that, my friends, was the dictionary definition of suckage, but in the playoffs it's not over til someone gets sent home

i find it interesting to note how looking backward can change your perspective. for example: the idea behind paying out all that cash for the Japanese pitching phenom, whose legendary (of Loch Ness variety) "gyroball" had the Red Sox & Yankees foaming at the mouth, seemed like a good one. not only were we adding a third ace-quality starter to our rotation, but we were wisely *keeping* him from pitching for our nemesis. brilliant move! check mate! except that now it looks like we put all our eggs (all hundred million of them) in one basket, and scored ourselves a wicked expensive Kei Igawa. hindsight, i tell ya.

or perhaps we could talk about the sneaky move we made during the dwlindling moments of the trade deadline, swiping one of the game's elite closers out of the grasp of (once again) the Yankees. we were going to have not one, not two, but *three* closer-caliber pitchers to fall back on when we picked up the bullpen phone. you think the Yankees are still feeling abdominal soreness after the uproarious laughter they surely had at our expense? because for all of that fist-pumping at landing Eric Gagne, we could have gotten the same by simply re-signing Rudy Seanez. i think, after all my support, no matter how the chips were down, i have earned the right to be disheartened by Gagne at this point. don't get me wrong. i am still pulling for him, but you've got to give me a reason to keep believing, and i am not even seeing the faintest glimmer of hope here. i wish, for his sake as well as our own, that he had simply put his foot down & pointed to his no-trade clause in silence. hindsight.

so in light of this whole "the true nature of the beast is not how good it looks tonight, but in what it looks like in the morning" philosophy, i am going to implement a little reverse psychology in regard to Game Three. last night looked, in a word, bad. and before you wag your finger at me & say that's not looking at last night's loss with fresh eyes, let me just say that i call it "bad" now, when last night words like "abysmal" and "dismal" came immediately to mind. bad is most definitely an improvement in disposition. what i am hoping is that tonight our elder statesman will stroll, with his calm, quiet demeanor, onto the mound, give the Indians a little what-for by means of a dancing knuckleball, and that suddenly we'll be back to an even record, so that i can look at Monday night with a shrug, chalk it up to a serving of humble pie, and be able to state, one more time: hindsight.

the game started out promising. i mean, how can you feel anything but fired up when Jonathan Papelbon gives you your Sox starting line up while biting back a grin that just reeks of mischief & shenanigans? i will even tell you that the raucous cheering coming from those Cleveland fans made me proud as a fan of the game. turns out, as the game progressed, i would begin to loathe that guy & his infernal drum-banging, and miss terribly the rousing Red Sox chants that followed the boys around the country during the regular season, but were noticeably absent when we needed them most.

i tried, valiantly, to shake off the feeling of foreboding i got, when i realized Coco must have forgotten the memo in which was clearly stated the Sox were no longer squandering bases-loaded opportunities because this is October now, and these games are for real. (for shame, Covelli. for *shame*.) at this point, i merely determined that the problem lay in the fact that i had donned my lucky Trot Nixon jersey, and its power was lost in this environment known as The Jake, where our Dirt Dog now calls home. off came the Trot jersey, replaced with the Lowell All Star option instead. surely *that* would right the ship.

i settled back on my couch, and just about the time i was chuckling to myself that Kenny Lofton walks exactly like Woody in "Toy Story," the old timer lets one sail, and suddenly a 2-0 deficit sucks the humor out of the moment. i crashed back to earth, recalling every start Matsuzaka has made since July. the only laugh i was able to manage, after that little trip down memory lane, was a dark one, when one of the talking heads commented on how Kenny Lofton is still chasing a ring. the sharp laugh was the accompaniment as i thought to myself: if that is the case, i am kind of wishing he had pursued that dream by way of Boston.

by the end of the game, i had changed from the Lowell jersey to my favorite "what's not to love?" Sox t-shirt, and then in a moment of desperation, layered the Lowell jersey *and* the Trot jersey on top of it. it wasn't going to help though. nothing would. not even a two-run shot by El Capitan. none of it would be enough. it was a hard game to watch. hard to admit that starting pitching not executed by Commander Kick Ass himself was no longer our strong point, that our bats never materialized, and that no combination of relief would be our savior. we couldn't even count on good umpiring last night, because i don't know what parallel universe the home plate umpire was watching this game from, but he was not calling a game that was happening in real life.

i think the shot of Schill, a cup in each hand, chewing sunflower seeds like a chipmunk with a nervous tic, about summed up the level of anxiety we have all reached as a collective nation. i want nothing more than to see the boys take the field tonight with fire flashing in their eyes, lightning bolts for bats that leave the sound of thunder echoing in the stunned silence of Jacobs Field as the ball is slapped out of sight, pushing across home plate an obscene number of runners with Boston worn proudly across their chests. i want to see Coco's backside glued to the bench & the youth movement that carried us into the post season patrolling center field with the name Ellsbury across its shoulders. i want Dougie to remind us why he once bore the nickname "Stud Who Hits Bombs." but more than anything else, i want to see them play like winning is the only option. because, ya know, my calendar reads October. and that's sort of the situation we're finding ourselves in these days.

that & i want to pretend the scariest thought ever (and i say this after seeing "A Hundred Million Reasons I Don't Want to See Matsuzaka on the Mound Again Anytime Soon") was never uttered, or that maybe the Sox have taken a page out of Bill Belichick's Guide to Making Your Opponent Feel Safer Than They Should. because taking Papi's bat out of the lineup right now? not so much a trip to the happiest place on earth.

since Daniel has informed me that it is, indeed, wrong of me to secretly hope that the business side of baseball is industriously making the necessary phone calls as we speak to ensure a Sox-Rox World Series because it's better for the ratings, then my alternate option is that someone with fury, someone with a substantial stockpile of firearms who is just crazy enough to make them all worry to the point of sitting up & paying attention, someone the likes of Mike Timlin, stormed the clubhouse last night, bellowing into the somber quiet, demands that they knock this sh*t off right this minute.

this is October, after all. and the chances are getting slim.
may the knuckleball be our saving grace.