Boston Red Sox: 3 obstacles in the way of playoff success

The Boston Red Sox won the American League East, but their 100-plus win season won’t mean anything in the playoffs.

If you’re a passionate sports fan like myself, you obviously want the Boston Red Sox to win a World Series year after year. However, I’m not going to be a crazy sports fan and say that they have the tools year after year to win, because quite honestly they don’t.

We all know the Red Sox are going to the playoffs this year as American League East division champions with home-field advantage.

I’m here to tell you why the Red Sox could win 110 games this season and not even win the pennant in three reasons.

Ready? Let’s go.

The biggest and most obvious reason – the bullpen. The Red Sox bullpen has been horrific as of late. Just look at this tweet from Yahoo Sports’ Mike Oz. The stats are striking.

This is precisely what fans should be scared of in October, and why the Boston Red Sox may not even make it out of the first round, depending on who they play.

If you’re asking the average Sox fan, I think they’ll tell you that the Sox should see the Yankees first round. The Red Sox don’t want any business playing against the team that comes out of the AL Wild Card game.

However, by their No. 1 seed they have no choice. The Yankees are scary when they have everyone together, and the Red Sox could play the long five game series if they see New York in the playoffs.

Secondly, are the Injuries.

Within the last few weeks of this post fans have seen Mookie Betts and Eduardo Nunez both leave games with injuries. This is the point in the season that you want players to be coming back from injuries, not leaving with them.

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Betts looks okay right now, and the Sox have clinched the home field position, which means that manager Alex Cora can start to rest players and give them a much needed break before next week’s start of the MLB playoffs. Look for reduced playing time from the main guys in the lineup and some minor leaguers to get a taste.

The third reason, which almost ties into the first reason, is the starting rotation.

Chris Sale is coming back slowly, David Price got shelled in New York, and Eduardo Rodriguez?

Not good. Not good at all. Look, I’m just a sports fan like the rest of you but with a rotation consisting of this? Won’t get any team very far.

The other concern with the rotation is who is the starting four/five that Boston finds on the roster.

Fans should expect to see Chris Sale at number one after his long rest and most likely price at number two, but after that it starts to get a little dicey. The average fan would expect to see Rick Porcello at number three but after that? No one really knows. Here’s FOX’s Ken Rosenthal on what he thinks will happen.

Nathan Eovaldi would make for a good playoff piece for a guy the Boston  Red Sox picked up in the middle of the season, but do you add a fifth or let Sale pitch game five? Cora will ultimately most likely pick the four but fans are anxious to hear this news.

I love the Red Sox just as much as the next guy. I really do. They’re probably my favorite Boston sports team.

But I have to be honest with myself and you do too. The Boston Red Sox are good, but they’re not consistently good.