Welcome to the Huddle Up Pennant Race World Tour. Five small towns and a small city in three days. And, thankfully, only about four innings of Tim McCarver. Might as well keep a running diary:

Friday, Sept. 30

RUMFORD – Covering the Greely/Mountain Valley football game and the Hosmer Field PA announcer gets the most critical question of the evening out of the way early – Will he be providing scoring updates from Boston? The answer is yes, though the initial announcement isn’t a good one. Yankees got a run in the top of the first.

The updates come fast and furious over the Hosmer loudspeakers, Yanks 1, Sox 1, then Sox 2, Yanks 1. A pretty good football game is unfolding in front of me, too, but I can’t wait for halftime.When it arrives, I sit on the Mountain Valley bench, pull out my blue walkman and search for a decent signal. After some initial static, it pulls in the Yankees’ flagship, WCBS. Here I am, nestled deep in the western Maine valleys, and I can pick up a New York AM station as if I’m sitting in Central Park. God bless AM radio.

Thankfully, the Yankees don’t score during halftime, so I don’t have to suffer through one of John Sterling’s insufferable home run calls.

It’s still 2-1 as the third quarter begins, and the updates come less frequently as the football game becomes more tense.. Finally, as the teams line up to shake hands following a tough Falcons’ win, “Red Sox 5, Yankees 1, sixth inning” echoes throughout Hosmer, and the Mountain Valley faithful breathe their second sigh of relief of the evening.

Waiting for Falcons’ coach Jim Aylward to comment after the game and he’s talking to a guy in a Yankee cap. I bite my lip and refrain from making a smart comment. Interview completed, I hustle up to the car and tune in the Sox broadcast and it’s 5-3 Sox, so I pat myself on the back for keeping my mouth shut a few moments earlier.

Now, it’s 45 miles back to Lewiston, and Joe Castiglione and Jerry Trupiano are my co-pilots.

TURNER – Between innings, I flip the dial over to AM 1100. If memory serves me correctly, that’s the Cleveland Indians’ flagship. Sure enough, I tune in just as the Tribe have gotten themselves into a rundown in the bottom of the ninth. Ben Broussard can’t stay out of the pickle long enough to allow Victor Martinez to score, the winning run, and the anguish in the play-by-play guy’s voice as this unfolds is priceless. Have I told you how much I love AM radio?

LEWISTON – Great timing. I pull in to the Sun Journal parking lot just as Derek Jeter, who should change his number to 27 for all of the final outs he’s made this year, grounds out to end the ballgame. I can now file in peace.

Saturday, Oct. 1

SABATTUS – Home, and I can finally catch some of the series on television before heading to my son’s football game at 3. Things get into an inauspicious start as I emerge from the shower only to witness Gary Sheffield’s two-run moonshot in the first. 3-0 Yanks in the first.

Manny Ramirez matches Sheffield in the tale of the tape, but the Sox are still down a run. Kevin Millar takes care of that with another bronze glove play at first that turns a potential double play into a couple of runs for the bad guys. Maybe watching this wasn’t such a good idea. I’m heading to Wales. Hideki Matsui goes deep before I get out of my driveway.

WALES – Welcome to beautiful Oak Hill High School, where the Oak Hill fifth and sixth graders are set to do gridiron battle with the Maranacook fifth and sixth graders. It’s a grudge match, as the Black Bears handed the Radiers their only loss earlier in the season.

Oh yeah, that other game. I left the walkman in the car, secure in the knowledge that Bill Fairchild, working the PA at my boy’s game, would update us if anything occurs. No news is bad news, however, as Bill is making more noise about the Whoopie Pies missing from the concession stand than the baseball game.

Finally, he brings us up to speed, 8-4 Yankees in the ninth. That’s all I need to hear for today.

Sunday, Oct. 2

FOXBORO – Yes, I’m at the Patriots game writing a Red Sox column. Sportswriting’s a crazy business, huh?

All of the monitors in the press box are tuned to the football game. Fortunately, the guy next to me has his wireless for regular updates. Chicago jumps out to an early lead on the Tribe, and the Gillette Stadium crowd lets out its biggest roar of the first quarter when the PA announces “Chicago 2, Cleveland 0”. I’ll tell ya, PA announcers went up a couple of notches in my book this weekend. They do a thankless job.

The Sox game starts and Steve, the guy next to me, is already starting in on Schilling. The Yanks have first-and-third and two out, and Steve says “What’s God (his ultra-clever nickname for Schilling) going to do now, put red dye in his sock?”

Steve hasn’t shut up the whole game, but what am I gonna say? He’s my only life-line.

At halftime, on my way to some free press box cuisine, I finally track down a monitor tuned to NESN, just in time to see Schilling blow Tino Martinez away with a man at third. Good ol’ Steve-O is nowhere to be found.

My pal unveils more of his nicknames in the second half. Manny is “Manny the Wonder Dawwwg”, Trot Nixon is “Dick Nixon”. He’s got a million of em, folks. Finally, he takes time out from the Chris Berman act to check the score. 1-0 Sox.

Meanwhile, on the field, Drew Brees is carving up the Patriots’ secondary It’s 34-17, San Diego with about five minutes to go. The defending champs are about to go down at home for the first time in three years, and the fans are filing out of Gillette like they’ve got another bandwagon to catch. .

Now, it’s 2-0, courtesy of Bill Mueller, or as I would like to think Steve calls him “That guy who spells his last name wrong.” I’ve got some interviews to catch downstairs in the Patriots locker room, aka “The Dead Zone.” Doubt they’ll have the game on down there.

Upon returning to the press box about a half hour later, I catch a glance of a monitor and it’s 10-1 Sox. We’re goin’ to Chicago.

My buddy Steve returns to his seat about two minutes after me.

“Boy, those Patriots were a joy, huh?” he says while opening his laptop. “It’s 10-1, by the way.”

Thanks Steve. I couldn’t have made it without you.

Randy Whitehouse is a staff writer. He can be reached by e-mail at [email protected]