while replaying the events of the last two nights over and over.

The Yankees are headed home and they only have to win once before the Red Sox win twice. That was what I told myself as I tossed and turned in bed trying to clear my mind. It was now the early hours of Tuesday morning, I was wide awake, and thanks to a rainout between Games 2 and 3, an off day had been erased from the series, and both teams were on their way to New York with Game 6 later that night.

I watched from a foldable camping chair in my dorm room with the only light in the room being that emitted by the TV as the Yankees never bunted and never made Schilling move or really work on a surgically-repaired ankle in Game 6. I was in the same spot for Game 7 when Ortiz set the tone in the first inning with a two-run home run off of Kevin Brown and Damon essentially ended it with a grand slam in the second off Javier Vazquez.

A few hours after that grand slam, when Sierra grounded out to second to end the game and the series, like that guy wearing the “1918” shirt and staring out onto the field, I stared over my TV and out my 11th-floor window as chaos began in my dorm and the horns and sounds from outside on the street rose like heat into the Boston night.

The Red Sox had become the first team in history to erase a 3-0 series deficit, coming back in Games 5 and 6 at home and winning at Yankee Stadium in Games 6 and 7, all of it happening in four consecutive nights.

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