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I didn’t get to see the game yet. As I write this, it’s about noon on Wednesday, and I was at a Black Sabbath concert last night. I did tape the game, I’ll watch it later tonight and say something tomorrow.
However, I did get to see the thing in the beginning with Ted Williams – that was just so cool. I got to see two of my Phillies heroes from my childhood on the field (I was 15 and living in Philadelphia when the Phils won the series in 1980) – that was great.
More from me later – plus I also intend on getting some screen captures from the game of the Rangers players.
Edit in Dec 2008: As I finally convert the 1999 season to this new site format, I noticed I never wrote about this game, so I’ll copy an old wire story up here:
BOSTON (TICKER) — On a night when baseball honored Ted Williams, Pedro Martinez built his own New England All-Star lore.
Martinez, already an icon in just his second season with the Red Sox, became the first pitcher to open an All-Star Game with four strikeouts and fanned five in two dazzling innings to lead the American League to a 4-1 victory over the National League at Fenway Park.
Martinez earned the win with the help of run-scoring singles in the first by Jim Thome, one of four Cleveland Indians in the starting lineup, and 17-time All-Star Cal Ripken of Baltimore.
“I was really excited,” Martinez said. “But it wasn’t really for the fan’s reaction, it was just to see so many glories of baseball all together at one time.”
The third and final All-Star Game at one of baseball’s storied stadiums featured pregame ceremonies steeped in tradition. Candidates for baseball’s All-Century Team, including Hank Aaron, Willie Mays and Fenway legend Carl Yastrzemski, were introduced along with the players in tonight’s game.
The final tribute was saved for the 80-year-old Williams, an 18-time All-Star and the last player to hit .400, 58 years ago. Williams was taken to the middle of the infield on a golf cart, where both All-Star clubs and members of the All-Century Team converged to greet him amid thunderous applause.
“I can only describe it as great,” Williams said. “It didn’t surprise me all that much because I know how these fans are here in Boston. They love this game as much as any players and Boston’s lucky to have the faithful Red Sox fans.”
So enthralled were the past and present players with seeing Williams that an announcement had to be made to get the players back to their dugouts and begin the game, which started 14 minutes later than the scheduled 8:40 p.m. EDT.
With the aid of 15-time All-Star Tony Gwynn of the San Diego Padres, Williams made a soft toss to honorary AL captain Carlton Fisk, another Boston hero.
That set the stage for Martinez, baseball’s winningest pitcher (15) and the first Red Sox to start an All-Star Game since Roger Clemens in 1986. He made the most of his 28 pitches, 19 of which were strikes.
Martinez set down Barry Larkin and one-time teammate Larry Walker before fanning two of baseball’s most prolific long-ball hitters, Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire. All but Walker went down swinging.
“I don’t have too much to say, just fastball, changeup and curveball,” Martinez said of his encounter with Sosa and McGwire.
“He’s right now probably the top pitcher in the game and will be for a while,” said Walker, currently with Colorado and a one-time teammate of Martinez in Montreal. “He was dominating with all his pitches and threw them all for strikes.”
Matt Williams broke the streak by reaching on an error by second baseman Roberto Alomar as Martinez fell one shy of the record for consecutive strikeouts set by Carl Hubbell in 1934 and matched by Fernando Valenzuela in 1986.
Martinez ended up facing the minimum six batters after Jeff Bagwell struck out and Williams was thrown out attempting to steal. The All-Star record for strikeouts in a game is six by four pitchers, most recently by Ferguson Jenkins in 1967.
Martinez’s regular-season dominance carried over to the mid-season classic as he was named Most Valuable Player, the first Red Sox to earn the honor since Clemens in 1986. The only other Red Sox named All-Star MVP was Yastrzemski in 1970.
Martinez became the first pitcher to win a game in his home park since Toronto’s Jimmy Key in 1991. He has pitched four scoreless innings in three All-Star appearances.
The loser was starter Curt Schilling of Philadelphia, a one-time Red Sox minor leaguer who allowed a pair of runs in the first.
“I’m happy, but I certainly wish I would have thrown two scoreless innings,” Schilling said.
The game featured 13 hits, just six by the winners. The teams combined for 22 strikeouts, breaking the mark of 21 for a nine-inning All-Star Game set in 1984. No player had more than one hit, the first time that has happened since 1988 in Cincinnati.
