Gary Throne, A Bloody Mess: The Bloody Sock Revisited, Curt Schilling & MASN's Gary Throne...

Well, most baseball fans know of the 'bloody sock' game that Curt Schilling pitched in the '04 ALCS (game 6) to tie the series for the Boston Red Sox.

Now, someone is questioning the validity of that game.

However, it's none other than MASN's own Gary Thorne.

From boston.com:

Thorne said on the air, while the Orioles were batting in the fifth, that he'd been told by Sox catcher Doug Mirabelli that was not blood, but paint, on the sock Schilling wore during Game 6 of the 2004 American League Championship Series against the Yankees. It was done for the public relations effect, Thorne said.

"The great story we were talking about the other night was that famous red stocking that he wore when they finally won, the blood on his stocking," Thorne said to broadcast partner Jim Palmer, the Hall of Fame pitcher, in a conversation that had begun with a discussion of Schilling's blog.

"Nah," Thorne said. "It was painted. Doug Mirabelli confessed up to it after. It was all for PR. Two-ball, two-strike count."

Palmer: "Yeah, that was the 2004 World Series [sic]." Thorne: "Yeah."
During a break two innings later, Thorne confirmed that's what he said, and that Mirabelli had told him so in a conversation "a couple of years ago."

"Go ask him [Mirabelli]," Thorne said.

Mirabelli was shocked, then angry, when relayed Thorne's comments.
"What? Are you kidding me? He's [expletive] lying. A straight lie," Mirabelli said. "I never said that. I know it was blood. Everybody knows it was blood."

Wow. Okay.

Well, I can only imagine the coverage this is getting in Boston. Well, here are some quotes from the higher-ups on the Red Sox, and from Curt ’38 Pitches’ Schilling himself.

What Schilling says:

"It gets stupider," Schilling said with a tone of resignation in his voice. "I got the 9-inch scar for you. You can see it.

"There are some bad people in your line of work, man."

Here’s what Terry “Tito” Francona says about the situation:

"I am just floored. Schill takes his share of shots, and this one is so far below the belt that I'm embarrassed and I wish somebody would have had the good conscience to ask me. I saw the leg. If that had been painted, I wouldn't have had my knuckles so white, and having so much anxiety."

Larry Lucchino:

"I have never heard any such thing internally, and I refuse to believe it now," Lucchino wrote. "It was a courageous moment for Curt Schilling and a glorious moment for the Red Sox, and it shouldn't be sullied with such speculation now."

My favorite of them all – Theo Epstein:

"You're kidding me, right?" Red Sox general manager Theo Epstein wrote in an e-mail last night. "I'm the GM of the team, not Jerry Springer. I couldn't give two [expletives] about what was on his sock, I care that we won the game. The rest, and Gary Thorne, is just noise."


Now, I am no fan of the Red Sox – but one of my best friends in Marblehead, Mass., is and I can only imagine what is going through his mind at this moment.

I’ll say watching the 2004 ALCS myself – there is no way the bloody sock story is fake. I believe Schilling did indeed pitch with a bloody sock, and what transpired with that game and the 2004 World Series was special.

Schilling, for that game, no matter what I have said about, you have my respect for life. It takes a real ballplayer and a man of grit to pitch through all of that.

However, I need to take Gary Throne (a MASN guy – a basically an employee of the Orioles to task) and Jim Palmer too for not even refuting the assertion Throne made.

It’s been proven time and time again that Schilling did indeed pitch with sutures in him, and they did break, thus blood leaked out.

Do we need a freaking DNA test for this now?

What’s especially shocking to me was that Gary Throne, not only a veteran of baseball play-by-play, but hockey, would even say such a thing – especially something that is pretty much fact. I don’t know if he was trying to make conversation with Jim Palmer, or perhaps was just bored but needed to talk about something, but his thoughts were just way off base.

What Throne was thinking, I don’t know; therefore, he’s going to have a hell of a lot of people mad at him, even myself…