Red Sox games make the night, early in the morning, tired fans

Slowly, watery eyes, they emerged in the morning of dawn.

On Thursday, on Washington Street, it was nearly 6 am, the day after a second straight game of the Red Sox World Series. Fatigue was beginning to be felt, especially for early birds in the city.

"I'm paying for it now," said Brian Schweizer, 37, while he was preparing omelettes and sausage pies behind the counter at Archie's Place in Pi Alley early Thursday morning. He had watched the first two games of the Red Sox World Series in their entirety and had only slept three hours Wednesday night before the start of his five-hour shift.

The hometown team may have started the series well – the Red Sox have a 2-0 lead in the series before Friday's game 3 in Los Angeles – but that was not without collateral damage to the teams. circadian rhythms of the local. fan base.

Throughout this sleep-free region, people are experiencing the inevitable effects of a pair of late-night games, relying heavily on caffeine, sheer willpower and the promise of next weekend to move on to through the rest of the work week.

The first match of Tuesday night lasted three hours and 52 minutes and extended until after midnight. Wednesday's match was shorter but continued late into the night. That does not bode well for the remaining games in the series, in the meantime, the fact that the Sox and Dodgers are notoriously slow, both having an average of three hours and 13 minutes per game in the regular season – or near 10 minutes more than the average championship.

All this left the fans who have trouble emptying the next day.

In New Haven, Connecticut, Trish Resio, a Red Sox fan, did his best to avoid burnout. The day after the first match, she ate three cups of coffee, a cup more than usual, and tried to calm herself down by thinking she was not the only one to walk in the day with zombies.

"You will stay awake, you will suffer," said Resio, who works for the Yale School of Management. "But there's that camaraderie around that, when you see other exhausted fans with you."

For Tes Kebede, a friendly 46-year-old who had stood up to finish Wednesday's second game when he was supposed to be at work around 4 am on Thursday, the win also helped.

"I always feel good thanks to the win," said parking manager Pi Alley before joking: "If they lose and I spend all my time watching, I'll be pissed off."

For some, the late start times and long matches have certainly been too numerous.

Like a number of shy construction workers coming out of Dunkin 'Donuts on Thursday morning, Jerry Clarke admitted that he only survived the fourth or fifth inning of the second game before going to bed, even though he was offering a reasonable excuse.

Not only does he begin his exterminator work every morning at 3 am, he added, but "I'm always tired of the last time the Bruins won the Cup."

Indeed, Boston sports team supporters have a lot of experience in sports-induced sleep deprivation.

The 2004 series of the American League of Champions League, in which two of the last four games of the series have taken an extra turn, has provided valuable practice, said Andy Ellis, security manager at Akamai Technology in Cambridge. Ditto for the annual barrage of the night games of the Patriots and the almost annual appearances of the Super Bowl.

At the same time, Ellis confessed, he would not mind seeing the Red Sox sweep the series Saturday night in Los Angeles, which would give him a respite from one night before what, another Monday, late at night, when the Patriots face the Buffalo Bills in a prime time match with a send-off of 8:15.

"I'm a little older now," he said. "So midnight feels like 2 am at the time."

However, in typical Boston fashion, fans seem to be deceiving themselves – despite some inevitable squeaks on social networks.

Bob Kelley, who has operated a small Pi Alley lottery ticket and key store for over 30 years, said customers were not complaining much after match 1. Controlling the attendance book Wednesday, Anna Ford, a deputy director of Newton North High School, was a little surprised to learn that the delays and absences had not increased the day after the nearly four-hour victory of the Red Sox game 1.

Again, she said, he was early in the series.

"Next week," she said, "it's going to be difficult for a lot of fans."

Indeed, with the potential to win five more games in a series at the best of seven years, all starting after 20 hours. locally – the endurance test could extend until Halloween.

But as the sun began to rise on the city on Thursday morning, Adrian Dominguez was standing in front of a Donkin 'Donuts, smiling as he painted the windows in a bright red Sox jacket.

Lynn, 43, a jovial 43-year-old, knew that this afternoon, he would surely feel the effects of the previous night, when he was awake to watch the final of the 4th in Boston. 2 win.

But the Red Sox only hold two more matches in another World Series title, and that one idea, he said, was enough to propel him until the end of his 12 hours.

As he said, standing in the cool morning while the city was slowly animating, "it's a beautiful feeling."

[email protected] can reach Dugan Arnett. Follow him on Twitter @duganarnett.