Every playoff series always has a big hero. But in the 2007 Red Sox case, I’d say they had one for each game. For game one, it was Josh Beckett pitching a complete game shutout. For game two, Manny won the game on a three run, two out, walk off home run that was probably confused for a missile launch by the Russian radar systems. And today, the Sox got one more hero. This time it was from a pitcher with a storied career that clearly doesn’t have the same stuff that he did in 2004. I am of course talking about Eric Gagne, who has such a large heart that he felt the need to give the Angels a going away present by allowing them a single run.

In all seriousness, Schilling looked a bit shaky at the start, but settled down nicely to pitch a vintage Curt Schilling playoff game: 7 innings, 6 hits, 1 walk that was all-but-intentional, and most importantly, zero runs. He was fantastic when he got himself into a few sticky situations, and once he got a small lead he had no intention of giving it up. If this can keep up, we’ve got two legit aces on the staff.

The offense also decided to show up, even if they arrived a bit late. Papi and Manny “a bad man” Ramirez gave the Sox the lead in the forth with back-to-back jacks. Amazingly that was the first time all season the two had gone b2b. The score stayed 2-0 until the 8th when apparently the team became as sick of the fucking rally monkey as I am and wanted to keep it off the Jumbotron. So they scored seven runs. While I would have preferred the breathing room earlier so I didn’t have to dig my nails into my flesh when Curt had to work out of a leadoff double in the 7th, I’ll take the runs anytime I can get them.

It amazed me that for all the talk of Schilling’s previous playoff start — the “bloody sock” start — nobody on TBS bothered to mention that the reason for the heroics was a result of an injury Schilling sustained at Anaheim. But I guess that’s normal for TBS to miss obvious connections. I’m still not sure what would be worse, the announcing team of Ted Robinson, Steve Stone and Jose Mota or Frank Caliendo impersonating all of them.

Congrats to the Sox, they clearly outplayed a very injured Angel team in every facet of the game. I just hope Paps has enough time to recover from this celebration’s hangover by the time they play again on Friday.

And of course the playoff beard, while I kill the rally monkey once and for all: