BOSTON -- Yeah, OK. So they gave up 13 hits combined. Each had the gall to walk two batters, one of them the pitcher's first free passes in a month. And an entire five guys crossed home plate.

	Martinez

	Schilling

But this was still Pedro-Schilling at Fenway. A historic matchup in a venue echoing with history. Close your eyes and the pop in the catchers' mitts could just as easily have been courtesy of Young and Mathewson, Grove and Feller. No pitchers in the history of the game have combined power and control quite like Pedro Martinez and Curt Schilling, and this game was nothing short of a rare, interleague eclipse. It wound up a tense, 3-2 victory for the Diamondbacks and Schilling, whose incredible 2002 season keeps gaining momentum toward the unprecedented.

Neither pitcher was in top form, particularly Martinez (7-1), who took his first loss of the season by giving up all three Arizona runs on seven hits in six innings. Schilling (12-1) became the majors' first 12-game winner despite looking shakier than usual early on, yielding five hits to the first 14 batters, and ran into enough trouble in the eighth to be removed from the game with his lead in serious jeopardy.

In the end, though, the matchup did little to disappoint -- two of this era's best pitchers hooking up in nine innings of tight baseball that ended with the Red Sox stranding the tying run 90 feet away, the Diamondbacks' 25 sighs of relief mirrored by 33,275 Fenway groans.

"Packed and electric and loud" was how Schilling described the scene. Added Arizona third baseman Craig Counsell, "For a regular-season game in June, you're not gonna find better than that -- that was a fun, fun game to play in. That was Major League Baseball at its best."

For five total runs to be considered somewhat high underscores how tantalizing the Martinez-Schilling matchup had been. Despite a halting recovery from the shoulder injury that knocked him out of much of last season -- and feeling what he afterward described as "lost" because he wonders if and when his top, three-pitch arsenal will return -- Martinez carried a 7-0, 3.18 record into the game. And Schilling is on pace for one of the greatest pitching seasons of all time.

Schilling's 12 wins put him on pace for 30 if he makes 35 starts. Before walking Johnny Damon in the eighth he hadn't walked anyone in 44 innings, covering 165 batters, and now has obscene season totals of just 10 walks and 140 strikeouts. He is 19-2 in his last 24 starts, and including last year's heroic postseason, he's 23-2 in his last 30.

"The postseason showed me there was a next level to get to," Schilling said. A full season at this level would put him among pitching's all-time greats -- a group that includes the Martinez the Red Sox ace longs to see again.

No strikeout pitchers in the history of the game have combined control like Schilling and Martinez. How comparable is their dominance? Schilling is on pace to strike out 378 batters and walk just 27. Since 1900, only one pitcher has struck out more than 300 while walking fewer than 50: one Pedro Martinez in 1999 (313 whiffs, 37 walks).

Moreover, of all the 20-win seasons by major-league pitchers since 1900, Martinez and Schilling stand 1-2 in strikeout-walk ratio:

Pitcher           Team              W-L     K   BB  K/BB
1. Pedro Martinez 1999 Red Sox      23-4   313	37  8.46
2. Curt Schilling 2001 D-Backs      22-6   293	39  7.51
3. Fergie Jenkins 1971 Cubs         24-13  263	37  7.11
4. Cy Young       1904 Red Sox      26-16  200	29  6.90
5. Walter Johnson 1913 Senators     36-7   243	38  6.39
6. C. Mathewson   1908 Giants       37-11  259	42  6.17
7. Juan Marichal  1966 Giants       25-6   222	36  6.17
8. Sandy Koufax   1965 Dodgers      26-8   382	71  5.38
9. David Wells    2000 Blue Jays    20-8   166	31  5.35
10. Sandy Koufax  1963 Dodgers      25-5   306	58  5.28

Consider that Schilling is striking out 14 batters for each walk this year and is more than halfway to 20 wins in early June, and you get an idea of what we're watching this season. "He's a power pitcher that locates," said his catcher, Damian Miller. "That's a brutal combination for a hitter."

For a fan, the confluence of Schilling and Martinez for one afternoon was anything but brutal -- it was a packed-to-the-gills, heavyweight matchup more intruguing than any Lewis-Tyson tilt. This was such an event that the special MLB bomb-sniffing dogs made a pregame run through both clubhouses. (Asked if they came only to score free tickets, the dogs suspiciously had no comment.) Fans crammed in Fenway's tight stands and buzzed in anticipation. Throughout the game the Boston sky was crisp and clear, as if the heavens dared not miss a pitch.

