Each of these late-night, west coast contests are like three games in one to me. There’s the first three innings, for which I’m wide awake, nursing my 16th beer of the day and possibly my fifth roast beef sandwich. Then there’s that haze of the middle innings, where I’m usually in and out of sleep, babbling incoherently about David Ortiz or my Aunt Mustafa. Then there’s the final three, where I’m either asleep on the lawn or passed out drunk with my head in a bowl of Doritos.
The worst part? That confusion when I finally wake up the following morning. Did the Sox win? Did they shit the bed? Did Dustin Pedroia finally snap and stick a bat up an umpire’s South 40?
Thankfully, I woke up to a win today, although it took an extra innings Pablo Sandoval home run to make it happen. I was at my most coherent in the early innings, as Scott Kazmir dispatched the Sox with the carefree air of someone shooing away a fly, allowing no hits through the first three. I was only half-conscious as the Sox and A’s traded the lead from the fourth through the seventh. I woke up at one point and swore I saw Edward Mujica pitching for Oakland and setting the Sox down in order, but I’ve convinced myself that was a hallucination. And I was sawing serious wood by the time Sandoval went yard to put us ahead and Matt Barnes shut the door.
Amazingly, this win marked the first time the Red Sox won consecutive games since April 21. If they want to do it again tonight, I certainly won’t argue. But I can’t guarantee I’ll be awake to see it.
