Get the hell out of my office

Our house it has a crowd.
There's always something happening,
And it's usually quite loud.

Our house, in the middle of our street,
Our house, was our castle and our keep.
-- Chris Foreman & Carl Smyth, "Our House," 1982.

Reason #34 baseball is the bestest sport of all: home field advantage actually changes the rules of the game. Everyone knows it's a nice psychological boost to have a huge throng of people cheering for you to succeed rather than, say, do something inappropriate with parts of your own anatomy. But among the major American sports, baseball is unique in the way it handicaps its contests. It is deeply and profoundly unfair. It is totally wicked cool.

For consecutive stamina-draining nights, David Ortiz and the Red Sox have now made the most of the privilege of last ups. This is the principal beauty of being the home team in a close game. The team in grays can never rest, always shadowed by the dread specter of possibility lurking in the bottom half of each inning. The visitors may strike, but cannot be victorious until they have faced the opponent yet one more time. A knockout punch struck by the team in white, though, leaves the visitors no chance to get up off the mat. When it's over, it's over. Suddenly. Finally. Over.

At the very least, the seemingly ceaseless zombie jamboree celebrated at Fenway Park over the last two days and nights staved off the ignominy of the season coming to a close in the Red Sox' own yard. Champagne turns to acid under such circumstances, and the Sox have done well to avoid that bilious fate.

Another of baseball's idiosyncrasies is the structure of the best-of-seven series. Hockey and basketball now both follow a 2-2-1-1-1 format, while baseball has stuck with the 2-3-2. Having the final two games in your house is certainly preferable, but the middle three games, a time when a series may either be put away or made interesting, are no trivial matter. As this ALCS returns to the Bronx, where the Yankees will have the home field advantage once more, it should not be forgotten that the shape and trajectory of this series was altered with the indelible stamp of Fenway. But the next one is at The Stadium. They get last ups. They only need one win. Everyone's two favorite strippers will probably be in attendance. That's home field advantage in every way.

With nothing to lose besides the ALCS, the Red Sox will hand the ball back to Curt Schilling and his tricksy ankle. Having consulted every expert in the land short of Richard Dean Anderson, the Sox will have to hope Schilling, armed with a bionic shoe cobbled together from space age magnets, loose change, and Alan Embree's spent slug of chaw, can find the peace of body and mind to be something like his old self. Failing that, they will have to hope Jon Lieber can summon the decency to be something like his old self. That little Greg Maddux impression in Game 2 was a real hoot, Jon, but it'd be just swell if you could go back to getting cuffed around a bit like we know you can. Everyone's counting on you.

Another fortuitous rainout beckons as the teams head down I-95. It's hard to say whom this would benefit more, as both bullpens are utterly spent. As are, for that matter, the catchers. Would it surprise anyone if both clubs petitioned the league office to allow Varitek and Posada to catch while sitting on a small stool? If there must be a winner in this still hypothetical coin flip, it would probably be the Sox on account of the extra day of rest for Schilling and the extra day of R&D for their super double secret crack team of medical engineers. Either way, Game 6 has the makings of a dandy, and that's exactly how far in the future we all should be looking at this juncture. The thrill is on.

Uno mas!