Rays deliver crushing blow to Red Sox’s play-off hopes
If the Boston Red Sox were to have any realistic chance of playing in October this year they were going to have to sweep their three-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays.
The series started well for the Red Sox, taking the first game 12-5. That win brought them to within 6.5 games of the Rays in the wild-card race but all that good work was thrown last night when the Rays exacted some revenge, crushing the Red Sox 14-5.
That leaves Boston 7.5 games behind in the wild-card race and with just 19 games left to go this season, it’s going to take a huge collapse by either the Rays or New York Yankees for Boston to be playing in the post-season.
Daisuke Matsuzaka started for the Sox but it didn’t go very well for the Japanese pitcher, giving up eight earned runs in just 4.2 innings. That was too much for the Red Sox to come back from, despite being two runs up in the first inning. Matsuzaka even apologised for his performance after the game.
"I knew very well that this was a critical game, so to allow what happened to happen so early in the game, I can really only apologize to my teammates and to the fans,” Matsuzaka said.
But Red Sox Nation know it wasn’t the performance of Matsuzaka which has all but ended their play-off chances. A season full of injuries to key players has restricted Boston this season, something which in the American League East can’t be afforded.
Josh Beckett, Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis, Jacoby Ellsbury, Victor Martinez and Jason Varitek all missed considerable time with various different ailments during the season. That’s a list of players which would be the core of a championship calibre team, and is a list of injuries just too big to overcome for anyone.
To put into perspective how well the Sox have actually done this season, Boston has a better record than the Texas Rangers, who lead the American League West, and are just five games back from the Minnesota Twins who lead the American League Central.
If Boston can overcome the 7.5 deficit it will be a monumental turnaround, but with so many injuries to so many key players 2011 might now be on the agenda for the Red Sox Nation.
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