Good and Crazy: Kaz Uehara’s Nice Summation of the Red Sox Triumph
There will be no Halloween Night climax to the 2013 Major League Baseball season.
The Red Sox scotched my fantasy last night with an efficient dispatching of the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-1, to win the World Series four games to two. Two three-run outbursts in the 3rd and 4th inning took all the drama out of the game as John Lackey pitched craftily until two out in the 7th inning.
Junichi Tazawa then induced a bases-loaded ground out from the heroic Allen Craig who came back from a serious foot injury to try to bring St. Louis another world title. Craig will be remembered forever for his base-running adventures in the 9th inning of Game 3 that led to the Cardinals winning the first World Series game ever on obstruction of a baserunner.
Revealingly, the Red Sox had such depth in their roster that the two Bosox victims on that play, catcher Jarrod Saltamacchia who threw off-line to third baseman Will Middlebrooks who became entangled with Craig leading to obstruction, never played again in the Series. The light-hitting but better defensive catcher David Ross replaced Saltamacchia and the 21-year-old Aruban phenom Xander Bogaerts replaced Middlebrooks and the Red Sox swept the next three games. Ross even belted the game-running RBI double in Game 5.
The late great Orioles skipper Earl Weaver used to laud his team's "deep depth". Clearly the 2013 Red Sox demonstrated that vital trait time and again. They won Games 4 and 5 without sparkplug Shane Victorino who returned to belt the bases-clearing double that cemented the Game 6 Series clincher.
As all of you must know by now, it was the first Fenway Park clinching of the World Series since 1918 and also marked Boston’s third World Series triumph in the last ten years. The Bosox turned around a dismal 2012 of 93 losses into a 97-win best record in the American League. Though behind by one game in both the League Championship Series and the World Series, they showed the resiliency of champions to win the last two playoffs in six games.
Not enough can be said about Boston closer Koji Uehara (whose name thanks to David Waldstein in the New York Times should be pronounced “Way-Ee-Hara”). I’ve noted before the amusing irony of the 38-year-old Uehara shaving his goatee and fearsome muttonchops before the Boston beards grew all around him. He might now look half his age but he was a star in Japan before the Orioles signed him.
The Birds must rue his not returning to Baltimore when he wanted to return after 2012 when the Texas Rangers let him go. We Oriole fans should remain thankful that when he was traded to Texas, we did receive in return the new home run king Chris Davis and useful power pitcher Tommy Hunter. So in the spirit of gratitude without being greedy, all hail to Koji for putting the finishing touches on the Red Sox triumphant 2013.
Uehara won the MVP in the ALCS for winning one game and saving the other three.
David Ortiz won the Series MVP for an astounding performance, 11 hits in 14 ABs and a mountain of intentional walks, making his presence in the lineup a constant worry to the overmatched Cardinals.
The best and simplest words to describe the 2013 Series experience came from Kaz Uehara, Koji’s little boy who when asked by Fox Sports’ Erin Andrews how he felt after the Series victory said simply, “Good.” And what would the celebration be like afterwards? “Crazy.”
Good and Crazy. Not bad words to sum up the season and the Series.
And now winter has come metaphorically and soon actually. Yet in approximately 105 days spring training begins!
Keep that consoling thought in mind while I remind you as always: Take it easy but take it!
There will be no Halloween Night climax to the 2013 Major League Baseball season.
The Red Sox scotched my fantasy last night with an efficient dispatching of the St. Louis Cardinals, 6-1, to win the World Series four games to two. Two three-run outbursts in the 3rd and 4th inning took all the drama out of the game as John Lackey pitched craftily until two out in the 7th inning.
Junichi Tazawa then induced a bases-loaded ground out from the heroic Allen Craig who came back from a serious foot injury to try to bring St. Louis another world title. Craig will be remembered forever for his base-running adventures in the 9th inning of Game 3 that led to the Cardinals winning the first World Series game ever on obstruction of a baserunner.
Revealingly, the Red Sox had such depth in their roster that the two Bosox victims on that play, catcher Jarrod Saltamacchia who threw off-line to third baseman Will Middlebrooks who became entangled with Craig leading to obstruction, never played again in the Series. The light-hitting but better defensive catcher David Ross replaced Saltamacchia and the 21-year-old Aruban phenom Xander Bogaerts replaced Middlebrooks and the Red Sox swept the next three games. Ross even belted the game-running RBI double in Game 5.
The late great Orioles skipper Earl Weaver used to laud his team's "deep depth". Clearly the 2013 Red Sox demonstrated that vital trait time and again. They won Games 4 and 5 without sparkplug Shane Victorino who returned to belt the bases-clearing double that cemented the Game 6 Series clincher.
As all of you must know by now, it was the first Fenway Park clinching of the World Series since 1918 and also marked Boston’s third World Series triumph in the last ten years. The Bosox turned around a dismal 2012 of 93 losses into a 97-win best record in the American League. Though behind by one game in both the League Championship Series and the World Series, they showed the resiliency of champions to win the last two playoffs in six games.
Not enough can be said about Boston closer Koji Uehara (whose name thanks to David Waldstein in the New York Times should be pronounced “Way-Ee-Hara”). I’ve noted before the amusing irony of the 38-year-old Uehara shaving his goatee and fearsome muttonchops before the Boston beards grew all around him. He might now look half his age but he was a star in Japan before the Orioles signed him.
The Birds must rue his not returning to Baltimore when he wanted to return after 2012 when the Texas Rangers let him go. We Oriole fans should remain thankful that when he was traded to Texas, we did receive in return the new home run king Chris Davis and useful power pitcher Tommy Hunter. So in the spirit of gratitude without being greedy, all hail to Koji for putting the finishing touches on the Red Sox triumphant 2013.
Uehara won the MVP in the ALCS for winning one game and saving the other three.
David Ortiz won the Series MVP for an astounding performance, 11 hits in 14 ABs and a mountain of intentional walks, making his presence in the lineup a constant worry to the overmatched Cardinals.
The best and simplest words to describe the 2013 Series experience came from Kaz Uehara, Koji’s little boy who when asked by Fox Sports’ Erin Andrews how he felt after the Series victory said simply, “Good.” And what would the celebration be like afterwards? “Crazy.”
Good and Crazy. Not bad words to sum up the season and the Series.
And now winter has come metaphorically and soon actually. Yet in approximately 105 days spring training begins!
Keep that consoling thought in mind while I remind you as always: Take it easy but take it!