BOSTON -- The marathon may feel a little more like a slog before an insane sprint.
The Red Sox won’t see the Astros again until September, a month when roughly half of the 26 games they play, 12 of 26, are against either the Yankees, Astros or Indians.
MORE RED SOX
That kind of scheduling should lead to a palpable pennant race. Baseball is better off with high drama essentially built into the calendar. But there is a flip side: those head-to-head meetings allow for a last-second rewrite, potentially dampening some of the allure of the other match-ups in between. The second half of August, for examples, has four games with the Indians, six with the Rays, two with the Marlins and a series with the White Sox leading into September.
You’re eating your vegetables to get to dessert.
At times, that’s what it often feels like the Sox have been doing this season. As still the only team in the majors with 40 wins, the Sox stand apart. But theirs is a case where carrying the best record is not a seal they are baseball’s best team.
Boston Red Sox
Find the latest Boston Red Sox news, highlights, analysis and more with NBC Sports Boston.
The driving question as the non-waiver trade deadline approaches in July: How well do they match up with other elites in a short series? For as volatile as baseball is on a day-to-day basis, the Sox showed some mettle when they took the final two games of four from Houston over the weekend.
“We came here and we competed at a high level,” manager Alex Cora said on the way out of Houston. “And we know we’re a little bit banged up, but guys stepped up and the energy was great. We faced four of the best righties in the big leagues, and we did a good job with them.
“We know that team is going to be around, and they’re going to be around in October. Where we want to be, probably we have to go through them. So, it was a great series. We did a lot of different things. We just need to keep playing that way. I think with this unit right now, who we have, playing fast, being aggressive, is going to help us out.”
MLB DRAFT
Those are nice buzz words, but it’s also the way a team talks when it’s been weakened. Losing Mookie Betts and Dustin Pedroia indefinitely hurts. But the Sox can survive, possibly even thrive until their expected returns, because seven of 10 teams between the American League East and Central are under .500.
The first-place Mariners and the AL West, where only one team is below .500, are featured prominently in the second half of July. That should be a welcome dose of reality — the reality that matters, anyway — as the Sox approach the trade deadline.
The Sox are an excellent team. And baseball’s playoff format makes an arrival in the playoffs the most important element. But after two straight years of first-round knockouts, and with a schedule this year that’s designed to create September insanity, a sense we’re all just waiting around for the season’s fourth quarter is hard to avoid. In the meantime, the Sox need to remember what they'll be up against when crunch time arrives.