Schilling was actually the first to run into trouble. In the bottom of the first, reborn Sox designated hitter Carlos Baerga scorched a 1-0 pitch over the right-center fence for his first home run in almost three years. But Martinez countered by quickly giving up a solo home run to Arizona's Jose Guillen in the first at-bat of the second inning to knot the score at 1.

In the third, Arizona strung together three straight hits off Martinez to take a 2-1 lead and added another run in the sixth on Steve Finley's single following two walks. "We got a couple of hits when we needed them," said Diamondbacks left fielder Luis Gonzalez, whose single drove in the second run. "He's had an explosive fastball in the past, and I don't think he broke 93 today. But besides the home run, all our hits weren't that pretty."

"Not pretty" might as well have been how Martinez described his psychological outlook after the game. He hasn't won in three straight starts, since beating the Yankees on May 23, and in the last two starts before Saturday had felt arm weakness and subsequent caution that infected his mental approach, one of his strengths.

"Sometimes I have to give away the focus in the game that I need, to focus on what is going on in and with that shoulder," he said solemnly. "It is really hard to concentrate with those things in your mind." Martinez denied feeling distracted against Arizona, but he spoke morosely enough to worry all of New England:

"I am a rookie at this ... I don't really know what to expect and when to expect it," said Martinez, despite striking out 10 in six innings and throwing 75 of his 115 pitches for strikes. "The biggest adjustment I have to make is realizing that I have to deal with this for the rest of my career -- or for this year at least. After the season is over, I am not going to know what is going to happen. In reality I don't know if I am going to pick up velocity after [this year's] first half. I don't know if I am going to make it to the second half. I am wondering. I don't know. I don't know. I am lost."

Schilling was anything but lost from the first through the seventh innings, but ran into his worst trouble in the eighth when Lou Merloni opened with a single and Damon took a four-pitch walk, Schilling's first since May 8. "It was probably the first hitter this year that when I got done with the at-bat I was very upset -- I lost focus, or whatever it was, that keeps me going," Schilling said. "It was the eighth inning, a 3-1 game, and I'd just put the tying run on base. I never even came close to throwing a pitch where I wanted it. I'm not sure why. But that's how you end up losing ballgames."

Baerga sacrificed the runners to second and third before Schilling pitched so carefully around Nomar Garciaparra that he walked him. Arizona manager Bob Brenly removed Schilling in favor of lefty Mike Myers, who got pinch-hitter Tony Clark to ground into a run-scoring, bang-bang fielder's choice at second base whose out call Boston manager Grady Little came out to argue. Closer Byung-Hyun Kim then came in and got Shea Hillenbrand to fly to center, ending the threat; Kim allowed a runner to reach third in the ninth with two out but struck out Merloni to end the game and secure Schilling's 12th win -- his career-best ninth straight.

"I thought I was in that game win or lose -- I felt I had the game plan to go after the next two guys," Schilling said. "I was surprised that I didn't get a shot at it."

Because of interleague play, Schilling, who credits his hours of pregame video preparation for his late-career blossoming, suggested he had less of a game plan than usual against the Red Sox. "I don't have the history with these guys that I have with the guys in the National League," he said, "so I have to rely on other people's scouting reports, which I don't like to do. I made a couple of phone calls this week and talked to a few people who had seen them this year, and I looked at some games from these past couple of months when these guys faced a right-handed pitcher." As for interleague play, Little said, "One of the bright spots here today was he is not pitching for a team that we have to play 19 times."

Strangely, Fenway fans acted after the game as if they wouldn't mind seeing more of Schilling -- under different circumstances. Twenty minutes after defeating their beloved Sox, Schilling walked under the stands toward the media interview room through dozens of fans, most of whom clapped in respectful appreciation at the pitcher began his professional career in 1986 with Boston (he was traded to Baltimore before reaching the big leagues).

"Wear a Red Sox uniform again!" one man yelped.

"I did!" Schilling replied.

Another fan yelled out, "Come back, baby! We want you!" As early as this October, no doubt. The Red Sox and Diamondbacks each hold their leagues' best records, making a World Series between the pair and Schilling-Martinez II a distinct possibility. Like most sequels, it'll have a hard time playing as well as the original.

Alan Schwarz is the Senior Writer of Baseball America magazine and a regular contributor to ESPN.com.