Ortiz moves Red Sox one game closer to improbable ending
By Scott Miller | SportsLine.com Senior Writer Follow ScottBOSTON -- Lightning struck twice, and David Ortiz may never have to buy another dinner again here.
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| David Ortiz is once again the hero for the Boston Red Sox.(AP) |
Lightning struck twice, and ...
Wait. This is a set-up, right? The Red Sox are stuck on nine innings from elimination for another day. They've won two games to not only put a pulse back into this American League Championship Series, but to qualify it for high blood pressure medication.
A stunning, 14-inning 5-4 victory in Game 5 on the Ortiz-sized back of an equally shocking 6-4, 12-inning triumph in Game 4?
With one Ortiz swing winning each game?
"That might be the greatest game ever played," Boston general manager Theo Epstein said in a jubilant -- and exhausted -- Red Sox clubhouse after another midnight special. "And that's one of the best at-bats I've ever seen."
The Red Sox have discovered another way to jack up New England's hopes again before another heartbreaking fade. Right? It's gotta be that. No team has ever fallen behind three games-to-none and then come back to win a seven-game series in the baseball postseason.
But eventually, that comeback will happen. And after watching these past 26 innings in last 28 hours, why not the Red Sox? The Yankees' lead is down to three games-to-two, and Boston is gaining ground in a hurry.
The way they were chanting "Ortiz!" and "MVP!" for the longest time after Ortiz's RBI single against Esteban Loaiza -- the seventh Yankees pitcher of the night -- that scored Johnny Damon with the winning run, a Red Sox comeback is beginning to at least look within the realm of possibility.
Especially the way Ortiz is going.
"It's almost to the point where you'd like somebody else to take the weight off of his shoulders," first baseman Doug Mientkiewicz said. "We seem to find a way to get it to him."
