BOSTON -- When it comes to post-season playoff experience for the 2016 Red Sox, it's an all-or-nothing proposition.
There's David Ortiz, who owns three World Series rings and has enough playoff and World Series at-bats to fill a highlight tape.
There's Dustin Pedroia, who has been part of the last two World Championships with the Red Sox.
There's Hanley Ramirez, who tasted the post-season twice while with the Los Angeles Dodgers, and Chris Young, who has made visits to the post-season with two different teams in three seasons.
Aaron Hill was there once. So was Xander Bogaerts, at age 21.
The rest of the position players, however, have no experience at all in October. For Jackie Bradley Jr., Andrew Benintendi, Mookie Betts, Travis Shaw, Sandy Leon, Brock Holt and a couple of other reserves, the playoffs will be a new experience entirely.
Pedroia, for one, believes that experience at this time of the year can be overrated.
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"It's the same game,'' maintained Pedroia. "It's not like they're going to move the bases around or anything like that. We've already played 162 of them, so we just have to continue to play and play together and win. That's the only thing we're worried about.''
It didn't take Pedrioa long to get a hang of the post-season. In his first exposure to the playoffs, he homered off Colorado Rockies starter Jeff Francis in his first World Series at-bat.
Bradley, too, isn't sure what the hype is all about.
"We just have to play the game, play the game the right way and have fun,'' he said.
It's true that the Red Sox younger players have already been exposed to pressure-filled games. The Sox played plenty of them in September, with a jumbled division that saw the standings change almost daily.
And while it's undoubtedly accurate that trying to win the division rather than settle for a wild card spot isn't nearly as desperate as a Division Series elimination game, the young players have been exposed to plenty of big games.
What's more, the sold-out crowds and attendant expectations at Fenway provide, on a nightly basis throughout a six-month season, a little bit of a preview of what's in store in the post-season.
"I'm sure it's going to be a little different,'' said Betts, "but as much as I control my nerves, I will. But (the goal is to) have fun, primarily.''
Betts said he hasn't talked a lot about what to expect, or asked for advice from his more seasoned teammates.
"We haven't talked a lot about it,'' he said. "I just want to look at (every playoff) game as another game. I don't want to add any pressure or take away anything. I just want to go out and play the game the way I have all year.’’√
Given the individual success enjoyed by Betts, Bradley, Benintendi and others, that might be the proper approach.