May 24th: Walking off the Yankees
Red Sox 9 – Yankees 8
Before the Cleveland Indians went on their late 90’s run as one of the greatest offenses of all time, they spent the early part of their decade as one of the laughingstocks of baseballs.
The one exception was Carlos Baerga, their undersized but scrappy second baseman. From 1992 to 1995, Baerga never batted below .312 and made the All-Star team three times.
His tenure with the Red Sox was much less impressive. In his lone season in Boston, he hit only two home runs and drove in just 19 runs. None of that mattered in a May 24 matchup with the Yankees, as his 11th inning sacrifice fly drove in Ricky Henderson with the winning run and gave the Red Sox a two and a half games game lead in the division.
It appeared the Red Sox would cruise to victory when they lit up Yankees starter Roger Clemens. The Red Sox jumped him for three runs in the first, two in the second, and singular runs in the third and the fourth.
An RBI single by Garciaparra and a ground-rule double by Daubach knocked out Clemens after just 3.2 innings. In all, Clemens was battered for seven runs, nine hits, and two walks and left with the Yankees down 7-1.
Meanwhile, Red Sox starting pitcher John Burkett was cruising. Though Jason Giambi got him for a solo shot in the 4th, Burkett entered the seventh with an 8-2 lead. That’s when the Yankees mounted their comeback. Alfonso Soriano led off the seventh with a solo home run and a Derek Jeter single forced manager Grady Little to bring in Casey Fossum.
Fossum did get the first two outs of the inning but was pulled after a walk to Robin Ventura loaded the bases. Rich Garces entered and promptly walked Shane Spencer and allowed singles to Rondell White and Nick Johnson. The Yankees had pulled within one, and they would tie the game the following inning on a sacrifice fly by Jorge Posada.
After 16 combined runs through the first seven and a half innings, both offenses finally began to slow down. The Yankees went down in order in the top half of the ninth, tenth and eleventh, while the Red Sox failed to score from the seventh to the tenth. It took until the eleventh for the Red Sox to finally get a rally going.
Henderson led off the bottom of the eleventh with a single, and Shea Hillenbrand followed with a single of his own. Both runners advanced on a bunt by Trot Nixon, and Baerga assumed the role of hero with his game-winning sacrifice fly.