Major League Baseball's regular season lasts for a grueling 162 games. Anyone who's played the game can tell you - it's a marathon, not a sprint.
Yeah, I know. That's the mother of all clichés. It's been beaten to death a million times before, and it wasn't even that interesting to begin with. But bear with me.
This year's Red Sox team is the guy in the front of the pack. He's got the talent to run away from the field right from the start, but he stays back, keeping it close, just jogging along. He's saving himself for that final sprint.
That's the philosophy that's guided the Red Sox all year long. That's what was going through their heads in May, when they sidelined the 7-0 Josh Beckett for 16 days with the most minor of finger injuries. It's why they gave Curt Schilling a month and a half to recover from a sore shoulder. And it's why Manny Ramirez sat out almost a month with a strained oblique.
Gun to his head, any of those three men could have suited up and played hurt throughout the regular season, just to help his team win. But the Red Sox, banking on their comfortable AL East lead all year long, saved their big guns for October.
Those three men have three things in common. First, they're all healthy now - and then some.
Second, they were the three heroes of the team's first-round sweep of the Angels this week. Beckett turned in one of the finest pitching performances in postseason history in Game 1, Ramirez hit his first walk-off homer ever at Fenway in Game 2, and Schilling closed the deal with a seven-inning gem in Game 3.
And third, they're all World Series MVPs.
If you're building a team to win in October, it's hard to find a better nucleus than those three guys. Just look at the numbers.
In just six postseason starts, Beckett has more career shutouts (three) than he's amassed his 169 career regular-season games (two). He carried the Marlins in the 2003 World Series - at age 23. His career postseason ERA is 1.74.
Schilling is this generation's Mr. October. He's 9-2 with a 1.93 ERA in the playoffs. He's been to the World Series with three different teams, won it with two of them, and absolutely dominated with one - the '01 Diamondbacks, with whom he made three starts and allowed four runs. Not bad.
Ramirez has 22 career home runs in the postseason, which puts him tied for the record with Bernie Williams. Here's a bold prediction: that first-place tie is even less secure than Joe Torre's job. (Sorry. I couldn't resist.) Manny was a downright filthy .375/.615/1.125 in the Red Sox' first round sweep. He's hot, to say the least.
Can anyone in Cleveland look at those résumés without trembling? Didn't think so.
Of course, the Red Sox are much more than those three guys. David Ortiz made Manny look like a slouch last week, going .714/.846/1.571 in the three games. Mike Lowell and J.D. Drew drove in three runs each. And everyone in the bullpen not named Eric Gagne was lights-out.
At the Sox' postgame press conference on Sunday, Schilling said: "This is not a solo thing. You've got to have a team to make it work."
And seconds later, the 40-year-old veteran stood up to leave the press room, revealing on his T-shirt, in bright white lettering, the Sox' postseason motto.
The Season Begins Now.
This is the sprint to the finish line. No one remembers the first 25 miles.
Evans Clinchy is a junior majoring in English. He can be reached at Evans.Clinchy@tufts.edu.
