The Red Sox just can’t catch a break. Or maybe they can, and that’s the problem. Either way, infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa landed on the 10-day injured list Saturday with left forearm inflammation, and for a team already buried in the AL East basement, this is the kind of news that makes you just shake your head.
Kiner-Falefa isn’t a star by any stretch. But he’s been doing exactly what the Red Sox needed him to do lately: play solid second base. He’d appeared in 47 games this season, hitting .277 with a .344 on-base percentage, two home runs and 13 RBI. He also swiped seven bags. Nothing flashy, but steady. And right now, steady is hard to come by in Boston.
To fill the roster spot, the club called up infielder Anthony Seigler from Triple-A Worcester. Seigler is a switch-hitter the organization has been watching, but whether he can provide anything close to what Kiner-Falefa was giving them remains to be seen.
The Red Sox are sitting at 30-43. That puts them 15 games back of the Yankees, who are running away with the division. They’re also 3 games behind the fourth-place Orioles. The last Wild Card spot currently belongs to the Athletics at 38-38, and Boston is 6.5 games out of that. So yeah, it’s not great. It’s not even close to great.
Injuries aren’t the whole story here
Yes, the Red Sox have been hit hard. Pitcher Garrett Crochet hasn’t thrown in weeks and the team hopes he can return after the All-Star break. Young prospect Roman Anthony has been out since early in the season with a wrist issue, and nobody’s sure when he’ll be back. But Boston’s problems go way deeper than the training room.
They just can’t hit for power. Through Saturday, the Red Sox rank 29th out of 30 MLB teams in home runs with 62. That’s barely more than two per game. And it’s not just the long balls that are missing. They’re not getting clutch hits with runners on base either. The starting pitching has actually been decent for most of the year, but when you’re not scoring runs, decent pitching doesn’t win you many games.
The lineup looks thin. Opposing pitchers aren’t scared. And when a team doesn’t make you pay for mistakes, you start to see why they’re 13 games under .500.
There’s still a lot of season left. But the clock is ticking. And with Kiner-Falefa now sidelined, the Red Sox are down another body in a year that’s running out of bodies and answers.
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