Splinters and Long Balls

I finished watching one heck of a great game last night between the Red Sox and Yannkees. Granted, the game took forever, I believe it was 3 hours and 10 minutes long, but the calibur of baseball was pretty darn good.

Curt Schilling was masterful for the most part, despite his only big mistake, his pitch that Derek Jeter launched into the Fenway night atop the Green Monster. He had the Yankees stifled for 7+ innings until then.

Roger Clemens, making his first start at Fenway since 2003, and his 200th Fenway start overall, helped make the matchup live up to its hype. More impressive than Schilling and Clemens performances was the amount of lumber they destroyed along the way. I counted at least five broken bats, nay, shattered bats, in this game alone. Heaters from grizzled veterans sawing off unsuspecting hitters, pure pitching magic that helped solidify an already concrete rivalry between these two clubs.

Equally impressive, the youngsters on both sides, from Joba Chamberlain on the Yankees to Dustin Pedroia and Jacoby Ellsbury on the Red Sox, now engrained in the fabric that is Red Sox/Yankees baseball.

This one had everything, folks. Great defense, timely hitting, excellent pitching, even drama so intense you could cut the air at Fenway Park with a Sportserv concession stand plastic knife. Who wasn't at the edge of their seat watching Mariano Rivera's bases loaded showdown with two outs against David Ortiz? It's the stuff made for October, and should they meet again in the American League Championship Series in a month or so, I expect more of the same. Broken bats and all.