Farrell’s long, lost day to forget
One couldn’t blame John Farrell if he needed an Ambien to get to sleep last night.
A case of amnesia wouldn’t be the worst thing for him today, either.
A long, long day at the office featured almost every sort of calamity a manager could experience.
The list feels as long as the 5:50, 16-inning game itself.
Before the game, Joe Kelly, Farrell’s second-best reliever, went on the disabled list.
In-game, his sound decision to replace the best starter in the league with the best closer in the league for a four-out save situation backfired.
Seven extra innings ensued in which the following happened:
The Red Sox offense could not score a run and managed just three singles.
Reliever Blaine Boyer left the game with a tight elbow.
A crazy play at first base that Farrell protested turned into an actual protest of the game.
The extra frames meant the club chewed up its bullpen the night before today’s doubleheader.
Tuesday’s starter Doug Fister had to pitch.
And oh yeah, his team, the still first-place Red Sox, lost a 4-1 game in which the offense did not muster a single extra-base hit. That will gray some hairs. “A lot of opportunities, a lot of missed opportunities, a lot of very good pitching over the majority of today — Chris Sale was outstanding once again, a rare nonconverted save for (closer) Craig (Kimbrel) today and then some opportunities following that where a base hit with a man in scoring position just wasn’t there today,” Farrell said.
The decision to lift Sale after 118 pitches with two outs and one on and the most dangerous threat in baseball, Aaron Judge, at the plate was not made lightly or quickly by Farrell.
No matter how efficiently Sale got through the first three batters he faced, he was going to use Kimbrel to face Judge and he was planning to use Kimbrel for a four-out save.
“Fact is, (Sale’s) pitching on four days after two of the innings in the All-Star break — fourth time through the order, 118 pitches, and thought that was a key moment in the ballgame,” said Farrell. “Thought that was a big out at that moment, so went to Kimbrel.”
Farrell thought that today’s doubleheader would be the spot he would turn to Kimbrel for a four-out save, but the Kelly hamstring injury meant he had to turn to Kimbrel.
“I thought today was a unique set of circumstances — I talked to Craig when we were in Tampa going into the All-Star break that Sunday was a possibility with the additional days of rest and then with multiple days off, talked to him during the game and he was fully prepared, ready to go,” said Farrell.
And while Kimbrel struck out Judge, he also allowed a leadoff home run in the ninth to Matt Holliday, who tied the game and forced the eventual marathon.
Did the Judge at-bat, which lasted 10 pitches, affect Kimbrel in the ninth?
“A 10-pitch at-bat, yeah, potentially could have,” Farrell said. “But then you look at the quality of stuff Craig had the remainder of that ninth inning, was still powerful, a lot of swing and miss, got a fastball down in the strike zone where Holliday’s got the ability to handle it versus up in the zone so you know what, he beat on a fastball down and middle in.”
Sale, by the way, had no problem with the move, even though he said, as always, he could have finished off Judge.
“I wanted to finish that one — like I said, you’ve got a guy like Craig down there, it’s kind of like pick your poison,” said Sale. “It makes it a little easier to pass the ball off when you’ve got a guy like that.”
The fight with the umpires was an exercise in frustration for Farrell. The problem was that Holliday decided inexplicably to slide back into first base after being forced at second on Mitch Moreland’s throw to start a potential double play. Shortstop Xander Bogaerts’ throw back to first intended to nail Jacoby Ellsbury for the DP could not be handled by Moreland because of Holliday’s presence.
The umpires confabbed with headsets twice for assistance but Ellsbury remained safe. He never scored, and five more innings were played, but Farrell was left unsatisfied.
“I didn’t get an explanation,” said Farrell. “My view was that it was interference, regardless of whether it was intentional or not. That’s why I protested the game. But there was, after repeated conversations with New York, it was brought back to me that they weren’t going to change the play. And the play stood with no explanation.”
And without a victory, no explanation will ever make up for one long and lost day at the ballpark.