The best day of the season (so far) is upon us
NEW YORK - Some teams and some series allow for a mistake here, a miscue there. Not the Red Sox, and not this Wild Card round against the Yankees.
That reality was put on display during the Red Sox's Game 2, 4-3 loss on Wednesday at Yankee Stadium.
They were close to closing out the New Yorkers. But close was not nearly good enough, and now there is the winner-take-all Game 3 Thursday night.
There are obvious elements of this equation, such as the need for key participants, such as Brayan Bello, to be at their best. Wednesday night, Alex Cora sensed early on that this was not going to be the case, so a wave of relievers was sprung into action, starting with one out in the third inning.
"It was a tough lineup. A lot of lefties. The bats were getting better with the lefties, and we had a bunch of them in the bullpen," Cora said when asked about the quick hook for Bello.
"Felt like at that point kind of like we have to do this. It doesn't feel good, you know, because you want the kid to go out there and get his experience and pitch deep into the game. I felt that moment we needed to."
Now the necessity will be for rookie starter Connelly Early to be at his best. Because of the stakes and the state of the Sox's bullpen, there is no room for interpretation.
"He doesn’t have to make it bigger than what it is," said Red Sox pitcher Lucas Giolito of Early. "He doesn’t have to do anything extraordinary other than just be himself and compete and execute pitches. He does that and he’s going to do a great job and put us in a good position to win."
Then there are the specific moments that define this team's fortunes. Wednesday night there was a few of those even after Bello's surprise early exit.
One of the most impactful and obvious forks in the road came in the fifth inning when Jarren Duran dropped a two-out line drive off the bat of Aaron Judge, allowing the Yankees to take a 3-2 lead. The Red Sox did immediately knot it back up thanks to a Trevor Story solo homer the following inning, what-could-have-beens weren't about to go away.
"This one’s going to sting a little bit," Duran said. "I know the game is 100 on me. If I make that play, Trevor hits the homer, we take the lead. But, I messed it up, gave them momentum, and then, things just happened from there. But that one's on me. I'm gonna have to wear that one."
In the seventh, the Red Sox seemingly were presented with an opportunity to walk through the door that would lead them to a trip to Toronto when Masa Yoshida rifled a hard grounder just to the right of second base with two outs and runners on first and second. Yankees second baseman Jazz Chisholm knocked it down and threw it to first, where Ben Rice saw the toss trickle off his glove and a few feet behind him.
What looked like enough of a miscue to allow Nate Eaton to race home simply resulted in the bases being loaded with the game still deadlocked. There would be no runs, with Story's long fly ball out to center field, ending the threat.
Could Eaton could have scored? That was up for debate.
"Obviously, it was a big play. We didn’t score," Eaton explained. "I obviously couldn’t see it. As I’m getting to third I’m told to stop and then I couldn’t see how far the ball was away when it got by Rice."
"That's their opinion," said Cora when told the ESPN TV crew was questioning Eaton and third base coach Kyle Hudson not taking advantage of the opportunity. "I think it's easy from up there to say that he should have -- could have scored. You know, they are not down there with us."
Thursday, the Red Sox will get a chance to rectify their mistakes. If they don't, it will likely be their last chance.