Green: Things are back to normal in Hub

This is more like it. Recriminations, second-guessing, anguish — this is what October baseball in Boston is supposed to feel like. Let’s just make sure the victims of our endless rehashings are the right ones.

While there’s plenty of blame to go around, most of the talk has focused on the bullpen in general, and one Eric Gagne in particular, for letting the Indians blow the game open in Game 2’s pivotal 11th inning. In fact, as SportsBlahg.com first noted, more than a hundred anti-Eric Gagne groups have sprung up on Facebook, many of the most popular sporting names too vulgar to print. Nonetheless, there are 471 members of the G-rated “If Gagne Blows Another Game I Am Going to Flip.” 140 more passive-aggressive types have joined “Eric Gagne Comes into the Game, Go to a Different Room.” A mere 26 have signed up for “The Group of People who Have Pity for Eric Gagne.” But Eric Gagne doesn’t want to pitch badly. Nor does he choose when to put himself into a game. Nor does he make up the postseason rosters. The same goes for lefty specialist Javier Lopez, another Game 2 goat. Yet Lopez’s numbers against left-handed batters are actually much worse than his numbers against righties. So is it Lopez’s fault that he keeps coming out of the pen to face lefties?

And you can’t blame the bullpen for Curt Schilling’s subpar performance or for Daisuke Matsuzaka’s inability to adjust to an American strike zone or for the team’s lack of timely hitting (Kevin Youkilis gets on base four times in two games, but no one can drive him in?) or for the sudden woes of Dustin Pedroia (a .160 postseason average, plus his first consecutive multiple strikeout games), whose struggles at the plate reveal just how much this club has come to depend on him.

Yes, Sox fans have Theo Epstein to blame for the acquisition of Gagne and for still-underperforming hitters Julio Lugo and J.D. Drew. But who decides how much playing time these guys get?

So the time has come to point the finger (j’accuse!) at one Terry Jon Francona. Until now, he’s done a remarkable job of staying above the fray. But in the postseason, you have to go with the guys who got you there. That includes Julian Tavarez and Kyle Snyder, both left off the ALCS roster. And you have to go with the players who give you the best chance to win now. That includes Jacoby Ellsbury.

Francona deserved credit for sticking with his regulars when they struggled during the regular season, but that kind of time is a luxury he no longer enjoys. It ain’t April anymore. And, unless the Red Sox can take four games from the Indians, it will be an early winter in New England.

Sarah Green is a freelance writer who can be reached at  .