The Yanks call on Bucky “Fucking” Dent to throw out the first pitch, hoping to stir up old ghosts. Yogi Berra, who watched Maz’s homer go over the wall in Forbes Field, catches for him.

Maybe they should have let Bucky start, because Kevin Brown has nothing. In the first, after Johnny is thrown out at the plate on a Manny single—on the very next pitch!—Brown tries to sneak an 88 mph fastball past David Ortiz. Never happen. El Jefe lines it into the short porch (in Fenway it either falls for a single or Sheffield catches it racing in) for a 2–0 lead, and the Yanks never dig themselves out of that hole. With bases juiced in the second, Johnny Damon greets Javier Vazquez with a line-drive grand slam into the same short porch that has padded so many Yankees’ power stats over the years,[80] and the thousand or so Faithful drown out the rest of the Stadium.

And that’s basically it. Tonight Derek Lowe, who was supposed to be the best number three pitcher in the majors, is just that.[81] He gives up one hit in six innings. I’ll say that again: he gives up one hit in six innings. As in Game 4, D-Lowe rhymes with hero. Johnny hits a second dinger off Vazquez, just like he did on June 29th, and we’re up 8–1 and chanting “Reg-gie Da-mon!” The crowd is totally poleaxed, as if they’ve shown up on the wrong night. They revive only when Pedro comes on for a vanity appearance in the seventh and gives up two runs, one of which Mark Bellhorn (from now until eternity Mark “Fucking” Bellhorn to Yankee fans) immediately gets back with a towering blast off the right-field foul pole. Another garbage run on a sac fly, and yes, finally, that is it.

I’m behind home with Steve as we nail down the last outs. We don’t even need our closer. It’s 10–3, and no one can hit a seven-run homer. Jeter looks sick. A-Rod and Sheffield have both gone 0-for—complete and total justice. It’s as if the Sox have walked through the Stadium driving stakes through every single ghost’s, vampire’s and Yankee fan’s rotten, cobwebby heart. It’s quiet and the upper deck is half-empty. The Yankees are cooked, and their fans can’t believe it. In the biggest game ever played in this rivalry, the Red Sox have beaten the Yankees at home, by a touchdown, on Mickey Mantle’s birthday. At one minute after midnight, the start of a new day, when Sierra grounds weakly to Pokey Reese, and Pokey flips to Doug Mientkiewicz (so simple!), the most expensive baseball team in history is history.

And we’re sorry, George, but that’s more than half a billion dollars you’ve spent…for nothing.

Come on now: Who’s your Daddy?

Diamondbacks. Angels. Marlins. Red Sox.