Deciding how long a contract to offer to Jason Varitek — or whether even to offer him one at all — doesn’t look like it’s going to be the only difficult decision the Red Sox will have to make concerning one of their veteran players after the season.
Judging from tonight’s performance, they may have to decide if knuckleballer Tim Wakefield’s usefulness has come to an end. Wakefield is signed only through this season with annual club options thereafter.
It wasn’t the three homers Wakefield allowed that should concern the Sox. Those things happen with knuckleballers of any age. It was the play preceding Willy Aybar’s two-run homer that should have the Red Sox worried.
Carl Crawford hit a soft groundball to the right side that Wakefield had to field. The 42-year-old Wakefield — who tonight became the oldest pitcher to ever start an ALCS game — looked painfully slow coming off the mound to make what should have been a routine play. He ended up having to dive for the ball and then had trouble getting it out of his glove. From his stomach he flipped the ball to first baseman Mark Kotsay, but too late to get Crawford for what should have been the third out of the inning.
Instead Aybar followed with a homer, extending a 3-0 lead to a commanding 5-0 edge.
Knuckleballers can throw forever, and some of them have pitched into their mid and late 40s. But while their arms never go, their legs do. And when their legs go, so do they.
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