Veteran Sox starter Tim Wakefield was routed in a seven-run fifth inning and crafty Cleveland righty Paul Byrd blanked the Sox for five to give the Indians their third straight victory in a series that thus far has stunned the Red Sox and New England.
"We know where we are, and there's some guys in there that have been in this situation before," said Red Sox manager Terry Francona. "And the best way all of us know to go about our business is to play the next game. If you start to look ahead, it can be a little overwhelming."
If any team knows how to recover from an ALCS deficit, it's the Red Sox. Boston wrote the book (which yielded approximately 26 books the following spring), beating the Yankees four straight times in 2004, becoming the only team in baseball history to recover from a 3-0 deficit in a best-of-seven series.
There are eight Sox players remaining from the '04 championship season and tomorrow night they'll turn their eyes toward 20-game winner Josh Beckett, who gets the ball against Cleveland ace C.C. Sabathia. Beckett beat Sabathia in Game 1 and a lot of Sox fans wanted to see him start Game 4. Rather than have Beckett pitching on three days' rest, Francona and Boston's baseball operations department elected to go with Wakefield. Like Curt Schilling and Daisuke Matsuzaka in Games 2 and 3, Wakefield failed to finish the fifth inning. This is not a championship formula.
Wakefield had a lot going against him. He hadn't pitched since Sept. 29. He had given up 24 earned runs in his last 25 innings, had taken two shots of cortisone in his right shoulder, owned a 6.12 career postseason ERA, and had won exactly one game since Aug. 25. If all that weren't enough, the game was played on the fourth anniversary of Aaron Boone's walkoff blast against him in the final game of the 2003 ALCS. It was also the third anniversary of the Yankees' 19-8 Game 3 ALCS win in 2004 at Fenway, a game in which Wakefield was among the pummeled.
