Sox score early and often

BOSTON -- Another late October night at Fenway Park, another high fly ball off the foul pole.

Years later, the same result: Home run, Red Sox win.

Mark Bellhorn hit a drive off the foul screen attached to Pesky's Pole in right field, and Boston held on to take the highest-scoring opener in World Series history, beating the St. Louis Cardinals 11-9 Saturday night.

Bellhorn's two-run shot off Julian Tavarez in the eighth inning decided a game in which the Red Sox blew an early five-run lead. And it certainly brought back memories for everyone who watched Carlton Fisk's 12th-inning drive off the left-field pole in 1975 that stunned Cincinnati in Game 6.

All that was missing this time was Bellhorn frantically waving, trying to keep it fair, as Fisk did. No matter, the 100th World Series was off to a wild, crazy start.

David Ortiz kept up his October rampage, hitting a three-run drive for Boston's first Series homer at Fenway since Fisk's famous shot in 1975. The ALCS MVP wound up knocking in four runs -- and knocking out a second baseman.

Larry Walker did his best for the Cardinals, and still they lost their seventh straight Series road game. He homered, doubled twice, singled and hit a fly ball that left fielder Manny Ramirez muffed, helping St. Louis make it 9-9 in the eighth.

Keith Foulke got five outs for the victory as the Red Sox won their fifth straight postseason game, a surge that started when they came back from a 3-0 deficit to beat the New York Yankees in the ALCS.

It was surely not the best baseball ever played, with 13 walks and five errors. Yet it was entertaining the whole way.

Game 2 will be tonight, with Curt Schilling again testing his sewn-together ankle against St. Louis' Matt Morris.

Bellhorn, batting ninth, connected after an error by shortstop Edgar Renteria on Jason Varitek's grounder. Foulke worked around Marlon Anderson's double in the ninth to finish it.

Down 7-2, the Cardinals eventually tied it when Renteria and Walker hit RBI doubles in the sixth.

Right after Ramirez singled home the go-ahead run in the seventh, Ortiz hit a wicked grounder that took a bad hop, clocked drawn-in Tony Womack in the collarbone and sent him to the hospital for X-rays. The RBI single made it 9-7.

Not that the team that led the NL with 53 comebacks wins was worried, especially with the erratic Ramirez out in left field.

Because on consecutive plays in the eighth, Ramirez let St. Louis tie it. Two singles brought Foulke from the bullpen, and Renteria hit a single that Ramirez overran for an error that scored a run.

Walker followed with his fly to left. Ramirez tried to make a sliding catch, but his spikes appeared to catch in the grass. He suddenly popped up and the ball glanced off his glove for another error and the tying run.

The sellout crowd groaned at Ramirez's misplays. Moments later, the fans were delirious were Bellhorn struck.

At the start, the game became a classic NL vs. AL matchup -- bunts against blasts. No surprise, the boppers went ahead because of Ortiz's shot off Woody Williams.

But Tim Wakefield's wildness let the Cardinals rally from the 7-2 deficit. The first knuckleballer to start a Series game since Gene Bearden in 1948, he couldn't control his floater in the blustery conditions and tied a Series record with four walks during a three-run fourth.

At 49 degrees with a 21 mph wind, it was a bit nippy. Plenty of players put on ski caps for batting practice and Cardinals manager Tony La Russa wore gloves on the bench. Commissioner Bud Selig bundled up in a heavy coat and scarf next to the Boston dugout, three rows in front of cuddling couple Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck.

Williams, however, took the mound in short sleeves. After posting Game 1 wins in the first two playoff rounds, he struggled in the cold and soon St. Louis had someone warming up.

Boston chased him in the third on Johnny Damon's bases-loaded single. Dan Haren relieved, Orlando Cabrera hit an RBI single on the first pitch and Ramirez had a run-scoring groundout for a 7-2 lead -- the Boston slugger did not have an RBI in the ALCS.

That's when Wakefield committed a pitcher's sin -- he walked the bases loaded to begin the fourth.

Boston's defense messed up for the first time, starting on Mike Matheny's second sacrifice fly of the game. Cutoff man Kevin Millar hesitated, then skipped his relay into the stands while trying to get a runner at third.

Defensive whiz So Taguchi, playing left field to let Reggie Sanders be the DH, got an RBI when third baseman Bill Mueller couldn't cleanly grip a grounder, and just like that it was 7-5. Wakfield left after his fifth walk, and Bronson Arroyo relieved.

Ortiz kept up his penchant for key hits, launching his fifth homer of the postseason. The drive down the line sailed above the foul pole, right-field umpire Charlie Reliford emphatically signaled fair ball and the Red Sox spilled out of the dugout to greet their big "Papi."

A double by Millar and a two-out single by Mueller made it 4-0.

The Cardinals manufactured a run in the second. Edmonds bunted for a single down the third-base line against the extremely overshifted infield, Womack sacrificed and Matheny had a sacrifice fly that made it 4-1.

Walker, in the Series for the first time in a 16-year career, homered in the third.

Notes: Ortiz became the 28th player to homer in his first Series at-bat. Troy Glaus of Anahaeim (2002) was the last to do it. ... Pitcher Jose Santiago was the only other Red Sox player to homer in his first Series at-bat, doing it against St. Louis' Bob Gibson in 1967. ... The last Series game at Fenway was exactly 18 years ago, when Bruce Hurst beat Dwight Gooden and the Mets 4-2. ... Matheny's two sacrifice flies tied the Series record set by Wes Westrum in 1954 for the New York Giants. ... Ramirez's single in the fifth bounced off a side wall and hit left-field umpire Gerry Davis in the leg. The ball remained in play.