Hold on to your butts

We are less than three hours away from what may turn out to be one of the strangest nights in post-season history. Oliver Perez is starting a Game 7. On top of that, his mound opponent tonight is Jeff Suppan, making this game Dave Littlefield's crowning achievement as GM of the Bucs (besides that Worst GM award he took home in June). Rob Neyer talks about Perez in his ESPN Insider column about Game 7. Most of you probably don't have Insider, so here's the key line:

Perez is almost certainly the worst pitcher who's ever started a Game 7.

Well then. The thing with Perez is that it's impossible to know what to expect of him. The Mets know as well as the Pirates that he can be Sandy Koufax one day and Jimmy Anderson the next. The thing is that, as Neyer points out in his column, Perez is the best option available for the Mets tonight. But here's the thing about Ollie, he always seems to pitch in big games and when people think he can't do it. In a pride game in the WBC this spring he took the mound for Mexico and pitched three shutout innings against Roger Clemens to keep the US from advancing. After Jim Tracy failed to mention his name as a strikeout pitcher, he K'd 9 Brewers on Opening Day. For several weeks in May and June he was mentioned as a candidate to be demoted and almost every time someone called a start "his last chance" he responded with a good start. Now he's being called the worst Game 7 starter in history. That may be true (at least if we're talking about in-season stats), but tonight he'll be facing a lineup he's very familiar with in a pitchers ballpark. If there's one thing I'm certain of, it's that Oliver Perez is possible of throwing a much better game than Jeff Suppan tonight. It may not be likely, but if he catches that lightning in a bottle tonight, I would not want to be the St. Louis Cardinals. Mostly, I'd expect him to pitch just like he did through 5 innings in Game 4. He went 5 strong and kept the Mets in the game, Willie Randolph left him in too long (given that he hadn't thrown in two weeks) and he gave up 2 homers and ended up with an ugly line. I don't know if Dr. Jekel or Mr. Hyde will be on the mound for the Mets tonight, but if Perez sets the Cards down in the first and gets that adrenaline pumping in a positive way, I don't think I'd want to face him tonight.

That or Darren Oliver will be in the game before anyone knows what happens, which is at least equally likely.