From apathy to anticipation: Red Sox’ hot streak means rivalry matters again
This time it counts!
Now, I should say that my enthusiastic exclamation is not intended as a reference to Tuesday’s MLB All-Star Game, even if that does happen to be the slogan of the semi-competitive exhibition that for some ridiculous reason determines home-field advantage in the World Series.
I do still dig the All-Star Game, even if interleague play and the ability to watch every baseball game you could imagine has sapped it of some of the meaning and mystery it held way back when I was a kid and we thought electricity was the devil’s magic.
I’m not sure a game that includes Red Sox gritmaster Brock Holt but not three-time Cy Young Award-winner Clayton Kershaw is technically an “All-Star’’ collection, but no matter. It’s a sweet celebration of the season’s best and the game itself, and that will always work for me. Even if it shouldn’t count, this time, next time, or even in 2047 when it’s played at Milwaukee’s state-of-the-art levitating SeligDome.
What does count – and what, thank goodness, actually has genuine relevance to the standings – is what comes before the festivities, starting tonight at Fenway Park. That is the venue and scene for a three-game series with the Yankees that, oh, two weeks ago looked like nothing more than a pit-stop in an American League East race in which the Red Sox did not and would not matter.
On June 24, exactly 14 ballgames ago, the Red Sox began the day 10 games under .500 and 9.5 games out of first place in the division. The former was the low-water mark, while the latter was a half-game from being their largest deficit of the season.
Even though they won that night’s ballgame, a 5-1 victory over the Orioles, it felt like the low point of the season. Dustin Pedroia pulled a hamstring. Hanley Ramirez was hit on the hand by a batted ball, because of course he was. Even in a victory, they suffered a couple of losses, and the turn of events left even the straggling optimists (hello there) pondering what the likes of Clay Buchholz might fetch in a deal with a contender.
And yet here were are, those 14 ballgames later, and what looked like the beginning of the end at the time now appears in retrospect to have been a new beginning. Pedroia went to the DL, and Holt has filled in admirably, because that’s what he does best. Ramirez, after the usual vague drama, began hitting again, even crushing a winning homer against the Astros on Sunday that stands as the biggest hit of the season so far. Buchholz, who takes the mound tonight against Yankees pitcher Michael Pineda, has turned the “I’m The Ace’’ t-shirt from a punch line to a point of pride.
The Red Sox have won 10 of those 14 games, including 8 of the last 10 and their last four. If they sweep the Yankees, they’ll enter the All-Star break with a seven-game winning streak and, despite all of the lousy and uninspired baseball for the first 2 ½ months of the season, just 2 ½ games out of first place.
The key phrase there, I suppose, is “if they sweep.’’ It’s a reminder that the many nights of putrid baseball in April, May and June have left the Red Sox with little margin for error. They need to play nearly as well over the remainder of the schedule as they have over the last 14 games. To win 88 games, for instance, they’d need to go 47-29 the rest of the way.
It’s not impossible. It’s not likely either, if we’re being honest.
The offense has come to life – or become a reasonable facsimile of the run-scoring machine we expected to be getting in April, really. David Ortiz is hitting again and playing first base when necessary, despite his harmless and somewhat justifiable I’m-too-old-for-this grumpy-old-man protests. Xander Bogaerts is a superstar in bloom, and Mookie Betts is fulfilling his promise, too. But unless Rick Porcello morphs into the competent performer he was a year ago, they still need one or two reinforcements in the starting rotation behind Buchholz and Eduardo Rodriguez if they intend on sustaining this recent success.
But they are playing impeccably well – finally and at last — at the moment. The games in July are important again. The Red Sox have revived themselves, and so for the first time in a while, a midsummer series with the Yankees actually feels like a rivalry again.
There are real stakes. The apathy has given way to anticipation again.
This time it counts? Well, sure, they always do, no matter the order of the standings.
But this time it matters, and that’s a bigger deal, if not a better slogan.
The Yankees are in first place, the Red Sox are in hot pursuit, and while that pecking order certainly wasn’t the Boston fan’s ideal scenario entering the season, having a reason to give a damn again is some kind of progress.
Now that they’ve got our attention again, a sweep would be a swell way to keep it going. Perhaps a necessary way, too.
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com