Kenny Lofton of Cleveland reached on an infield single when Schilling was late covering first on a grounder. Lofton promptly stole second before Boston’s Nomar Garciaparra flied out to right field and Ken Griffey Jr. took a called third strike. Manny Ramirez of Cleveland walked and Thome and Ripken followed with consecutive RBI singles.
“It was great. Kenny did his normal thing and got on base, and I got lucky and got a hit,” said Thome, who has hitless in his three previous All-Star at-bats.
Martinez was replaced by David Cone of the New York Yankees, who allowed a run in the third on a double by Jeromy Burnitz and a two-out single by Larkin. Cone also allowed the NL to load the bases in the fourth before getting Burnitz on a groundout.
The AL increased its lead to 4-1 with two runs in the fourth off 14-game winner Kent Bottenfield of St. Louis, who opened the inning by walking Thome and hitting Ripken with a pitch. Rafael Palmeiro of Texas singled home a run and Ripken scored after third baseman Williams misplayed a ball hit by Alomar.
Garciaparra, who received a warm ovation before the game, was hitless in two at-bats before being replaced in the fourth by Derek Jeter of the AL East rival Yankees. Garciaparra missed Boston’s last nine games due to a groin injury, and the ailment may have prevented him from getting to the single by Larkin in the third.
Sosa and McGwire had their chances to get the NL back in the game in the fifth, but Mike Mussina of Baltimore struck out the sluggers with runners on second and third to end the threat.
A dazzling play by Cleveland shortstop Omar Vizquel saved a run in the seventh. The NL put runners on first and third off Texas rookie Jeff Zimmerman with the help of an error by Boston second baseman Jose Offerman. Vizquel reached a ground ball up the middle by Vladimir Guerrero of Montreal and flipped the ball straight from his glove to Offerman for the final out of the inning.
“I thought it was just an opportunity to shine for my team,” Vizquel said. “I didn’t have much time to think about it. I just did the best I can.”
The NL went down meekly thereafter. Texas closer John Wetteland got the save, ending the game by starting a broken-bat double play by San Francisco’s Jeff Kent.
Despite Fenway’s cozy dimensions, the game did not feature a home run. Coming closest was Thome, who flied out to the warning track in right field off Jose Lima of Houston in the fifth.
The AL won its third straight All-Star Game, but still trails in the series, 40-29-1.

What’s surprising the last several outings by John Burkett is how GOOD he’s pitched. I wonder where all this stuff has been hiding the last several years? He’s definitely looked to me the best he’s ever looked in Texas these last four games he’s pitched. He didn’t get a win today, but six innings, giving up one run and six hits is pretty good to me. Not godlike, but certainly way better than our pitching has been overall. He would have gone further if we weren’t in a National League game, too.
Speaking of that, this was our final game in a National League Park this season – our pitchers were terrible batting this year, after a great year in 97 and an OK year in 98. Mike Morgan had a single yesterday, but that’s the lone hit by Ranger pitchers this year – Burkett looked weird up there, even more so than some of the others.
Anyway, this game was a great pitchers duel until the bottom of the 8th when Loaiza & Venafro just blew it, giving up 5 runs in the 8th. San Diego pitcher Matt Clement pitched excellent, going 7 innings, giving up one run and only 3 hits – the other Ranger run was a solo home run by Raffy in the 9th.
Juan Gonzalez wasn’t in the game, as he and his wife were at the hospital as their youngest daughter had an asthma attack in the morning, and had to be rushed there. During the radio post game show, they said that the group were still at the hospital, and tests were still going on. As I write this at 1:20AM on Monday morning, I still had not heard anything new here.
We end the “half” in first place, with a five game lead over Oakland, a six game lead over Seattle, and a 6.5 game lead over Anaheim. We should have been around 8 on the second place team, but I’ll take the lead – this is the largest lead we’ve had at an All-Star Break ever. Speaking of that, Manny Ramirez ended up with 96 (or 98, I’m not sure right now) RBI’s going into the break, a couple short of Juan last year. However, Juan had a really slow second half last year, and my gut feeling says that Manny won’t this year – I think he might take a stab at Hack Wilson, and he’ll probably get the MVP.
Hey, I like Manny Ramirez – I’m 33, and in all my years of going to baseball games, he’s the only person I’ve ever caught a foul ball from (May of 98 at the Ballpark). OK, it’s a geeky reason to like someone, but what the hell, it’s my reason. :)
Hopefully when the second half starts, we can put some distance between us and the rest of the division – our focus needs to be on the best record we can get, because if things end up the way they are now, we’re playing the Yankees again in the first round of the playoffs – UGH!!!

