Opening now: The Hunger Games

Fourteen games left. One up on Showalter. Three against Oakland, in our house. After that, a buffet of Dinty Moore: Twins, Blue Jays, Redsocks. The lone uncertainty: Are we a tomato can?

One with Tampa. Today. Win, and they might as well be Sarasota. Back to dodging hurricanes. No more Joe Madden overshifts. No more Longoria. No more Big Game Shields. Go home and start thinking about next year's sound-effects in the Trop. They'll be four out in the Wild Card. All they can do is mess up Baltimore in the last three games.

Meanwhile, Buck must be miserable. If they get swept by Oakland today, they go to Nintendotown and have to face King Felix. Ha. That's a loss. Best they would do on the western trip is 2-4. After that, they play six against the Redsocks, who used to own them, and three with Toronto, who hasn't played a meaningful late September game since Tony Fernandez held down SS.

Fourteen games. One up. If Baltimore beats us, we have no excuse. None. But at least Joe won't have to sweat trying to line up our ace for the one-game playoff. We have no ace. He can just continue his normal turn through the rotation.

Fourteen games. Fifty at bats. Two, maybe three starts. Arod needs two HRs to hit 20. Grandy needs 10 RBIs to hit 100. (And 24 Ks to hit 200.)  Hughes could win 18. Andy could get back into the swing. Tex could heal. Andruw Jones could - well, I dunno - maybe draw a few walks.

Fourteen games. Every one critical. Seven and seven won't cut it. We need 9 and 5, or better. Lose today, and we could be tied with 13 left. That's an unlucky number.