The most criticized and doubted 108-win team in baseball history has gotten it together ahead of the World Series, which begins on Tuesday.
HOUSTON — As the Red Sox sprayed Champagne and beer across the visitors’ clubhouse here Thursday night, they also began showering one another with praise.
There was Mookie Betts, in the hallway, lauding Jackie Bradley Jr. On one side of the room stood Andrew Benintendi, complimenting Alex Cora, the manager. With a bottle in his left hand, J. D. Martinez waxed lyrical about the complementary players in Boston’s lineup.
Pitchers applauded defenders, batters commended the pitchers — and everyone raved about starter David Price.
“We had 108 wins,” Martinez, Boston’s marquee slugger, said. “Two or three guys don’t do that. It’s a whole team. This whole series, this whole playoffs, displayed that.”
The Red Sox set a franchise record with 108 regular-season wins and steamrollered the Yankees in their division series. Yet until they clinched the pennant by defeating the Houston Astros, 4-1, in Game 5 of the American League Championship Series on Thursday night, they might have been the most nitpicked, criticized and doubted 108-win team in baseball history.
Their record was inflated with easy wins over inferior teams, critics charged. The bullpen middle relief is terrible, others complained. The starting pitching is suspect, and the ace of the staff is hiding a shoulder injury. There is no solid third baseman, second base is a hole, and the closer can’t throw a strike that isn’t hit into the stands or close to it.
Going into the A. L. C. S., the sports book at Bovada had the Astros as strong favorites to win the series, even though Boston had home-field advantage.
But the Red Sox just kept winning, and they did so at an even better clip than in the regular season. Boston is 7-2 in its two postseason series and 5-0 on the road, thanks in large part to a lineup that wears out even excellent pitchers like Houston’s Justin Verlander, who took the loss in Game 5.
While the Red Sox were celebrating down the hall, A. J. Hinch, the Astros’ manager, who led Houston to its first World Series title last year, seemed almost stunned by how good Boston’s lineup was.
“Their at-bats are really exceptional,” Hinch said. He added: “They have tremendous balance. They don’t concede any at-bats. They never got off our fastballs, and we couldn’t quite — they laid off tough breaking balls. They do it right. And that’s why it’s hard to get 27 outs against them.”
Hinch noted that coming out of spring training, it was clear that Boston was good. The same was true of the Astros, the Yankees and the Cleveland Indians. But Boston began the season 17-2 and played consistently well afterward, even as the questions mounted.
“The talent was there, but they had to go out and play and prove it,” Hinch said. “And then when people doubted them, it seemed like they got better. And they never stopped. They never stopped coming at you. They’re a relentless group.”
Most notable in the playoffs so far? That all of Boston’s blemishes — the bullpen, the infield, Chris Sale’s health, Craig Kimbrel’s jitters and Price’s difficulty winning in the postseason — are real but not debilitating.
Price stepped in for Sale on short rest in Game 5 and pitched the game of his life to win a postseason start for the first time in 12 tries. Rafael Devers, who has been inconsistent at third base, hit a three-run home run. Bradley, supposedly a weak link in the lineup, knocked in nine runs in the series and was named its most valuable player.
In fact, despite some dicey moments in both series, the supposedly overrated Red Sox won both rather easily. In total, against two 100-win teams, they outscored the Yankees and Astros, 56-35, for an incredible run differential of plus-21 in nine playoff games. (Yes, the 16-1 win over the Yankees contributed to that, but it happened.)
Some of the success in overcoming the deficiencies was because of Cora’s aggressive managing, especially his regular use of starters in relief. He sent all four members of the rotation to the bullpen at various times in the postseason, and it worked. He used Rick Porcello, Sale and Nathan Eovaldi in relief and had Price warming up three times in Game 4, even though he was scheduled to start Game 5.
Before the first game of the playoffs, relief pitcher Steven Wright went down with a knee injury, but Matt Barnes and Ryan Brasier got the job done instead. And after Kimbrel nearly handed away three victories with shaky outings in Game 4 against the Yankees and Games 2 and 4 against the Astros, he discovered a clue to his troubles (he was tipping his pitches) before recording a relatively painless save in Game 5 of the A. L. C. S.
So as Boston turns its attention to the World Series, many of the doubts and questions seem resolved. Price is now a swaggering postseason winner. Kimbrel’s problem is presumably solved. Sale will have nine days to recover from a tender shoulder and a stomach bug, and Mitch Moreland’s sore hamstring has even more time to heal.
It was a topic of conversation on the lips of all the players on Thursday, as the Champagne dripped from their pennant-celebration T-shirts. Say what you want about inflated records and shaky bullpens: For the Red Sox, everything is coming together.
“We’ve had a special year all the way through, and it’s been a blast,” Moreland said. “This was our goal the whole time, to win a World Series. So we’re not done yet.”
