Red Sox offense knocking on the door of historic pace

The Boston Red Sox have been scoring runs at a ridiculous pace, but how many runs is this team capable of putting up?

The Boston Red Sox have been putting up some prolific offensive numbers this month, smashing any opposing pitching staff that stands in their way. At the rate they are going, one might wonder if it will be the record books that they end up smashing next.

The Red Sox have scored at least 11 runs in each of their last four games, all of which were victories. How impressive is that? In the last 100 years, only three other teams have scored that many runs in four consecutive games.

Already the American League leader in almost every offensive category, Boston’s 11-1 victory over the Houston Astros Thursday night vaulted them over the Chicago Cubs for the highest scoring team in the majors. The Red Sox homered twice in the game, extending their streak to 13 consecutive games with a least one home run, the longest active streak in the majors.

The month of May has seen the Red Sox powering up after a slow start in that category. Boston’s 23 home runs in May lead the league for the month and puts them on pace to break the franchise record for home runs in a month, which they set in July 2003 with 55.

"“We’re in a good stretch,” manager John Farrell said, per WEEI.com. “That goes without saying. It’s just the relentlessness up and down the lineup. And that’s the one word we try to take pride in, that means you’ve prepared, that means you’ve not given at-bats away or innings away from the mound. The more we can make that customary, we’re probably in pretty good shape.”"

The individual league leader boards are littered with the names of Red Sox players. The lineup has six regulars hitting over .300 that rank in the top 17 in the league in batting average, led by Xander Bogaerts at .331. David Ortiz and Jackie Bradley are both in the top 7 in OPS and top 4 in RBI. Ortiz is also 5th in the league with 9 home runs, while three others in the lineup have 6 homers.

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This lineup is scorching hot right now, but how good can the Red Sox offense be from a historical standpoint? The team is currently averaging 5.91 runs per game, putting them on pace for 958 runs for the season. If they stay on this pace it will be the most runs the franchise has scored since 2003, when they scored 961 runs to kick off a three-year span that saw the Red Sox top the 900 mark. The team hasn’t scored 900+ runs since 2005.

While it was common for at least one team to crack 900 runs scored during the steroid era of the late 90’s to early 2000’s, no team has reached that milestone since the New York Yankees did it in 2009. It’s rare territory to even flirt with that level these days, but this Red Sox team may do it.

Could they even take it to the next level and make a run at 1,000 runs scored? Only 16 teams in the history of baseball have done it, but most of them played in the 19th century. The only team in recent history to do it was the 1999 Cleveland Indians. Prior to that, it hadn’t been accomplished since the Red Sox did it in 1950. The historic Yankees teams of the 1930’s scored over 1,000 runs several times, including the 1931 Yankees lineup that holds the modern record with 1,067 runs scored.

Making a run at 1,000 would be a long shot, but being on a pace that puts you in the conversation for that possibility is quite an accomplishment. It would be impressive if they can even get to 900, given that offense in Major League Baseball has been dwindling overall in the past few years.

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We’re still dealing with a relatively small sample size, so it remains to be seen if they can keep up this pace over the grueling schedule of a long season. A lot can go wrong over 162 games, but if the Red Sox can keeping hitting at a rate anywhere near what we’ve seen through 35 games, we’re in store for potentially seeing a pretty special season.