It’s becoming apparent that the Red Sox’s problems go far beyond David Ortiz’s failed drug test.
They have lost five in a row and in their last two defeats to the Yankees, they haven’t scored.
“We’ve faced two really good pitchers and we’ve done nothing,” manager Terry Francona said after his team dropped its third straight in The Bronx yesterday, 5-0, after winning the first eight games between the two teams this season. “If I thought the effort was terrible, I’d go in and throw something, but it’s not. We’ve just put up zeroes for the last . . . a lot of innings.”
They’re also dealing with infielder Kevin Youkilis playing an ugly left field because of Jason Bay’s bad hamstring, ineffectiveness at shortstop with Jed Lowrie now on the disabled list with an injured wrist and a pitching staff that doesn’t seem as strong as it did just weeks ago.
All that has left the Red Sox with their second five-game losing streak since the All-Star break, dropping them from three games up in the AL East to 5½ behind the first-place Yankees.
“There’s a long way to go and a lot of things can happen,” said Youkilis, who misplayed two balls in his second straight game in left. “We can come back, we’ve done it before. All we have to do is make the playoffs. We’re still in the race.”
The Red Sox will try again tonight in the series finale against Andy Pettitte, who will attempt to continue the scoreless string started by A.J. Burnett on Friday and continued by CC Sabathia yesterday.
“CC was dominant, he had something do with it,” Dustin Pedroia said. “And A.J. was pretty good. Those are two reasons over the past couple of days that we’ve been off. You’re gonna go through periods like that.”
Which is something Francona knows.
“It’s not always easy,” he said. “It never is in this game.”
For the Red Sox over the past few years, it hasn’t usually seemed this hard.