The wire, down

And that brings us to a seventh game that has every excuse to be the best game seven ever.

After tonight’s game, I’m finally ready to echo a sentiment I’ve heard a few times this post-season. The Red Sox have now given me every bit as much of a season as I could have hoped. They have given me thrills, and hope, and joy, and I say this next without a hint of pessimism concerning tomorrow’s game: I won’t cry bitter tears if they lose tomorrow. I am satisfied. I am happy.

I think they will win tomorrow. I think Pedro will find the hard core of anger at his center that he uses to pitch his very best games. I think Roger will falter in the final game of his career, as perverse payback for 1986. I think the heart of the Red Sox batting order — a heart which is, make no mistake, nine men large — has remembered how to bat. I think we’ll see a classic, and I think that when the dust clears the Red Sox will stand in the midst of the enemy, victorious.

But if the worst happens, I know that I will still be telling stories of this season decades from now. The year I came back to Boston, the Red Sox wrote a story to remember. I thank them.