(AP Photo/Steven Senne)
I’m not a fan of bandwagon jumping just for the sake of doing so. But yesterday was a special circumstance. I wonder how many times (off the record and on) Jason Bay was asked how it felt to be replacing the “best right-handed hitter” the Sox have had in decades? How many times did they ask him if he was nervous about replacing a fan favorite. How many times did patrolling (or as Heidi Watney called it “trolling”) the Green Monster come up? How many different ways did he learn to say “I’m not Manny Ramirez and I’m not going to try to be him”?
I like the guy. I liked him in Pittsburgh and I’m excited at the prospect of what he’ll be able to do here. But I wasn’t going all gooey on him based on one entertaining and well-poised press conference.
And then I watched the game.
I think if I was there (and I had at least two friends who WERE there) I might have cried a little. Cried at the realization that Manny is gone and cried for the way the fans made sure Jason Bay wasn’t going to be held “responsible” for that.
In his first at-bat as a Sox player, he walked and then scored the game’s first run. And I was happy. In his second at-bat, he was hit by a pitch and my reaction was less happy (“But at least he got on base!”). He then went on to strike out swinging…twice. But the baseball gods are funny and they turned this game into an extra-innings extravaganza…so Bay would have another shot at the plate. And he used it to walk…again. Those baseball gods are funny folks aren’t they?
It wasn’t until the 12th inning, as you all know, that Bay had his true, defining, introductory moment (at-bat anyway. He made one hell of a catch in the fifth that saved runs early on.) at Fenway Park. With two outs and one strike on him, he hit a triple off the Monster and started the rally that would lead to his scoring both runs and leading the team to a win they really needed.
So, yeah, I’m all over the Jason Bay bandwagon now. 🙂
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