Ervin Santana vs Josh Beckett in Fenway

Remember that game was an ungodly 7:05AM PDT start, maybe Erv will do better with a couple hours later start :) and weather warmer than 47F

DISTANT VOICE: (rev wake up, wake up rev...)

this is a great way to overcome the odds.  Take it all on at once, Ervin...

I remember that Dr. Leo Marvin (in the epic film "What about Bob" with Bill Murray) wrote a book called "Baby Steps."  This will certainly be no baby-step for Ervin.

However, Francona made a mistake. He's starting Bucholz in the second game. Now it becomes a question of matchups. Lackey vs Bucholz gives us a much better shot at winning than matching up Lackey vs Beckett and Santana vs Bucholz.

Mike will probably throw out the bench for the first game. Budde (or Mathis if Nap is back), Quinlan, Aybar, and Haynes in. Juice, Vlad, Garret, and either Kotch or Cabrera will sit.

If by some miracle, Santana is on his game, we get a free shot at winning the first one. If not, no big deal, we weren't really expecting to win it anyway.

Doing it this way, pouring all of Santana's former bugaboo's on him at once, might actually help. There's so little chance of him winning, there's no real pressure on him at all, which might help him relax. All we really want him to do is pitch relatively deep in the game.

Mariners on being 1 game back as of Friday.

Why the F--- would you bring back Ervin "Black Hole" Santana, who's been shaky at best all season and not doing much better against AAA teams, and not only have him pitch a ROAD game--where he provides his worst starts--but have him do it against the RED SOX?

For fuck's sake if you're going to give up on the game at least bring in someone like Olenberger who the Sox have never seen so we have an outside chance of winning. Seriously.

Gonna be a long day. Maybe I should go camping with my girlfriend instead.

Not saying he would pitch much in the playoffs, but at the same time wouldn't we still want it to be possible if necessary?

O = How many outs will Santana record before Butcher's first trip to the mound?