Projo Sox Blog

BY KEVIN McNAMARA
Journal Sports Writer

BOSTON - Terry Francona said before his team tried to come back from a 3-1 deficit in the ALCS for the third time in five years that the every day grind of baseball in Boston helps prepare the Red Sox for these situations.

"We have good players. We've always had good players. I think they believe in themselves,'' he said. ``I also think the nature of what we do here every single day (helps). What we do today is not a whole lot different than during the year. It's not going to be like the players look up and say `there's media everywhere.' It's like that every single day. Every game is important. So we'll go play. Our biggest challenge is playing good enough to beat the team we're playing, not trying to worry about being nervous or if that's going to affect our play. They're able to play their best under some difficult circumstances, which is admirable.''

There's an old belief in sports that the toughest game to win in a playoff series in the knockout game. That's the challenge facing the Rays in Game Five Joe Maddon admitted as much in his pregame meeting with the press but as he noted ``this is all new for us, so I don't have a lot to go on."

 Tags  Terry Francona

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