The Boston Red Sox Need To Figure Out If They Are A Contender

Are the Boston Red Sox for real? Do they have a second half push in them to make things interesting at least in the wild card race?

Going into Monday’s action, Boston found themselves one game over .500, in fourth place in the American League East, 6.5 games out. But, only 2.5 games behind Seattle for the third wild card spot.

Sweeping the Nationals

Boston went down to Washington over the weekend and swept the hapless Nationals. Things are so bad in the nation’s capital that the club fired their general manager, Mike Rizzo, and field manger, Dave Martinez, at the end of the series. But, as Red Sox manager Alex Cora said before the game, the Nats took two of three from the first-place Detroit Tigers just a week or so ago, so Boston’s good weekend – on the road, no less – should not be given short shrift.

While the Red Sox have won 46 games (against 45 losses), their Pythagorean record has them at 49-42, three games better. And their BaseRuns record shows them at 52-39, a six-game improvement. If divisions were based on BaseRuns, then Boston would be in second place. Alas, such is not the case.

After a strong April wherein they went 16-11, May was a step back. By June 1st, the team was 28-32, with barely a positive run differential. June was a very small step forward, as they won 14 against 12 losses, with a +6 run differential. But when the calendar flipped to July, they started to play even better. On July 1, they beat the Reds 5-3 behind strong pitching from Richard Fitts and Brayan Bello, both of whom the team will need if they want to make a push during the dog days of summer. They did themselves no favors the following day, committing two errors which led to four unearned runs – which just happened to be the margin of defeat (8-4).

But on Friday night in Washington, the team played clean baseball behind 7-2/3 strong innings from Lucas Giolito, who may just be rounding into form. They rapped out sixteen hits and scored 11 runs in a game that wasn’t close after the fifth inning.

Saturday seemed like a repeat performance, this time the game wasn’t close after the third. Boston did commit two errors in the third (on the same play) which led to one unearned run. It should be noted that the errors were committed by Abraham Toro, who is only playing first base only because Triston Casas blew out his knee and because Rafael Devers would prefer to play in San Francisco than break in a new mitt (tongue only partially in cheek); and by Romy Gonzalez, only playing second base because Kristian Campbell needed additional seasoning in the minors, and for some reason Cora doesn’t want rookie Marcelo Mayer to get reps against left-handed pitching. As such, the defensive mishaps on Saturday could arguably be chalked up to managerial decisions rather than player performance.

On Sunday, the defense held strong, not making any errors. Nonetheless, the pitchers did their level best to give the game away. With the Red Sox leading 5-2 in the seventh inning, three walks sandwiched a single, forcing in a run to make it 5-3. After a Ceddanne Rafaela home run got the run back – Rafaela has been on a heater of late, slashing .333/.356/.754 with five home runs and 12 RBI over his last 15 games (plus another homer on Monday night) – a walk followed by a wild pitch followed by a single made the score 6-4 and brought the tying run to the plate with two outs in the bottom of the ninth. When CJ Abrams’ fly ball petered out in front of the warning track, the sweep was complete, and the Red Sox headed home to face the Colorado Rockies on a three-game winning streak.

Welcome Home

Prior to Monday night’s game, Cora talked about the team’s improved base running and strong defense being keys to their latest success. He was referring to taking extra bases on balls in play, and generaly being more aware of game situations. So, right on cue, after Nate Eaton’s one out double in Monday night’s game, he was caught stealing third with a left-handed batter (Roman Anthony) at-bat. Anthony then struck out to end the threat.

Thairo Estrada led off the next inning for the Rockies with a ground ball to short that Trevor Story circled and then threw into the dugout for a two-base error (so much for a clean game). Estrada, of course, came around to score an unearned run on a Brenton Doyle single.

After the Red Sox built a 5-1 lead through five, the defense did its thing again. This time, without an error. With runners on second and third and two out, Michael Toglia hit a harmless ground ball to third baseman (?) Nate Eaton – playing because again Cora didn’t want to start Mayer against a lefty – who couldn’t decide if he wanted to tag the approaching runner or throw to first to record the final out. So he did neither. A run scored making it 5-2. And as sure as day follows night, the next batter, Ryan McMahon, singled to right to score the Rockies’ third run. The kicker is that both runs were earned as the ground ball to third was ruled a fielder’s choice.

But baserunning may have saved their bacon. In the bottom of the seventh, Anthony singled and was stealing on a 1-2 pitch to Jarren Duran. Duran lined one 112 MPH into right field and busted it out of the box, taking a hard turn, and daring right fielder Tyler Freeman to throw behind him – which he did – and that allowed Anthony to come all the way around to score, and Duran to move up to second base. He then came scored on a Carlos Narváez single to left, getting those two important runs right back.

The Red Sox extended their lead to 9-3 after eight, and handed the game over to Jorge Alcala who gave up a lead-off double to McMahon, and stranded him and Ryan Ritter (who walked) to end the game. When it was over, Richard Fitts had his first career victory, and the Red Sox – despite some additional defensive mishaps and some questionable baserunning – had won their fourth straight game. Contenders? Hard to say, but things are trending in the right direction.