The Boston Red Sox are through the gauntlet.
They survived.
Mostly.
After entering the All-Star break on a season-high 10-game winning streak, the Red Sox were welcomed back to action with a brutal schedule, with seven of their first eight series in the unofficial second half coming against teams with a .500 record or better at the start of those series. That included some teams that significantly cleared the .500 hurdle, like the Cubs (57-39), Dodgers (60-43), and Astros (62-47 at the start of one series, 66-52 at the start of the next).
And though they certainly banger their struggles with a 1-4 stretch to start and more recently a three-game losing streak, the Red Sox posted a respectable 13-11 record over that span. They’re 66-56 on the year, and they’re firmly in the second wild-card position with a 1.5-game lead over New York and a 2.5-game lead over the Guardians, who are on the outside looking in at the moment. Through that daunting stretch of the schedule, the Red Sox largely did their job.
immediately, like a cold front moving in at the end of a heat wave, here comes the relief.
After catching their breath with a day off on Thursday following a series loss in Houston, the Red Sox will begin a stretch with eight of 11 series coming against teams with a losing record.
That includes some middling teams like Miami (four games under .500 entering Thursday), Cleveland (five games under), Arizona (four games under), and Tampa Bay (four games under). Yet it also includes some of the league’s basement dwellers, like two series against the A’s (15 games under .500), a three-game home series against the Pirates (20 games under), and six games against the Orioles (12 games under .500).
And even two of their series against an over-.500 team come with a caveat, as they’ll play seven games against the Yankees. New York sits at 64-57, but they’ve arguably been baseball’s biggest mess this month. The Yankees are 4-8 in August, after starting the month with a five-game losing streak. A series win this week over the Twins may work to stabilize the team, but the Red Sox have to hope those struggles continue for the Yankees through their series in New York (Aug. 21-24) and perhaps even through the series in Boston (Sept. 12-14).
All told, between immediately and Sept. 21, the Red Sox will face eight opponents who entered Thursday with a combined record of 461-508, a .476 winning percentage.
After that, they’ll close the season against the teams that are currently the two best in the American League: the Blue Jays and Tigers. But the Red Sox have done their job against sub-.500 teams this season, currently owning a 33-21 record against them thus far. If you want to play the theoretical game, they can go 15-9 against the sub-.500 teams down the stretch, which would get them to 81 wins. And if they can tread water in their 16 games against teams over .500, they’ll get themselves to 89. And 89 wins has been enough to earn an AL wild-card spot every year since MLB added the third wild card in 2022.
That, though, is the theoretical. In real life, it’s much simpler: After enduring a tough month-long stretch against some of baseball’s best teams, the Red Sox immediately face a much easier schedule for the next month. In their quest to make the postseason for the first time in four years, they’ll make life a whole lot easier on themselves if they can feast.
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