Five Swings: Limit Down

Let's not insult anybody's intelligence, but falling six games behind in two weeks and playing poorly surprises most Red Sox fans. There's talk of pushing the panic button, releasing veterans, and bringing up 'suspects'. Let's get real in macroeconomic sense.

1. Maas Appeal. There's always the 'catch lightning in a bottle' dream, but where's that dream coming from...Darnell McDonald? In 1990 Kevin Maas burst upon the scene in New York, hitting 21 homers in 300 at bats, surely the next Roger Maris. He was runner up for Rookie of the Year. The next season he hit 23, with an OPS of .723 with 128. Do you really believe that Josh Reddick is the next Kevin Maas. That is helpful exactly how?

2. Patriot Games. The Sox offense, producing a pair of runs on a Jeremy Hermida homer today, and the team is now producing less than four runs per game. Suddenly, we've become the Kansas City Red Sox. But, no, the Royals scored 686 runs last year, so even they had a more potent offense than the locals these day.

3. Boston Massacre. The original Boston Massacre occurred in August (as I recall) 1978, as Bobby Sprowl and the Pretenders got wiped out in a four game sweep by the Yankees, the accelerator to the 14 1/2 game collapse that sent Sox fans from Red Sox Nation to Prozac Nation. The version 2010 Sox didn't get outscored with the same vigor, but the results felt the same as Tampa now officially "owns" the Bosox, as in "who's your Daddy?" I'd like to think we could take something positive away from the beatdown, but I'm not seeing it.

4. Sliver Lining. Oh, maybe Terry Francona learned something in his cut down bullpen tryout camp, with the revolving door bottom of the udder of Scott Schoeneweis, Scott Atchison, and Ramon Ramirez battle it out while Daisuke Matsuzaka waits in the Paw-wings. Well, security does check for torches and pitchforks, right?

5. Mendozing. The "Mendoza Line" refers to the .200 batting line that distinguishes that which must never be known. For what it's worth, Mendoza "bench me or trade me" actually hit .215 in a nine-year professional carerr. As I recall, Mendoza perfected the art of 'bench sitting', and one of his top ten "similarity scores" is with former Sox shortstop Luis Alvarado. If you remember Alvarado, then you, too, likely 1) watched too much baseball as a youth and 2) are an old fart.

If we apply the 'real' Mendoza Line of .215, then the Sox have four members of the 'sub club', Victor Martinez, David Ortiz, J.D. Drew, and Bill Hall, and two hitters, Kevin Youkilis (.217) and Jeremy Hermida (.219) are within sniffing distance. As they like to say, "it doesn't get any worse than this."

In the futures industry, you'd have to call the Sox performance to date, "limit down".