It's a dangerous game to proclaim all is lost on a night like this. This is exactly why Alex Cora answered the way he did when asked if the Red Sox might want to rethink his teams approach to ninth-inning relief pitching after its 7-5 loss/late night horror show Tuesday night. (For a complete recap of the Red Sox' loss, click here.)
"No," Cora said after watching his bullpen give up two runs in the eighth inning and five more in the ninth. "We feel we've done an outstanding job so far so nothing is going to change right now."
The key words there are "right now."
The Sox manager isn't about to turn reactionary after the rain-soaked loss to the Indians, but he also knows the reality of this situation. What the Red Sox have can be better and, as we've seen, pretty decent at times, but it still isn't good enough as currently constituted. That was the reminder that this game offered.
The Red Sox now have converted 12 of their 21 save opportunities, which is the seventh-worst save percentage in baseball. Conversely, through 55 games last year they were 20 for 25 in save chances. And while you might want to point out that it's just a difference of four blown saves, understand how important and demoralizing each one of those babies is.
One of the blown saves was against the Yankees, two came on days New York didn't play and Tuesday night presented a valued opportunity to make up a game on the division leaders, who lost to the Padres earlier in the day.
These sort of things happen. And the Red Sox relievers have had their moments. But the window of opportunity to sift through what they have and don't have is closing. The time-honored tradition of paying for certainty is nigh.
It's not like Dave Dombrowski hasn't done this before. In fact, this seems to be an annual rite of passage. Brad Ziegler. Addison Reed. Even Nathan Eovaldi.
The guys they gave up for Ziegler were Luis Alejandro Basabe (the wrong Basabe brother?) and Jose Almonte. One is toiling in Single-A and the other hasn't played pro ball since 2017. The haul the Mets got for Reed (who was just released by the Twins, by the way) were relievers Stephen Nogosek and Gerson Bautista, neither one are in the big leagues, and Jamie Callahan who is battling back from injury in the Giants organization.
Jalen Beeks, the guy the Red Sox' gave up for Eovaldi? He has proven to be a legitimate major leaguer, sitting with a 2.83 ERA while serving as a key element in Tampa Bay's "opener" strategy. But sometimes you have to give up something to get something. That's OK, and a fact of life when in position to make a World Series run.
The Red Sox went through the offseason with a plan of Matt Barnes and Ryan Brasier pitching the highest leverage innings, with Tyler Thornburg and Steven Wright at the ready just before that duo. The Barnes part of the equation has worked out. Everything else? Not so much. Fortunately for the Sox guys like Marcus Walden (who had his first real hiccup Tuesday night) and Brandon Workman have emerged. That helps. But such surprises shouldn't be construed as lock-down solutions.
Perhaps the Red Sox want to buy themselves some more time considering the calendar. Such maneuvers as trading for Byung-Hyun Kim in 2003 -- which took place on May 29 -- is a rarity. Maybe there is a desire to give someone like Darwinzon Hernandez a whirl, or see if Brasier can rediscover the consistency he exhibited in the four appearances before his three-run, no-out ninth Tuesday. There certainly doesn't seem to be many answers coming from Triple-A Pawtucket, where perhaps the most notable candidate, former big leaguer Jenrry Mejia, has been uninspiring (5.09 ERA in 21 appearances).
Then there is Craig Kimbrel. Even if the terms are agreed upon this would be a risky road considering the time off. Remember the uneasiness he experienced just by missing spring training last year. And the history of free agents coming back in June after clearing themselves of the qualifying offer tag has not been good.
It seems that this situation is once again reminding us the importance of prioritizing the known.
There will be options for Dombrowski to target. There always are. But the Red Sox can't be seduced by what might be. It was a trap they almost fell into last year when Thornburg went on a little bit of a run just before the non-waiver trade deadline, leaving the Sox with prioritizing Kelvim Herrera or nobody at all. At the end of the day they were saved in the postseason by the use of starters in high-leverage relief innings.
World Series or no, lessons should have been learned.
Tuesday night wasn't the be-all, end-all. But it should have been a valuable wake-up call.
Lost in the late-inning disaster for the Red Sox was the performance of starter David Price, who weathered an hour rain delay to turn in six shutout innings. The outing lowered his ERA to 2.83, with the number dropping to 1.77 over his last seven starts. In three home starts this season Price's ERA is 0.95.
