Boston Red Sox: Time for Reassessment after Consecutive Defeats
They may be the best side in Major League Baseball, but the Red Sox have somehow either played their games clumsily, or ineffectually. While they have sought and perhaps struggled hard, to at least win a match, everything has gone against them this time.
On Thursday, they had their sixth consecutive defeat in the season that was the worst the team came up with prior to 1945.
It was the Cleveland Indians that trounced the Red Sox 1-0. Hosting the Red Sox on their home ground, Cleveland naturally had the advantage to build psychological pressure on the team. Add to it the seemingly impeccable strategy they employed to fight the
Red Sox.
Anyone who follows baseball knows that the Red Sox are one of the history’s most expensive sides ever. The profuse expenditure on the team, which is coupled with the conspicuous presence of young talents and mavericks like David Oritz, has not profitably
paid off.
The strength of the Red Sox is such that even their contenders cannot help acknowledging it. A sentiment that combined both relief and awe, Manny Acta, the Cleveland manager said, “I'm glad we're done, at least for now, with them. They’re going to go off
at any time and beat up on a lot of people. They're very talented."
The Red Sox had entered in this season with a side that was subject to awe, there were enormous expectations from them. Despite that, the performance was not par excellence, but remained below par. All the blockbusters that give prominence to Red Sox still
draw inspiration and hope that they might deliver in the upcoming games.
But history suggests otherwise as far as the regular season is concerned. There has hardly been any AL team that could reach the play-offs with a beginning that was punctuated with consecutive defeats.
It is pretty comprehensible, in fact logical, if a team takes pride in owning gifted players who ace the game. However, being endowed with good players does not guarantee smooth sailing. You somehow have to put that talent into adept use to reap the benefits.
Complacency, it goes without saying, hardly delivers unless there is an intense yearning for competition. That alone enhances competence which is something that Boston probably needed desperately this time.
This in no way suggests that the Red Sox lacked the competence to take on their rivals. What it actually spells out is preponderance of complacency over competence that barely helped the Red Sox derive any benefit from it. We know that every team that comes
in the season has played a great deal of baseball and competed consistently.
It is this line of argument that has its unlikely supporter in Adam Everett who, while cheerfully delighted over his team Cleveland’s victory, says, "The Boston Sox is not a good team. That is a great team. We caught them at a time where they're a little
down -- not swinging the bats like they can.”
When the Red Sox leave Cleveland, they will have a lot to ponder over. All these defeats must force them to go for sceptical reassessment of the plan chosen for the remainder of the regular season. While they have struggled indefinitely this time, there
is no doubt they can storm back with something that will go a long way in the annals of baseball history.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own and in no way represent Bettor.com's official editorial policy.
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