After a month where the Boston Red Sox could not be stopped, everything has gone wrong in July.
The Red Sox are just 6-15 this month and have lost games in seemingly every way imaginable. One thing that has stuck out has been the egregious defensive mistakes, which can be quantified by the most prevalent fielding stat around, errors.
“Red Sox taking much-needed round of infield,” Boston Herald’s Jason Mastrodonato tweeted Tuesday. “They have made (a Major League Baseball)-worst 19 errors in July.
On top of the league-leading statistic, some of the most costly plays were not even considered errors. Jarren Duran’s massive blunder in center field going as an inside-the-park grand slam is by far the most notable example. The same series against the Toronto Blue Jays also featured a pop-up that fell between four infielders.
Injuries have mounted, leading to some previously irregular players being thrust into key spots, which is making matters worse. Regardless of the reason, if the Red Sox can not clean it up defensively, they might as well sell because a postseason run would simply be a pipe dream.
The alternative would be to use Monday’s win over the Cleveland Guardians as a fresh start and realize they sit just three games back of an American League Wild Card spot and will make that ground up easily if they can replicate half of what they were in June.
