I had chills when I watched the ceremony on MLB TV. The game was on ESPN
in Israel, but not the pre-game ceremony. MLB TV has archived the game,
including all the pre-game hoopla. :-)

*RED SOX 8, YANKEES 1*


With Rings and Then a Rout, It's a Great Day for the Red Sox

*By TYLER KEPNER
<http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=TYLER%20KEPNER&fdq=19960101&\
td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=TYLER%20KEPNER&inline=nyt-per>
*

Published: April 12, 2005

BOSTON, April 11 - The Yankees have never debated the merits of the
Boston Red Sox' achievement. To the Yankees, there was nothing cheap or
fluky about it. The Red Sox stormed back to beat them in the playoffs
last fall, then charged through the World Series.

"You're probably a little jealous," Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter said.
"But they deserved it. You have respect for what they accomplished, and
you know how difficult it is to do."


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So on a crisp afternoon when they could have been in their clubhouse,
the Yankees found no shame in witnessing the celebration of a rival. As
the Red Sox gave out 45 World Series rings before their Fenway Park
opener on Monday, the Yankees watched from the third-base dugout, even
clapping now and then.

It was a tasteful gesture, the Red Sox thought, and the Yankees
continued to oblige. They did nothing to spoil the party, which
continued to the end of an 8-1 Red Sox victory. For 33,702 fans and a
throng of Red Sox alumni, the first look at a championship home team
turned out perfectly.

"The whole thing is that everyone thought when the Red Sox won the World
Series, it wouldn't be the same," said Theo Epstein, who was a Red Sox
fan before he became their general manager. "It just enhanced the
experience for everyone."

It helped to have the Yankees in town, and it helped further to have
third baseman Alex Rodriguez make a pivotal error. Rodriguez, now the
most vilified Yankee in Boston, booted a ground ball that could have
ended the fourth inning. It led to three unearned runs against a shaky
Mike Mussina, putting the game away.

In the eighth inning, when Rodriguez handled his next chance cleanly,
the fans gave him a standing ovation and chanted "A-Rod! A-Rod!" in
sing-song style. It reminded Rodriguez, who grew up a Mets fan, of the
taunting Darryl Strawberry received during the 1986 World Series.

"I think I'm becoming a cult hero in Boston, which I don't want that,"
Rodriguez said. "I really don't want that at all."

Rodriguez scored the Yankees' only run off Tim Wakefield, who allowed
five hits over seven innings and mastered the Yankees again. Mussina
struggled with the Red Sox and the strike zone, allowing seven runs,
seven hits, three walks and a hit batsman in five innings.

His undoing came in the fourth. Trailing by 4-0, Mussina had the bases
empty and two strikes on Mark Bellhorn. His next pitch seemed to drop
into the strike zone, and he made a move for the dugout when Bellhorn
took it. But his work was not done.

"I had Bellhorn struck out," Mussina said. "I think all three of us
thought so; me, Posada and Bellhorn all thought he was struck out."

Charlie Reliford, the home-plate umpire, disagreed, and Bellhorn dumped
the next pitch to right for a broken-bat single. Johnny Damon followed
with a roller to third that eluded a charging Rodriguez. That set up
Trot Nixon and Manny Ramirez, who drove in the next three runs.

"I knew Johnny got out of the box pretty good," Rodriguez said. "I was
probably a little overaggressive. If I had to do it again, I'd stay back
a little more and make a strong throw over there."

Like most Yankees, Rodriguez was in the dugout for the pregame ceremony.
He said he was happy for John Henry, the principal owner of the Red Sox,
who tried to trade for him after the 2003 season. The deal collapsed,
and Ramirez, the player Rodriguez would have been traded for, became the
most valuable player in the World Series.

The Yankees, of course, ended their season by absorbing the worst
collapse in playoff history. The Red Sox immortalized their perspective
on it with an engraving on the side of their rings: "Greatest Comeback
in History 2004."

For the ceremony, the Red Sox wore uniforms with numbers outlined in
gold. For the game, they wore a world-champions patch on the left sleeve
of their jerseys and another on the side of their caps. It was a lot for
the Yankees to endure, but Manager Joe Torre noticed that the dugout
filled from six or seven players to near capacity as the ceremony went on.

"I give the Yankees a lot of credit," said Commissioner Bud Selig, who
was at the game. "It was very classy. I'm not the least bit surprised,
knowing Joe Torre as long as I have."

Selig said he made no request to have the Yankees watch from their
dugout, and Torre said he had not instructed his players. "I never make
anybody do anything," he said. "That's just not what we do."

There was a practical reason to watch from the dugout: the players
needed to know how long the ceremony would delay the start of the game.
But, mostly, they were curious.

"I wanted to check it out, see what it was like," Jeter said. "I've been
on the other end of a few of them. Never watched one."

Torre watched from the top step, with his players fanned out on either
side. Red Sox Manager Terry Francona, who was hospitalized last week
because of tightness in his chest, pointed to Torre, and Damon tipped
his cap toward the Yankees' dugout.

Twenty-eight players strolled from the Red Sox dugout to the first-base
line to receive their rings in wooden boxes from Henry, who stood beside
the championship trophy displayed on a table.

Members of the Boston Symphony and the Boston Pops performed in the
outfield, playing "Sweet Caroline" and other Fenway favorites as the
scoreboard showed highlights of each player.

The final ring went to Johnny Pesky, 85, an honorary coach who played
for the 1946 Red Sox, the first of four teams that lost the World Series
in seven games. Pesky raised the championship flag in center with Carl
Yastrzemski, the Hall of Famer who came so close in 1967 and 1975.

Terry Cashman, the balladeer who sang "Talkin' Baseball," performed
behind the plate while the banner was raised. His new song included the
lyrics, "Raise the flag, the curse is over/The Babe don't live here
anymore."

The final flourish before Wakefield's first pitch came from Charlie
Wagner, a former Red Sox player. Wagner, a pitcher in the 1930's and
40's, took the microphone to shout, "Play ball!" He was 5 years old when
the Red Sox won the 1918 World Series, and 91 when they won it again.

zvika

Zvi Shilon,
Nahal Hayarkon 8/4,
Modiin, 71700,
Israel
972-8- 970-0381
972-54-879387
Fax #: 001-832-213-4057
zvika6@...



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