Red Sox go missing at the deadline

     

    Going into the august 1st trade deadline the Boston Red Sox had been the hottest team in baseball during the month of July, They went 15-8 over the month with the highlight of the season sweeping the Atlanta Braves. They went on this run and kept the team afloat with only two starting pitchers. The Red Sox bullpen had put out an all out effort starting with openers and full pen performances for 3 out of every 5 games in the Sox rotation. That pen did great, highlighting performances came from Nick Pivetta who recorded 13K's most by a reliever in Baseball history. Bernadino, Murphy had held down the team in critical spots, Chris Martin was another reliever that really stepped up in a big way when the Red Sox needed help. Jansen for the most part had been a rock as well. Winckowski had been solid in the early months of the season but the load looked to start to wear on Josh and his performance would start to slip.

    Going into the deadline players were going public with requesting the team to add at the deadline. The Red Sox players knew that this was a miracle effort coming from the Bullpen to hold down a teams pitching staff for over a month. Justin Turner was requesting the team added, Kenley Jansen aswell was looking for the team to add. The superstar of the franchise Rafael Devers was quoted saying "it would be nice to add pitching to take pressure off of the offense" The players felt that they had to score at least 6 runs a night to win a game because this bullpen had been becoming more and more taxed.  It was clear to the club that this miracle effort was not sustainable. The team needed an arm. 

    At the deadline the Red Sox would essentially do nothing, they made a minor move to bring in Luis Urias a member of their second base depth. The team then had a massive series against the Toronto Blue Jays. The Blue Jays had the wildcard spot the Red Sox had been eyeing. The Red Sox were two games back of taking the spot from the Jays and this was the perfect opportunity. Going into the head to head matchup the Red Sox were 7-0 against Toronto...

    They laid a straight egg, the Red Sox looked totally checked out. 21 out  of 27 innings were pitched by relief pitching who had obliviously been taxed. Huge names were on the market, Scherzer had been moved to the Rangers, Giolitto to the Angels, Verlander! who the Red Sox were in supposed talks of acquiring got shipped back to Houston. Virtually every team in the American League had added for the battle of the playoffs. This was because the American League is totally wide open for the first time in a long time. Once again it looked like bloom had no direction at the deadline. A good trade I had envisioned was Verdugo for starting pitching because of Rafaela lighting it up in Worcester, along with all of the depth in outfield as it is. Chaim didn't move on that, he had dangled Turner as trade bait, who had been the whole lockeroom for this team, which was crazy to me. Bloom moved Kike Hernandez to the Dodgers which was fine the fit was just not working out anymore. 

    The Red Sox stood pat and the team was not happy about it, granted they need to be mentally tougher if something doesn't go their way, but also the Blue Jays punished them. They capitalized on a taxed bullpen staff and obliterated the Red Sox in a 3 game series sweep. Alex Verdugo looks totally checked out he showed up 2 hours late to the 2nd game of the critical series, one of the most important games and series they would play for their race to make the playoffs. Cora would bench him and when asked from reporters Verdugo said "7 more weeks" which sounds a lot like he is counting down the days of the season. Verdugo wants out and Chaim should have sold high when he could have. 

    The perks of writing this post so late, Its not over! The checked out Sox busted out the magic yellow city connect jersey's. They were tied 2-2 in the 9th inning in a must win game and series against the Kansas City Royals, barring a controversial check swing coming from Luis Urias, Pablo Reyes when the lights were the brightest in a full count in the bottom of the ninth, the kid comes up massive and hits a grand slam bomb to walk off the game. This is just what this team needed and could have saved the season. The Red Sox have series against the Royals, Tigers and Nationals, three of the worst teams in baseball it is critical the sox ride the momentum built off Pablo Reyes and sweep all three series to gain ground in the Wild Card Race.