The Boston Red Sox have reached a season milestone that fans haven’t seen in 72 years with a 1-0 victory over the Toronto Blue Jays Wednesday night.
It’s officially been done! The 2018 Boston Red Sox can now check off 100 wins from their wish list this season with a 1-0 win over the Toronto Blue Jays in front of a packed crowd at Fenway Park.
It only took 146 games which is the fastest road to 100 wins since the Seattle Mariners did it back in 2001. That team eventually went onto win 116 games.
Does it get anymore ironic and/or perfect then watching David Price lead the Red Sox to their first 100-win season since 1946?
Well, that’s what Red Sox fans in attendance got on Wednesday night. Despite the media drama, the playoff history, and even the Fortnite drama, Price delivered! A script that couldn’t have been written any more perfect then the way it all came down.
Seventy-two years!
That means the last time the Boston Red Sox reached the 100 win plateau Ted Williams was still on the roster. In fact, he had just returned from World War II. That was one season before Williams batted .369 in 1948 and two years before he played a career high 155 games while bashing 43 home runs. So yeah it’s been quite a while. The list goes on and on with what’s happened within that 72-year span.
However Wednesday was all about the Boston Red Sox and more specifically David Price. The lefty arm who’s posted a 1.78 earned run average in the season’s second half.
Prior to Wednesday night’s start against the Blue Jays, Price entered the game having won 20 games in 28 starts. That’s a win percentage of 87 percent in career games when facing Toronto. Just the perfect setup for Price to throw on the big stage with a pact Fenway crowd looking to go home having witnessed something the park hasn’t seen in 72 seasons.
With all the praise Alex Cora and his 2018 squad have earned, concerns remain. In fact they remain bold and very existent.
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Let’s start off with the past two series which date back to taking one of three from the Houston Astros. In that series, the bullpen once again proved to be a major concern in which Red Sox president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski has failed to address since the trade deadline.
It is a concern in which anyone from miles away could’ve seen coming. For example, this past Sunday’s win that prevented a sweep at the hands of the Astros consisted of six bullpen arms being used.
And then the 7-2 win over Toronto on Tuesday?
That was an eight-man bullpen audition. Aside from Craig Kimbrel, Alex Cora is yet to discover a reliable arm he can roll out come October. In fact, the Boston Red Sox rank 6th among major league teams today with a 3.74 earned run average.
However, among those first six, they rank 4th in possible American League playoff opponents. The Houston Astros, New York Yankees, and Oakland Athletics all have better performing bullpens this season.
The opportunity remains wide open for someone in Boston’s bullpen to step up and emerge as an arm to rely on aside from Kimbrel.
Let’s not allow the remarkable 100-win milestone take away from the fact that the team isn’t perfect.
Granted, anyone can get on a hot run come October.
The hunt for a hot arm in October
Back in 2013 it was the unstoppable duo of Junichi Tazawa and Koji Uehara who combined to throw 7.0 scoreless innings against the Cardinals. Let’s not forget the fact that Uehara wasn’t even signed to take over the closer role in John Farrell’s bullpen. The Boston Red Sox only witnessed the first hand emergence of Uehara due to the season ending injuries of both Andrew Bailey and Joel Hanrahan.
Now we’re in a slighty different scenario with this 2018 Red Sox club. Boston has no reliable setup arm whatsoever! Back in early April through the first few months of the season, it seemed as though we had that arm in Joe Kelly. That spark which ignited to a classic Yankees-Red Sox brawl had Kelly throw below 1.0 ERA ball all of May. That’ll be remembered as the immaculate Kelly which disappeared following those 14 flawless appearances. It seemed as though early on that Cora struck gold with a perfect Joe Kelly.
Unfortunately his run ended like we’ve seen with several arms in the rotation when going through the list.
Last season that arm was ironically David Price. Let’s go back to the final stretch of the season and heading into the 2017 postseason. In that ALDS series, Price threw 6.2 scoreless innings. That was within just two games which made Price a semi-starter considering the hefty load of “bullpen work” he carried in that series. Unfortunately that arm is yet to emerge for Alex Cora and this Red Sox team.
Yet, October is October. That’s where unknowns make themselves known, making a sliver of hope existent within the bullpen.
Speaking of Alex Cora, let’s give the man his well deserved props. He’s the first manager in Major League Baseball to tally up 100 wins in his first year since the 2003 Giants and Felipe Alou did so. That was fifteen years ago! Now pressure still remains on him as well.
The Boston Red Sox have recorded just one victory within their last two playoff series they’ve played. Those seasons also included clinching their division. Back-to-back early exits for Boston in the past two seasons are something this team can soon make a forgotten memory of the past.
With 16 games remaining on the season, next assignment’s up in clinching the American League East.