Just a couple of hundred miles away, in Yankee Stadium, it was all about the Rocket and Rudy, the mourning of unimaginable loss and the shared celebration of a city and its champions, those on the field and those at Ground Zero.
Here, in Fenway Park, under sodden skies and with sagging spirits, it was about the end of the line, the Red Sox officially eliminated from postseason contention by the Baltimore Orioles in front of a September crowd so sparse it could have been Pinky Higgins in the Sox dugout and Ike Delock and Chuck Estrada on the mound.
This was a night long in coming for the Sox, their 12-7 loss last night sealed by Tony Batista's grand slam in the ninth off Allen McDill, the 30-year-old journeyman pegged as a ''future star'' in next year's Sox calendar. By virtue of a Boston defeat, a recurring theme in the history of both teams, the Yankees, for the fourth straight season, are winners of the American League East. The Bombers are going to the postseason for the seventh straight season and will be shooting for their fourth straight World Series title, a feat accomplished only by teams that have worn pinstripes.
''Just give credit to the Yankees,'' said the rook, Shea Hillenbrand, who has shown a knack for straight talk the last few days. ''They're professional players who play day in and day out, as hard as they can.''
Jog your memory hard enough, and it's possible to recall when people said the same thing about the Red Sox, praising them as ''dirt dogs'' and admiring the way they played with an edge. No one dares mention canines around here now, for fear it might be taken the wrong way. And 18 losses in their last 22 games have dulled whatever edge the Sox might have once possessed.
Winners of just one of every three games since Joe Kerrigan became manager (10-21), the Sox long since have ceased to be a welcome distraction to fans who last night stayed away in droves, discouraged by the rain and the team's ragged play.
The official attendance was listed as 29,726, but that was counting the thousands of ticket-buyers who paid for the privilege of an empty seat.
''I don't think about the finality of it,'' Kerrigan said when asked about the meaning of the official 10-count. ''Right now, our focus is just on trying to play good. I thought we battled back well tonight.''
Well, they did make it close for a while, coming back from 8-2 to close within a run. But only the presence of Cal Ripken, who had two singles and scored twice, and the appearance of former whipping boy John Wasdin, who did an encore of his way-back days by giving up an oversized home run to Hillenbrand, kept the crowd from dispersing altogether.
The Sox, down six runs after 41/2 innings, rallied within a run courtesy of Wasdin, who gave up a Wall-scraping double to Manny Ramirez in Boston's two-run seventh and Hillenbrand's home run in the eighth, a two-run shot that just missed conking the Coke bottles.
Wasdin then walked Jose Offerman and hit pinch hitter Chris Stynes with a pitch, placing Ramirez in a position to win the game, a sight so often seen in the season's first two months but an infrequent occurrence for the balance of the summer.
Ramirez gave it a shot, bouncing a ground ball up the middle against reliever B.J. Ryan, but second baseman Jerry Hairston, a third-generation major leaguer, made a play that would have made both his grandfather and daddy proud.
Hairston gloved the ball on the lip of the infield beyond second base and heaved a throw toward first with his momentum carrying him into left field. The ball arrived in the glove of first baseman Jeff Conine just ahead of Ramirez, ending the inning.
Hillenbrand's home run was his 11th of the season but his first in more than a month. His last had come Aug. 20 in Anaheim; he went 84 at-bats between home runs. It also was his first with a man on base since May 8, a startling statistic.
The Orioles, meanwhile, went just four batters into the game before DH Chris Richard took Sox starter Frank Castillo deep for a three-run home run. The Orioles, who had five hits in the first inning, made it 4-0 when Ripken singled and came around on a base hit by Brady Anderson.
Facing the league's biggest loser, Jose Mercedes (now 8-17), the Sox countered with a couple of runs in the bottom of the first, Ramirez singling home Offerman and Brian Daubach doubling home Ramirez. But Luis Matos homered in the second to make it 5-2 and James Lofton's two-out throwing error in the fourth led to two more Baltimore runs, as Larry Bigbie and Conine (three hits) both doubled.
The Sox have now lost four in a row. With a dozen games left to be played (a rainout against the Yankees mercifully will not be made up), the team is just one game over .500 for the first time since April 7. They are playing out the string; the Yankees, once again, are playing for a ring.
This story ran on page F1 of the Boston Globe on 9/26/2001
© Copyright 2001 Globe Newspaper Company