Red Sox offense goes quiet against AL East divisional foes

Red Sox bats are showing no life over seven game stretch

The Boston Red Sox offense is currently in flux. Over the past few games, you have seen their bats come to life for an inning or so and then go stagnant. What has been the problem? Is it the lineup and how it is currently shaped? Is it because J.D. Martinez has been out the past four games dealing with left adductor tightness? Or is it just a bad start to the season that has come to light more than it would if this lineup was not projected to be greater than last year’s?

Red Sox center fielder, Kiké Hernández, believes that it is just a bad start and they need more time to adjust with a shortened spring training.

“Yes, it’s a matter of time but … we’ve been saying that for quite some days now,” Kiké Hernández said via Christopher Smith of MassLive. “So we’ve got to figure out a way to get it done.”

Their latest game, a 5-2 loss to divisional rival, Tampa Bay Rays, on Sunday is a perfect example of the bats coming to life for a shortened period of time before going quiet again.

Within the first two pitches of the game, Trevor Story hit a leadoff double and would come around to score on a Hernández single to make it quickly 1-0. They would go on to score another run to make it 2-0 on four hits. After that, it was deja vu from the previous night where they were no-hit through nine innings before the 10th inning breakout. The Red Sox offense could only muster two more hits in the final eight innings.

Acting manager, Will Venable, doesn’t see one singular reason on why the offense is in a slump. He believes that there is a different reason every day on why the Red Sox hitters are not getting good wood on the ball.

“I think on a day-to-day basis, it’s different,” he said. “Largely, we talk about getting in the strike zone, swinging at strikes. The willingness to use the whole field. … I think that with our group is gonna be the story. And these guys will figure it out.”

Currently, the Red Sox rank 30th out of 30 teams seeing just 3.7 pitches per plate appearance this year. They chase bad pitches outside the zone 32% of the time, the worst rate in the big leagues.

These numbers make sense when you look at where Boston ranks in MLB in runs. Currently, they sit at 19th with 58 runs scored on the season. Over the current seven game stretch, they have averaged a miserable 2.3 runs per game. That is not going to win you a ton of games.

The Sox hitters are doing things at the plate that they normally are not known to do and that is to be impatient. They need to be more disciplined when stepping up to the batter’s box. Don’t give the pitcher more strikes and opportunities to get you out.

The bright spot in all of this is that the pitching has mainly kept them in games. If the Red Sox can turn things around at the plate and their pitching stays consistent as it has been, they are in a good spot to play some solid baseball to end April.

“Obviously we have work to do,” starting pitcher Rich Hill said via Jason Mastrodonato of the Boston Herald. “Going up to Toronto is not going to be an easy series at all, either. With that said, we are fully capable of going on a nice run here. We just have to make things small. Get back into that one pitch at a time mentality, one swing at a time, and ultimately build up those small successes into Ws.”

You would think with the guys the Sox have in this lineup that they will break out of this little slump sooner rather than later. Red Sox Nation is on the edge of their seat waiting to see if this team can figure out that part of the game before April baseball is over.