Red Sox Magic Number is 116!

The Red Sox are not good right now.

They’re in last place.

They have a sub-.500 record.

They’re 3-7 in their last ten.

They have the worst run differential in, like, the history of mankind.

They look worse than the Patriots did in September.

But, here’s the key. They’re only 4 games back.

ALL that garbage has happened. Nothing his gone right. Nothing they’ve tried has worked. Everyone is slumping. Nobody is hitting.

And they’re four games back.

Just like the Patriots, though, they’re not a bad team. They’re just playing like it at the moment. Water WILL find its own level. All these hitters will play to the back of their baseball card. And, when they do, they’ll only have to make up four games.

Because, actually, the entire season hasn’t been terrible. If you look at the OPS for the non-rookies, only Ortiz is significantly off his number from last year. They just had a high peak in April, and a low valley in May. If June is a plateau somewhere in the middle, things are going to be just fine.

Is there reason to think there will be a plateau? Of course there is. Ramirez has been crushing the ball the last couple games. He might not be April Hanley, but even “regular Hanley” will be a big boost to the offense. Pedroia and Bogaerts are definitely trending upwards. They’re definitely getting plenty of runners on base.

Everyone who tweets out their disgust at ANOTHER double play is missing the obvious point. You need a runner on base to ground into a double play. Or, to strand a runner. So, they’ve been getting their hits. It’s just a matter of getting them in a different order.

Odds are that will start happening very soon. Once it does, the Sox should be off and running.

With only four games to make up.