Hands to Keep I think it is important to view the deck in four components enablers (eight in total Entomb and Faithless Looting with eight creatures to discard), reanimation spells (twelve in total Reanimate, Animate Dead and Exhume), disruption (ten in total Thoughtseize, Unmask and Grief) and mana (twenty-two in total Lotus Petal, Dark Ritual and fourteen lands) The ideal hand in pre-board games is one that has a route to the combo (Entomb or Faithless Looting plus Creature, and a reanimation spell), a disruption spell (Thoughtseize, Unmask or Grief) and enough mana to make it all happen
Then you can spend three mana, sacrifice another dork, and then put a +1/+1 counter here, so that's a use for Saproling tokens or Spider tokens after they chump block
Still, 5 mana is a bit much for this effect
It also gives +2/+2 , which is decent but on the low end for a mid-priced card
But that wasn't it when it came to mana
You just do not see this kind of overwhelming mana advantage often and especially do not see it outside of Green
