Ten games. Ten straight losses. They were embarrassed. I was embarrassed. Late inning collapses. Lackluster offense. Poor pitching performances.
For 10 straight games, I watched horrific baseball. SportsCenter updates flooded my phone. The final box score spammed my email. Newspaper headlines the next morning reminded me that the Red Sox sucked.
For almost two weeks, the Sox went without a win. Clay Buchholz looks like a JV relief pitcher facing major league hitters. Will Middlebrooks struggled and revealed he may never return to pre-injury form, before he went on the disabled list — again. And even franchise second baseman Dustin Pedroia couldn’t buy a hit. I was beginning to hate them.
On Monday, the Sox won, and with the win, the skid officially ended. On Tuesday, they won again, and just like that, their losing streak became a winning streak. Even so, the team’s problems remain.
They desperately need offensive production. With outfielder Shane Victorino and first baseman Mike Napoli on the disabled list, the Sox had two options: Find a bat outside the organization or bring up players who are producing in Triple-A.
The Sox opted to do a little bit of both. They brought up Ryan Lavarnway, a catcher who has failed to live up to his potential at the plate, and Brock Holt, an infielder who is hitting .293 in 17 games this season. The team also signed shortstop Stephen Drew, a veteran free agent who was on the 2013 Championship team.
Although these are steps in the right direction, the team is still missing something — they are not last season’s team.
As a team they are hitting a paltry .242, which is good, or should I say bad, for 23rd in baseball. They are 22nd in homeruns hit, nineteenth in earned run average and fourteenth in fielding percentage. In short, the Red Sox are at best mediocre in everything. More than that, they are painful to watch — they just don’t look like they want to win.
Perhaps I am too critical, and I am just another “privileged” twenty-first century Red Sox fan.
Sure, I have witnessed three World Series Championships. In 2004, the Sox did the improbable and broke the 86-year curse. In 2007, they showed it wasn’t a fluke. And finally last year, they defied expectations and won it all in a “rebuilding year.”
But these championship seasons were sandwiched between infuriating and sometimes even humiliating seasons.
Just look at the 2011 and 2012 seasons. First in 2011, all hell broke loose. After a slow April, the star-studded team dominated the middle months of the season. But they collapsed in September, and it reeked of beer and chicken.
The Red Sox cleared house after that. General Manager Theo Epstein fled to Chicago in hopes of ending another curse. Manager Terry Francona turned in his uniform for a suit on ESPN.
But it only got worse; the 2011 collapse morphed into an ugly 2012. The controversial hire of Bobby Valentine proved to be an ill fit. Once again, the Sox cleared house, but this time with a blockbuster trade in late August. Gone were Carl Crawford, Josh Beckett and Adrian Gonzalez — three players who had been expected to bring glory to Beantown.
In the offseason they signed clubhouse guys — Shane Victorino, Mike Napoli, and Jonny Gomes — who had been around the league. These players just got it. They had fun; they bought obscure tokens; they wholeheartedly embodied everything baseball was supposed to be.
So what’s the point of rehashing all this Red Sox history? It’s to show that as a fan, I am entitled. I am allowed to hate my team, to question their acquisitions and to judge their play. But I am also allowed to love my team and to naively believe in the magic of the game. Being a true, loyal fan isn’t always loving the team and blindly supporting them.
Baseball is a sport that knows no history — even though Yankees fans love to point to their 27 rings — and that’s what I love about it. In two days’ time, a team’s 10-game losing streak can become a two game winning streak. Winning the World Series doesn’t stop a team from finishing last in the division the next season.
It’s an unpredictable game. It forces me to be involved, to follow baseball and the Red Sox’s every move. Maybe that makes me childish. Perhaps one day I will outgrow them. I will mature and learn to respect Yankees fans. But honestly I doubt it. (A true Sox fan knows all Yankees fans are devoid of morals.)
Carolyn Maguire is a rising junior in the College. Sideline Summer appears every other Friday at thehoya.com.
