By Daniel Hartill,Staff Writer

Turn off the cell phone. Unplug the computer. Hang the “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door.

After 159 games, the fate of the Boston Red Sox rests on the season’s final weekend, perhaps to the last pitch of the last inning.

Fear not, though.

A fan and an owner – author Stewart O’Nan and businessman Les Otten – say Sox fans ought to relax.

Or at least try.

“We’ve been in much worse situations,” O’Nan said. “And we pulled it out.”

And the Yankees?

“We know we can handle them,” O’Nan said.

It’s the remedy both Otten and O’Nan suggest for folks who may get too nervous, too jittery as the season comes to its all-too-dramatic conclusion against the Yankees tonight and on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.

Remember last year.

In 2004, O’Nan and buddy Stephen King chronicled the championship season, compiling their e-mails and accounts of the games into a best-selling book, “Faithful.”

This year, the two writers have continued their analysis, traveling together to spring training in Florida, going to games and swapping e-mails.

In some ways, this season has been even better than last, O’Nan said. From its midway point until a week ago, the Sox have monopolized first place in the American League’s Eastern Division, the five-team group that also includes the New York Yankees.

“It’s the end of September and we’re in it,” O’Nan said. “Anything can happen.”

Yet, even his famous pen pal has his anxieties.

“He’s excited and he’s nervous,” O’Nan said of King.

Part of the problem is habit.

After all, Red Sox fans spent decades learning to worry. Until last year, cool weather and crisp apples were harbingers of defeat.

One needs only to search the Internet for clues. Plug in the words “Boston Red Sox” and “depression” on Yahoo and 295,000 entries pop up.

Yet, fans may never get as low as they did last year, when the Yankees defeated the Sox three times in a row in the American League Championship Series. Another loss would have ended the season. For the fourth game, Boston commentators dressed in black.

“You have to wait 86 years to get that depressed,” said Otten, a Red Sox vice chairman, who lives in Newry.

He was there last October when the Sox won the World Series, breaking the losing streak that began in 1919. Last winter, when he brought the championship trophy to Maine, he carried it in a parade down Portland’s Congress Street.

As he rode on top of a fire engine, he cradled the trophy in his lap.

That euphoria may never be matched again, he said.

But the intensity remains for the team.

Sluggers such as David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez have powered the Sox all season. New guys such as second baseman Tony Graffanino and first baseman John Olerud have exceeded expectations.

“We’ve really sucked it up,” said O’Nan, who refers to team members as though they were members of his family.

The pitching has faltered, though. Last year’s hero, Curt Schilling, has been hurt and inconsistent. Pitcher Keith Foulke, brought in last year to face down batters at the end of games, is hurt, too.

If the Sox lose, the pitching will likely be their downfall, O’Nan and Otten agreed.

“From the inside, you put the best people you can find in charge,” Otten said. “At this point in the season, there’s really nothing you can do. You can only sit back and watch.”

As far as they go this fall, Otten plans to be with the team.

On Sunday, the last regular-season game of the year, O’Nan will be along, too, watching from the stands at Fenway Park.

His hope, like those of so many Red Sox fans, is for the Yankees to lose big.

The best scenario would be for the Sox to cement their spot in the postseason with a Sunday win, one that would also ensure the end of play for the Yankees.

If that happens, the team’s leadership, including manager Joe Torre, would likely be fired, O’Nan predicted.

“I will dance on their graves,” he said.

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