When the Boston Red Sox take the field at Fenway Park to face the Tampa Bay Rays on Friday night, they will be looking to extend their season-high wining streak to eight games. A win would also — at least until the first-place Toronto Blue Jays play on the west coast later in the evening — move the Red Sox closer to the top of the American League East than at any time since May 17.
But none of that was even the best news for the Red Sox on Friday. According to manager Alex Cora, Friday will see the return to the Red Sox lineup, after missing 44 games, of their biggest free-agent acquisition, All-Star third baseman Alex Bregman.
Red Sox Up-And-Down Fortunes Since Bregman Injury
The Red Sox have had an eventful month-and-a-half since Bregman took himself out of a game against the Baltimore Orioles on May 23 with a severely strained quadricep muscle. And that doesn’t even count the shocking trade of the third baseman Bregman displaced at the position, Rafael Devers, to the San Francisco Giants on June 15.
Since Bregman’s injury, the Red Sox have endured a five-game losing streak and a six-game losing streak. But they have also enjoyed a six-game winning streak and their current one which stands at seven straight victories.
They saw the departure of Devers, but also welcomed the promotion of baseball’s No. 1 prospect, Roman Anthony.
Bregman was the team’s best hitter when he departed with the quad strain, bettering Devers in OPS .938 to .905, batting average at .299 to .272 and home run rate, with one dinger for every 20.5 plate appearances. Devers hit one every 22.3 trips to the plate in his time with the Red Sox this season.
But the Red Sox offense has suddenly come to life even in Bregman’s absence, scoring an even 100 runs over the past 12 games — 21 percent of their total for all 95 games Boston has played so far.
The return of their premier hitter — not to mention Gold Glove third baseman whose five defensive runs saved (DRS) still ranks him fifth in MLB at the position despite not playing at all since May 23 — now gives the American League an entirely different outlook.
AL East Could Now Get Even More Competitive
Bregman also led — and still leads — the team in offensive Wins Above Replacement (oWAR), accounting for 2.3 of the team’s total of 17.0. Another way of looking at it: based on the numbers as of July 11, the Red Sox offense gets 13.5 percent better now that Bregman is set to return to action.
Meanwhile, the New York Yankees are just coming out of a lengthy funk that saw the team that led the AL East by seven games as late as May 28 slog through not one but two six-game losing skids between June 13 and July 5. With four victories on the trot as of Friday, the Yankees appear to be headed in the right direction now.
But the Yankees remain two games behind pace-setter Toronto — with the Red Sox just three games behind them, five games out of first. In fact, outside of the last place Baltimore Orioles who are languishing at 11 /12 games behind the leaders, the top four teams in the AL East are bunched within five games of each other.
A win on Friday brings the Red Sox within 4 1/2 games of the top. That would be the closest they’ve been since May 17 when they sat four games behind the Yankees, in second place.
Will the division draw even tighter with Bregman’s return to the Boston lineup. The first indications should become visible on Friday night at Fenway.
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