Page 287 - 1975 BoSox

Sox Double Whitewash the Yanks in New York
By Mark S. Sternman
Game One: Boston Red Sox 1, New York Yankees 0 — July 27, 1975, at Shea Stadium
ROOKIE SUPERSTAR FRED LYNN stole second base in the ninth inning to score the game’s only run and then
made a phenomenal catch of a Graig Nettles gap shot in the bottom of the frame to preserve Bill Lee’s six-hit shutout of the fading Yankees in the opener of a doubleheader in Queens. e loss, New York’s 18th in its last 27 games, dropped the Yankees to just one game over .500.
Neither team had a hit until the fourth, when Boston had the game’s rst threat. With Denny Doyle on rst base after a walk from New York ace Cat sh Hunter, Lynn singled to send Doyle to third with one out. But Hunter struck out rookie Jim Rice and got Rick Miller to ground to rst baseman Chris Chambliss to keep the contest scoreless.
Lee held the Yankees hitless until the fth, when three straight singles strongly suggested that New York would score rst. Nettles and Chambliss singled and Sandy Alomar beat out a bunt to load the bases with nobody out. But light-hitting shortstop Fred Stanley hit into a force out, third baseman to catcher, Bobby Bonds fanned on a “fastball” or “hard screwball,”1 and designated hitter Rick Dempsey popped to Miller in right.
e Yankees threated again in the sixth with a leado double by Roy White. Cleanup hitter and catcher urman Munson failed to advance White with a bunt back to a grateful Lee,2 who threw White out at third. Munson would have just three successful sacri ces in 1975 and a total of 21 in his 11-year career.
Munson’s failure proved critical when right elder Lou Piniella followed with a single that would have scored White but instead only sent Munson to second, from where neither Nettles nor Chambliss could bring him home.
e Red Sox seriously threatened again in the eighth. With two outs, Bernie Carbo, the designated hitter, drew Hunter’s fourth walk of the day. On a full count, Doyle followed with the game’s second and nal extra- base hit, a double, but a Piniella-Alomar-Munson relay cut Carbo down at the plate to set up the dramatic ninth inning.
With one out in the ninth, “Lynn hit a short grounder to short which bounced high.”3 Jim Mason, who had replaced Stanley at shortstop after Alex Johnson hit for Stanley in the seventh, failed to handle the ball cleanly and was charged with an error. With two outs, Lynn swiped second: “ urman Munson’s desperation throw was in the dirt, in front of Mason.”4 Miller then drove in Lynn on Boston’s third and last hit of the day, a liner to left-center that Bonds could not catch.
Lee made the lone run stand up by setting the Yankees down in order in the ninth. He retired Piniella on a comebacker before Nettles “hit a towering, slicing drive to deep left center.”5 e Boston Globe the next day ran two photos of the play from WSBK-TV. In the top frame, center elder Lynn has left his feet and leaped with an outstretched glove-hand as the ball rapidly descends. In the bottom frame, Lynn has begun to tumble with his left arm and leg thrown up in the air while snow-coning the ball, after which he “bounced three times, rolled over, and, with Jim Rice hurdling him, came up with the ball”6 to complete what coach Don Zimmer described as “the ‘best [catch] I’ve ever seen, given the situation.’”7
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