Let's all give thanks for Eric Patterson today. Photo courtesy of Kelly O'Connor/sittingstill.net and used with permission.
I don’t know what possessed me to stay up for that entire game last night. Watching that ninth inning was so depressing that I decided to just shut off the damn television and let whatever happened happen without me watching it. Instead, I stuck with it. Granted, “sticking with it” for me meant watching NESN with the sound turned off and the tv screen hiding behind my laptop screen while I peeked in every three minutes or so while I read Twitter for updates, but still I was up and paying attention. 🙂
That they won the game came as big a surprise as their blowing the lead. I’m not usually a negative person but I was convinced an extra-inning game, especially on the road, spelled loss for the Sox. Yet, I still held out a tiny bit of hope or else I would have just shut the tv and computer down the moment the score turned to 6-6.
I choose not to focus on the specifics of the game (except to point out that John Lackey was freaking amazing) and just settle into being happy that the Red Sox pulled off a win. One down, three to go in Seattle and Beckett back on the mound tonight. I’ll take it.
As an aside: I go out of my way to avoid Peter Abraham’s blog and his tweets and have unfollowed people who retweet him. While I get this is a trying season for even the most devout fans, his constant negativity and needling of the fans is obvious and annoying. I guess it’s what they all do at Boston.com now except for Chad Finn. Amalie Benjamin is guilty, as well, of writing things obviously written to get the fans going. Today it’s how none of the Red Sox were on the top steps of the dugout during the final innings of last night’s game. Both Abraham and Benjamin note that the Mariners were there and that the Sox looked like they had given up and “it didn’t look good”. Yeah, the team with no expectations that just came back from a five run deficit was excited and on the top step while the team with the weight of the baseball world on their shoulders who just blew a five run lead was less expressive and obvious. Start ordering up the 25 cabs for 25 players, Pete. They just lost three out of four in the last series and blew what looked like an obvious blow out game…who expected them to be all rah-rah and cheerful in the dugout? This is going to happen when the team is struggling. Doesn’t mean they’ve given up but I suppose if you want folks to keep reading your stuff you have to give them something to chew on. I have to get better at not following the links folks send me because I always end up reading someone at boston.com who I really don’t want to read. It’s getting to the point where I’ll be going on total radio silence and not reading anything short of the tweets of people I choose to follow. It’s tough enough being a Red Sox fan, hell even when they aren’t struggling, I don’t need so-called professionals stirring the shit as well.
Okay, that was a bit more than an “aside”.
Two more 10:10pm ET games (10:10pm on a Saturday? Really MLB? Why not just scheduled it for midnight?) and then a 4pm followed by two more 10pm games (and a 3:30pm to end the road trip). It’s a hell of a stretch but the boys will be back at Fenway on Friday!