LyfLines: Monday Pythagorean

You keep cranking out 4-2 weeks, you finish with a great record...

So, the Red Sox had a bad spell. The Yankees went on a tear, playing a long homestand against relatively weak and/or struggling competition, and made up ground. The lead, which was 8 games just 5 1/2 weeks ago is all the way down to 8 1/2.

OK, that's weak. The lead did peak at 14 1/2, it is down to 8 1/2. That's life. The Red Sox had their good stretch while the Yankees played poorly. Then the Yankees had a great stretch while the Red Sox played poorly. The bottom line is that right now, on Monday, June 18, with over 40% of the schedule played, the Red Sox are 8 1/2 games up in the AL East. That's a nice place to be, and it doesn't matter which team played well first. There was all kinds of "if the Yankees keep making up ground at this pace" talk earlier in the week, but it was fairly pointless. "Let's see, if the Yankees keep winning 100% of their games while Boston wins 30% of theirs..." Let's stay at least within hailing distance of reality, shall we?

They went 4-2 this week while struggling offensively, and seeing Beckett and Schilling lit-up on back-to-back nights. Lugo has been dropped to the bottom of the order. That's a good thing. I think I'd rather see Youkilis 1 and Drew 5 than the other way around, but maybe they'll do that when Drew starts to wake up. Crisp has a couple of hits over the past couple of days - could he possibly become a functional Major League hitter again? They need something to happen - they've all been cold together for the past couple of weeks, which makes for some ugly outings.

Over the last month, from 5/18 through 6/17, the Red Sox starting pitching stats are interesting. The best ERA among the starters is Daisuke Matsuzaka's 4.19, just barely beating out the 4.20 of ... Julian Tavarez. There were many who decried the Tavarez signing last year, and have been eager to get Jon Lester up here to replace him. But since May 1st, you could make an argument that he's been the Sox best starter. He's got the best ERA of the starters over the last month and a half, 3.94 over his last 8 starts, while averaging 6 innings per.