Player Of The Week - Tim Wakefield
Tim Wakefield - 49 - RHP
Week 21 - 23-29 August 2004
The elder statesman of the Red Sox, Tim Wakefield continues to quietly perform his magic as he does every year to try and bring this team closer to playoff contention. Wakefield took the mound Tuesday, needing to help his team rebound from a tough, 3-0 loss the night before to the Blue Jays. Although not his best outing of the season, he helped deliver that, allowing just three runs on ten hits in five innings of work to notch his tenth win of the season. Sunday, however, may have been the game of the season for “Wake.” Facing the toothless Tigers, Wakefield allowed just a solo home run and two other hits and easily cruised through eight innings of work as the Red Sox took out the brooms in closing a four-game sweep of Detroit. Wakefield has now won six of his last seven starts, going 6-1 with a 4.27 ERA, and if that knuckleball continues to dance and keep the opposition frustrated, he will prove valuable in the stretch run.
It’s a shame that the hottest bat on the team will be out for the first half of this week due to a four-game suspension he must serve because Jason Varitek has been an offensive force. As usual, he has been extraordinary behind the plate for the pitching staff but his plate appearances have people talking more than usual these days. Last week, “Tek” was 9-for-19 at the plate (a .474 clip), belting three home runs, driving in six runs, and crossing the plate four times. Over the month of August, he is batting .448, raising his average from .275 to .303, with five home runs and 19 runs batted in. He also has an on-base percentage of .507 this month and a slugging percentage of .845. Hurry back soon, Jason!
Red Sox fans this morning were ecstatic, albeit still a little sleepy, after staying up late to catch the end of Boston’s sixth straight victory won in dramatic fashion, thanks to back-to-back, late-inning home runs from sluggers Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz, over the nose-diving Chicago White Sox. It was the first time since late April that the Red Sox had swept a road series and earned Boston some revenge after losing two-of-three last weekend at Fenway to these same White Sox. It also meant that, after being 10-1/2 games behind New York at the start of last week, they had climbed back to with 5-1/2 games thanks to New York, who had lost five-of-six last week and were swept over the weekend at home by the red-hot Anaheim Angels.
Boston also has a more difficult schedule left to play. 13 games remain against West Division opponents and three of those teams are in the playoff hunt: the Angels, the Oakland Athletics, and the Texas Rangers. The Red Sox play two of those series at home against Anaheim and Texas, then fly straight to Oakland to play three more games before wrapping up the road trip with four in Seattle. Meanwhile, other than Boston, New York will face just one other team that has a record better than .500: the Minnesota Twins. The rest of these games include three series with Toronto, two each with Cleveland and Baltimore, and one each with Tampa Bay and Kansas City; New York is a combined 31-8 against all these teams, not including the slumping Indians with whom they have yet to play.
So, with the wild card so easily within reach, are the Red Sox only hurting themselves if they attempt to catch New York? To quote a well-known former Yankee great: “It ain’t over until it’s over.” History proves that New York is resilient and that they will fight right down to the final out. Plus, given an easier schedule over the next few weeks, perhaps some young pitching staffs will help New York regain it offensive edge while the club’s own pitching staff tries to regroup. However, nothing is set in stone and, if the Sox can stay hot, those two series between the two clubs could prove interesting. To say that I would love to see a reversal of fortune come in favor of Boston would be wonderful but, to put it in another perspective, a division crown is not the most impressive piece of hardware that can be placed in the trophy cabinet at the end of the season.
The longtime ace of the staff is heating up as the summer progresses and as the club continues to fight for a spot in the post-season. Since losing to Baltimore in mid-July, the Dominican Dominator has won three of his last four starts, with one no-decision, posting an ERA of 2.45. In that span, he has also struck out 37 and had fanned 10 or more in three straight appearances. Last Thursday, Martinez again proved his value to the club, throwing a complete game and shutting down the Tampa Bay Devil Rays on just six hits and 109 pitches to post his 13th win of the season, one shy of his total from a year ago. With another eight or nine starts left this season, Martinez has a legitimate shot to post 20 wins for just the third time in his career and perhaps a chance to collect his fourth Cy Young award. There are no guarantees in baseball but Martinez has looked stronger as the season has progressed; in the stretch, that will prove valuable.
Claimed off waivers last June from Colorado, Kapler was expected to provide some pop from the bench and substitute for Trot Nixon or Manny Ramirez when those players were given days of rest. When Nixon went down in spring training and then came back for only a couple of weeks before going back on the disabled list, Terry Francona turned to the seven-year veteran in the hope that he might fill those shoes. Kapler has not disappointed and has found himself playing almost every game for the Red Sox somewhere in the outfield but most often in right. Kapler has quite a gun and has proven that with five outfield assists; he has also kept the miscues to a minimum, making just two errors this season. Last week, he also batted .364 with four runs scored and two RBI, raising his average to a respectable .281, which is not too shabby for being in the bottom of the order for most of the season. With Nixon possibly gone for the rest of the season, we should see more of Kapler who should continue to fill those shoes without much difficulty.
The inevitable was approaching whether we wanted to believe it or not and Ted William’s frozen head must have spun inside that liquid nitrogen-filled container when the news broke. After ten years in the organization and seven-plus years with the parent club, the face of the franchise was sent packing in a four-team deal and a sad chapter closed the book on the relationship between the Boston Red Sox and shortstop Nomar Garciaparra. Whereas no one ever expected a few years ago that he would play anywhere but here, the relationship had cooled - perhaps had even become colder than an arctic breeze - and there was no getting around the fact that a break up was necessary. So the Red Sox sent employee number five to Chicago and that was that… or so it would seem.
There is no question that Garciaparra was, for the most part, a fan favorite during his tenure in a Boston uniform. He dazzled us with his amazing ability to snare ground balls and then whirl around to fire a bullet to first for the out. He peppered the field with hits all over the park, never fearing to swing at the first pitch he saw, and came through in the clutch in opportunities that were too plentiful to count. Most of all, whether he was happy or not with his situation off the field, he played 100% on the field, never doing less than what he felt the fans deserved to see from him.
Despite having pitched a perfect game for the Pawtucket Red Sox in August of last season, Bronson Arroyo is perhaps the most overlooked starter in the rotation for Boston this year. With only four wins on the season against seven losses in 17 starts, he hasn’t exactly created a buzz whenever his turn comes. However, when you look at his numbers, he’s had a very good season. His strikeout-to-walk ratio is just above three, he’s getting nearly eight strikeouts per nine innings, and he has a respectable 4.08 ERA, good enough for third among the team’s starters and just behind the perennial ace of the staff, Pedro Martinez. On Friday night, he pitched perhaps his best game this season; in 7-1/3 innings of work, he looked sharp as he gave up just two runs on eight hits while striking out eight batters and not allowing a walk to any Minnesota batter. What’s even more amazing is that he threw 98 pitches and 70 of those were for strikes, a percentage better than 70 percent! Entering the stretch run, we hope that we can see more games like that from the quiet man in the rotation.