|
 About 10 minutes later and with less than 11 hours remaining before
his team's next game, Farrell marveled at what had been
accomplished.
Center fielder Mookie Betts put the finishing touch on a bizarre
night at Yankee Stadium by lifting a sacrifice fly in the top of the
19th inning as the Red Sox outlasted the New York Yankees, 6-5, in a
game that featured a power failure in the 12th and took over seven
hours to complete.
"It's a matter of resiliency by both sides," Farrell said. "This was
a testament of endurance."
The Red Sox took their third lead of the extra innings when Bogaerts
singled in his fourth straight at-bat. He stole second, advanced to
third on a passed ball and trotted home when Betts lifted a 2-2
pitch from Esmil Rogers (0-1) to center field.
The sacrifice fly concluded what had been up to that point a
frustrating night for Betts. Betts had a fifth-inning double but was
hitless in his other seven at-bats and three of his four strikeouts
came after the ninth.
"It would have been the worst night of my life," Betts said as signs
in the Boston clubhouse reminded players about a first bus leaving
at 2:45 a.m. ET and a second bus departing at 3:00 a.m. ET.
The sacrifice fly also was a fitting ending to Bogaerts' night. He
was hitless in his first four at-bats but had four straight singles
and a walk in the extra innings.
"A long (night), it's good to win in the end," Bogaerts said.
Betts and Bogaerts being involved in the go-ahead rally would have
been a moot point had knuckleballer Steven Wright not secured the
victory on his third attempt. He blew a 4-3 lead in the 16th
provided by designated hitter David Ortiz's home run and a 5-4 edge
provided by third baseman Pablo Sandoval's single.
After Ortiz's home run, Wright allowed a solo home run to first
baseman Mark Teixeira in the 16th. Following Sandoval's hit, he gave
up a double to right fielder Carlos Beltran in the 18th that scored
pinch runner John-Ryan Murphy and it seemed possible he might do so
again when center fielder Jacoby Ellsbury opened the 19th
with a single.
This time, he finished it with some help from Bogaerts, who started
the double play against designated hitter Garrett Jones. Jones came
in as a pinch runner for Alex Rodriguez in the 11th and might have
had the game-winning double in the 15th had left fielder Brett
Gardner not been picked off.
"It's unjust to single out guy; this was a team win," Farrell said.
Not including the delay, the game took 6 hours, 49 minutes to
complete and in terms of time was the longest in Boston history and
the second longest in New York history, 11 minutes shy of the record
set June 24, 1962 in a 22-inning game decided at Detroit's Tiger
Stadium on the only home run of Jack Reed's career.
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"It all kind of runs together," Gardner said. "We showed a lot of
heart tonight. We didn't win but we played hard and we played long."
The teams went a combined 5-for-28 with runners in scoring position,
stranded 33 runners and struck out 28 times in a game that featured
a combined 628 pitches by 17 pitchers.
"It's one game that seemed about six but we'll move on," New York
manager Joe Girardi said.
In the 12th, the game was delayed for 16 minutes due to a power
outage while Beltran took ball one from Tommy Layne. As Layne threw
his first pitch, a group of lights in the upper deck went out in
what the Yankees said was caused by a power surge.
"Some of the lights went out and I just said I didn't think it was
right that they just hit in the bright lights and we're missing a
few," Girardi said. "So they waited until they came back on and we
went back out."
The extra innings were made necessary when third baseman Chase
Headley blasted a 2-1 pitch from Edward Mujica into the right-field
seats with two outs in the ninth.
Long before the drama of the ninth and extra innings, the Red Sox
took a 3-0 lead on a single by Sandoval in the first and a two-run
base hit by right fielder Daniel Nava. The Yankees scored twice in
the sixth on Rodriguez's RBI single and a sacrifice fly by catcher
Brian McCann.
NOTES: Told that New York DH Alex Rodriguez hit a home run on
Thursday, Boston DH David Ortiz said, "He did? Good for him. I'm
happy for him. The guy's been through a lot." ... New York manager
Joe Girardi hinted that Rodriguez may have his first day off
Saturday. ... On an MLB Network radio show, former Red Sox RHP Pedro
Martinez addressed the lack of velocity by Yankees RHP Masahiro
Tanaka by saying: "I think Tanaka is not committed to his pitches.
Tanaka is a guy who's aggressive in the strike zone and attacks the
strike zone. He doesn't look like he's attacking the strike zone.
... Thursday was the season opener for the minor leagues and, for
the second year in a row, the Red Sox had a no-hitter on opening
night. This time, Class A Salem RHPs Jacob Dahlstrand and Joe Gunkel
pitched a seven-inning, rain-shortened no-hitter.
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