Analogy

Let's see, Can anyone complete this one?

? is to Buckner as Francona is to ?

Poor Bill Buckner. The villified, eternally maligned first baseman who committed the famous error in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series when the Red Sox were one out away from breaking the curse. No one asks, well, why didn't they just win Game seven? No one asks why John McNamara, the Red Sox erstwhile manager would even put Buckner in at that position when his knees were so bad he could hardly bend over. Anyone really wonder why the ball went through his legs?

So, flash forward to the current series. Terry Francona, in his first season with the Sox has pulled together a rag-tag lot of bums and whiners into a team that was able to stage the most improbable comeback in the history of ball-sports. Now the Sox lead 2-0 in the World Series. Unfortunately, the games now move to the Cardinal's home park. Obviously, the pitchers are required to bat on the senior circuit and no designated hitter is used.

Why is this a problem? David Ortiz has been the Red Sox main savior in the last six games. Without his spectacular batting prowess as DH, the Sox would have gone down in four and been relegated to the dustbin of sports history once again.

Now, It looks like Francona is going to pull his usual first basemen in favor of placing Ortiz at the #1 bag. Granted, Ortiz used to play first before settling in as DH, and his current .421 average over the last month should continue. But, if he ends up making some silly error because he's rusty on the field, the previous analogy will complete itself.