Springing leaks in late summer

A sinking feeling about the playoffs

Reliever Chris Smith couldn't stop the bleeding in yesterday's lopsided loss at Toronto. (Frank gunn/canadian Press)

TORONTO - Your starting shortstop, third baseman, right fielder, and No. 1 pitcher are out with injuries. One of your young starters was so bad he had to be demoted to Double A. You lost to a division rival, 11-0, yesterday as your other top hurler, Jon Lester, was pummeled and lasted 2 1/3 innings. Your wild-card lead is teetering.

How are you feeling right about now?

If the Red Sox were my team, I'd feel a sudden attack of agita.

The Sox finally defeated the Blue Jays Friday night but couldn't gain any ground because Tampa Bay keeps beating really good teams like the White Sox and Twins and Angels. More and more, you begin to wonder whether the Red Sox can weather the injuries and come away with a playoff spot.

It wasn't long ago that you believed the Rays, Twins, and White Sox would fade, and the Red Sox were an automatic for the AL East title, or at least the wild card.

But there's a problem: Those teams aren't fading. In addition, Toronto is rising from the dead, and the Yankees are still hanging around.

The White Sox are a good team, and the Twins and Rays don't seem to care that they're not supposed to be this good, or that the pressure of the stretch run is upon them. Conventional wisdom tells us the Red Sox, the defending world champions, should get into the playoffs because they're a deep team and have shown for a long time they can overcome serious injuries. They have been through this, and have the experience not to panic when things get tight.

But do you have confidence that that's going on right now?

"We'll be fine, bro," said David Ortiz. "We go through this [expletive] every year. At the end of the day, we'll take another ring with us."

We all got excited Friday night when Jason Varitek homered for the third straight game and extended his hitting streak to five. But yesterday he couldn't get the ball out of the infield. Shortstop Alex Cora made a silly throwing error in the third inning that helped hasten Lester's exit.

We all love Chris Smith's story of perseverance, but his relief outing yesterday was a train wreck (four runs, six hits in 2 1/3 innings). Now Daisuke Matsuzaka, a 15-game winner (is he really or are we making it up?), takes the mound today in the series finale and it looks as if he's going to have go very deep in the game or the Boston bullpen is going to implode.

A loss like yesterday's, another in a too-long line of recent poor starts (see: Josh Beckett, Clay Buchholz, Matsuzaka, and Charlie Zink), and the recent spate of injuries makes you realize you can't take anything for granted.

There hasn't been much talk of the Red Sox being out of the postseason picture because most of the focus has been on the Yankees likely not making it for the first time in 14 years. But the Sox are in grave danger here.

Now, members of the brass don't appear too concerned that J.D. Drew will be out for a long time, but they also said Beckett was being backed up three days and now it's turned into six. Until we actually see Beckett and know whether the inflammation in his elbow - news manager Terry Francona sprang on us for the first time yesterday morning - has subsided, and whether the tingling in his fingers is completely gone, we have no idea how this is going to end up.

"You've got to be healthy to win, but we're not going to use injuries as an excuse," said second baseman Dustin Pedroia. "We've got to find a way to win. We'd love to be a team that just runs away with it, but that's not the way it's going to be. It's going to be a tight race."

Lester has been such a difference-maker for so long that it was shocking to see him to pitch so poorly. He had gone 9-1 in his last 14 starts with a 2.89 ERA. Scouts were raving about him, calling him the true ace of the staff, but he was crushed yesterday. Vernon Wells saw cantaloupes being served up to him. It was so un-Lesterlike it was eerie.

Is the sky falling?

Well, not yet. But it's dangling. The Sox could use a reinforcement or two right about now (Tim Wakefield's expected return Tuesday should be huge), but the waiver wire just isn't packed with players who are better than what they have. Brian Giles was their best shot at landing a hitter who could make an impact, but he elected to exercise his no-trade and continue his surfer-boy lifestyle. Jeff Bailey has had a very good Triple A season, but every time he gets called up to the big leagues, he looks like a big guy with a slow bat.

So the Sox are likely to go with what they have.

If everyone is back and clicking, they should be OK, but the players on the field now feel the weight of the world on their shoulders because, as Pedroia put it, "Every game we play is important from here on out."

The Red Sox are trying to survive at a time when they would rather be pulling away. But the Rays, Twins, White Sox, and Blue Jays are pulling them back into a tight race that's not likely to free up soon.

The playoffs should have been a slam dunk, but now you can almost hear Jim Mora screeching in the background, "Playoffs?"