Red Sox Are In The 2021 ALCS

...and Our Man Shank is all over it:

Red Sox’ victory over Rays had drama, excitement, inspiration, and another walkoff, all the way to the ALCS

We got two magic nights at Fenway and two walkoff wins. ‘Neath the cover of October skies.

And so the Red Sox are advancing to the American League Championship Series, which will start Friday in either Houston or Chicago.

The Sox won Game 4 of the ALDS Monday, beating the Tampa Bay Rays, 6-5, on Kiké Hernández’s sacrifice fly to left, scoring Danny Santana from third base in the bottom of the ninth. The wild-card Sox beat the 100-win, first-place, heavily-favored Rays three straight times after losing the series opener.

After defeating the shell-shocked Rays on a 13th-inning walkoff homer by Christian Vázquez Sunday, the Olde Towne Team found more cosmic gold on Marathon Monday. After blowing a 5-0 lead and watching Tampa tie it with two in the eighth, the Sox got two perfect innings from reliever Garrett Whitlock and pushed across the winning run in the ninth.