The Good: Todd Zeile extended his hitting streak. We had three Ranger home runs.
The Bad: Mike Morgan seems more like what his record indicates he would be pitching like, not like the guy we saw in Anaheim the other week.
The Ugly: Two errors in the 9th inning leading to a total defensive meltdown, costing us the game.
Oh my, what an ugly way to lose a game. Not only did we commit one error (Rusty’s bobble of a ball he tried to basket catch), but the one by Wetteland to finish the game was obscene. Actually, he probably should have been charged with TWO errors, as on the play before it he failed to cover his part of the infield – Wetteland seemed asleep on defense, big time.
Scarborough Green made it into this game – he drew a walk. I tend to root for the guys who hardly ever get to play, I seemed to have picked this up from my wife Lynn who feels this way about all kinds of sports players. I’m wondering how much longer he stays around, especially if we make some sort of move before the end of the month.
The ending of this game really spoiled what was an otherwise good game. Mike Morgan looked sloppy again, and we ended up taking the lead on three home runs hit by our guys today, including a real dinger of a shot by Ruben Mateo (440 feet or so). Todd Zeile set a career high hitting streak for himself with 17, and I was feeling good going into the bottom of the ninth, especially after a baserunning blunder by the Padres left us with two outs and the lead. Then Wetteland has his meltdown.
It’s too bad, as I can’t think of anything else about this game except this.

Aaron Sele looked really good, like he had some of his best stuff going tonight. He was great through the first six innings, but seemed to crap out come the seventh – he had something like 115 pitches, if I’m not mistaken. He gave up two innings, before handing the ball over to Venafro, who ended the seventh inning. Jeff Zimmerman came in and got another scoreless inning – lowering his ERA from 0.89 to 0.88. It’s about at the point where it’s not going anywhere else. :) John Wetteland would have come in for the ninth, but we scored a couple of more runs in the top of the 9th, putting a save out of reach, so Tim Crabtree came in for the ninth, and did really well. Again, our bullpen led the way – giving up nothing.
Our offence got started early with a solo home run by Pudge in the first inning. We also had home runs from two others, a solo shot by Ruben Mateo, just back from the DL, and a two run shot by Royce Clayton (whose mother was shown in the stands cheering for him after the hr). Overall, it seemed like a very nice game – good pitching (2 runs on 9 hits), great offense (3 HR, 7 runs on 8 hits), and some awesome defense.
Twice Aaron Sele got out of bases loaded, once in a most cool factor. Bases were loaded with no one out, and Sele got a really big strikeout. Then he got Jackson to hit a ball back to him, and Sele converted a really cool pitcher to catcher to first double play ending the inning.
Todd Zeile did not play, he was “excused” from the game, as he had a personal matter to attend to at home (as his family is in Los Angeles).
Couple of interesting things about the game.. It seemed that every time Juan came up, he was booed (not terribly loudly, but you could hear it on TV), and when Pudge came into the dugout one time, there were two girls within earshot of a microphone screaming “Pudge, we came all the way from Texas, will you sign my ball? We love youuuuuuuuu!” Cute. :)
Tomorrow we’re on national Fox TV coverage – let’s see how bad they dump on Juan for his All-Star game stance.

Rick Helling doesn’t look like the pitcher he was last year. He’s had only one win in his last 8 starts. However, he does seem to be suffering from a lack of run support this year. Many a time, he’s pitched really well, only to be taken out late with a 2-1 deficit, or something like that. It’s too bad. Still, he is pitching well overall, but his record doesn’t show it, and his ERA was killed by his first couple of starts of the season.
However, our bullpen continues it’s masterpieces. Wetteland got his 26th save, and Zimmerman got his eighth win – At this rate, we have a chance of a bullpen pitcher having our most wins. I wonder what the record for any team for bullpen wins by one pitcher in a season is? Wetteland made it interesting in the 9th by allowing the bases to get loaded, but we ended up winning by 3.
I didn’t get to catch all of the game, as it was on during the day at work, and I sometimes can’t pay attention at work like I can at home. Still, it was a win, and we’ll always take that.
Nice day for the team – we have four All-Stars this year (Pudge, Raffy, Wetteland, & Zimmerman). We would have had five, for an all time Ranger record if Juan hadn’t decided to sulk.
The new Ranger killer, Ben Grieve hit another home run against us – this was his first one at home in about a year!