A Sad Day in Beantown

In a real-life rewriting of the age-old verse, there was no joy in Beantown Monday as mighty Yastrzemski had popped out.

When the battle-weary Red Sox captain popped out with two on and two out in a first-of-a-kind one-game playoff for the A.L. East crown at Fenway Park, the New York Yankees had won one of the classic games of baseball history, 5-4.

"I've gambled all my life, and I've been in a lot of photo finishes, but this is the closest one I've ever lost," Boston manager Don Zimmer said afterward.

And indeed it was a photo finish. The Sox seemingly had the contest and the pennant wrapped up after touching Yankee ace Ron Guidry for two runs in the first five innings--one on a towering Yaz homer in the second, the other on a Jim Rice single.

Sox starter and ex-Yankee Mike Torrez lost his Midas touch in the top of the seventh, though, yielding two singles before shortstop Bucky Dent came to the plate with two outs.

Dent--using a new, light bat that Mickey Rivers brought him during the middle of the at-bat--popgunned a fastball just over the short left-field fence for a 3-2 New York lead.

With the Fenway crowd at first in shock, and then comatose, the visitors upped the lead to 5-2 against reliever Bob Stanley on Thurman Munson's RBI double and Reggie Jackson's solo homer.

The Sox, who had forced the playoff by winning their last eight regular-season games, refused to die easily, striking for two runs in the eighth and putting men on first and third in the ninth.

But Yankee reliever Rich Gossage got Boston's Achilles and Ajax--Rice and Yaz--to make out, and it was all over but for the shouting, the playoffs, and the World Series.

"I'm just glad it's all over," Yankee Roy White said afterward. "I can relax now. We're about to start the playoffs."