ANAHEIM – Seven players remain on the Red Sox from the 2004 championship team, and yesterday three of them showed they still have that October magic.
Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz hit back-to-back home runs and Curt Schilling added to his sterling postseason resume to give Boston a 9-1 victory and an American League Division Series sweep of the Angels.
The Red Sox will open the American League Championship Series at Fenway Park on Friday.
This Schilling start lacked some of the drama of his previous postseason starts (see Sock, Bloody) but had the same result. The 40-year-old was overpowering when he had to be but for the most part settled for placing his pitches in spots that drew groundballs from the hapless Angels.
“He just carved up both sides of the plate,” Sox general manager Theo Epstein said. “He was really an artist out there today. It was fun to watch.”
Schilling gave up no runs on six hits in seven innings, with one walk and four strikeouts. He ran his postseason record to 9-2, the highest winning percentage for anyone with at least 10 playoff decisions.
He no longer lights up the radar gun, but he showed yesterday he can still come through.
“When you’re throwing less than that, your margin for error is less,” manager Terry Francona said. “But he didn’t forget how to pitch. He didn’t forget how to compete and he didn’t forget how to locate.”
With Schilling rolling through the Angels lineup, it was up to Boston’s two big bats to provide the offense. The Boston big boppers delivered in the fourth inning with consecutive homers off Los Angeles starter Jered Weaver.
The duo had a humongous series. They combined to hit .533 with four home runs and seven RBIs.
“If we’re going to go far, we’re going to count on them,” third baseman Mike Lowell said. “It’s one thing to count on them and it’s another thing for them to come through and they’ve been doing that in big fashion. That’s why they’re our two big dogs.”
The series victory is Boston’s first since that magical fall of 2004. It puts the Red Sox in the ALCS for the third time in five years.
Schilling rarely found himself in trouble and when he did he got out of it. In the third, he loaded the bases with a walk to Vladimir Guerrero that was not officially intentional but could have been. That brought up rookie Reggie Willits, who replaced Garret Anderson (conjunctivitis in the right eye) before the inning.
Schilling toyed with the rookie, getting him to foul out to catcher Jason Varitek.
The Angels threatened again in the seventh when Maicer Izturis doubled to lead off the inning. Schilling got three quick outs, the last a strikeout of Mike Napoli that stranded Izturis at third and put the punctuation mark on Schilling’s outing.
The Angels’ offense never showed up in the series. They went 19-for-99 (.192) in the series. Guerrero was particularly awful. His 0-for-3 yesterday made him 9-for-48 (.188) with one RBI in his last three-playoff series.
The game remained close until the Angels bullpen turned the game into a blowout in the eighth by allowing seven runs.
No Red Sox team ever will feel quite like that 2004 squad, which ended 86 years of suffering, but this year’s edition certainly feels as if it could play deep into October. Daisuke Matsuzaka was the only starter to give up a run. Ramirez (3-for-8, two homers, four RBIs) and Ortiz (5-for-7, two homers, three RBIs) are locked in.
Red Sox 9 Angels 1