BOSTON — After 11 consecutive losses and two straight playoff sweeps, the Los Angeles Angels had grown tired of being a bump in Boston’s road to the World Series.
“I don’t ever want to hear about that streak again. Ever. It’s over,” center fielder Torii Hunter said Sunday night after the Angels beat the Red Sox 5-4 in 12 innings to force their first-round AL playoff series to a fourth game. “We were trying to get that first win out of the way, and then you could see the smiles on people’s faces when we got in here.”
Mike Napoli hit two early homers off Josh Beckett, then singled and scored the go-ahead run in the 12th to help Los Angeles stave off elimination and snap an 11-game postseason losing streak against Boston. The Red Sox came back from a 3-1 ALCS deficit to reach the 1986 World Series, then swept the Angels 3-0 in 2004 and last year en route to their two World Series titles this decade.
“Last year is last year. They obviously had an incredible year,” Angels manager Mike Scioscia said. “They won their world championship in ’04. It was a terrific run. But it’s different times now. . . . They’re not taking the field thinking they have a world championship behind them last year that’s going to change anything. They’re taking to the field trying to beat us, and that’s what we have to do to them.”
Napoli took care of that, hitting a mammoth shot off the Green Monster light stanchion to tie the game 3-all in the third, then giving Los Angeles a lead with his second homer. The Red Sox tied it 4-all in the fifth, and it stayed that way until Napoli took part in a little small ball to score the decisive run in the 12th.
After hitting a leadoff single, Napoli went to second on Howie Kendrick’s sacrifice and scored when Erick Aybar looped a single to left-center.
“Hopefully, about a month from now we’ll talk about that 3-2 breaking pitch that Nap hit off one of the toughest pitchers ever in a playoff environment,” Scioscia said. “That was big. It got us back in the game.”
Beckett, who had been one of the most dependable pitchers in postseason history, gave up a double to Chone Figgins on the first pitch of the game and struggled through five innings. The Angels got six scoreless innings from five relievers to keep them in the game until Jered Weaver finished it 5 hours, 19 minutes after the first pitch.
Weaver, making his first career relief appearance, pitched two scoreless innings for the win. Javier Lopez, the sixth Boston pitcher, took the loss.
Francisco Rodriguez, who had a record 62 saves in the regular season, allowed J.D. Drew’s ninth-inning homer to lose Game 2 and almost took another loss Sunday. The Red Sox loaded the bases against the Angels’ closer in the 10th, but he got Jed Lowrie on a routine fly to right to end the threat.
Winners of a major league- best 100 games in the regular season, Los Angeles was in danger of the shortest possible stay in the playoffs against the wild-card Red Sox.
