On The Roller Coaster

Well, after successive streaks of ten (losing), followed by seven (winning), the Sox are back on the downhill run. Getting swept in Cleveland for the first time in over a decade, they received Terry's revenge. After a year away from the field the Sox former manager is now the manager of the Tribe, and has them of late on quite an upward trajectory. Although still hovering at/near just .500, they've climbed within range of their division lead, now just 4.5 back of the Tigers. Yesterday's loss, completing the Indians sweep, was probably the most painful of this latest run. After coming back from 4-2 down, the Hose went into extra innings before Mujica finally gave up a walk-off three run shot to, of all people, Asdrubal Cabrera, he of the low .240's batting average. This was a waste of some pretty good Sox pitching, particularly from the pen up to Mujica's appearance. In fact, Koji even went two innings of near perfect pitching, allowing only a sole freebie for his work. The pitching and Papi's 13th drive to the cheaps, which had the Sox briefly up, 2-1, all were for naught.
They have the day off to get out of this slide and try again to turn things around, and, with the way both the Jays and O's are playing, they'd better not waste a lot of time getting it in gear. However, it's difficult when what seems like a daily occurrence is another player sent to the DL. The latest are Carp, broken foot and Lavarnway, surgery for hamate bone removal from his hand. These latest come on top of Bucky, Vic, Napoli and Middlebrooks. Carp, Lavarnway and Middlebrooks are listed as 15 day DL, but you know that with fractures and/or surgery, it isn't, unfortunately, going to be anywhere close to that. A month or more, particularly with Lavarnway, is far more likely.  The only good to come from this is that Holt has been one of the callus, and is doing pretty well, managing to stay above .300 so far, including his four double day in Cleveland.  Still, all of these injuries, coupled with walking wounded in the persons of Pedey and Papi, aren't helping the team in its defense of the World Championship.