If the Sox can't feel [the Rays on their heels] by now, they never will. The Rays have won four straight and seven of eight to climb within three games of the wild-card lead in the loss column. The Sox have dropped five straight and were 1-6 on their road trip to nowhere.I don't know about you guys, but I didn't see this coming at all. To be honest, the fact that the Yankees have also built up a 3.5 game lead on Boston is also quite a surprise. A very pleasant surprise.
“Hell, yeah, you've got to panic,” David Ortiz said.
The Sox are a mess at the moment. They were outscored 22-8 by the Rays in the series and managed only 22 hits over 29 innings. Their starting pitchers — John Lackey, Kyle Weiland and Jon Lester — allowed 12 earned runs over 11 innings.
“We’re kind of in a fight right now and we know that. It’s not real pretty,” manager Terry Francona said.
The Red Sox played with little efficiency or emotion. They were 1 for 15 with runners in scoring position in the three games, overthrew cutoff men from the outfield and threw balls away in the infield. Their pitchers walked 16 and hit three.
Adrian Gonzalez mentioned the poor level of play on Saturday and Ortiz had his own comment today.
“If we keep on playing like that, we’ll be home in the tub,” he said, shaking his head as his teammates walked quietly through the clubhouse.
This Wild Card race will get even more interesting this week, as the two teams face each other again with four games in Boston starting on Thursday.
