Farrell, team leaders searching for answers
Red Sox trying to find spark with club stuck in last place in AL East
ARLINGTON -- Red Sox manager John Farrell and his team are searching for a spark, and they're exhausting all options to get it.
Farrell said he met with five players before Sunday's game against the Rangers, hoping to find a way to turn around Boston's season. The Red Sox (22-28) have lost five of six and are in last place in the AL East, though they are still only four games out of first place.
Farrell didn't go into extreme detail about the meeting, but its purpose seems to echo Farrell's concerns after Saturday's loss when the Red Sox got shut out and made three errors, plus made plenty of other mistakes.
"I guess the short version of [the message] would be for us to play with some aggressiveness and some smartness inside-the-game situation, without getting too detailed," Farrell said. "It was an opportunity to meet with our veteran group, to reemphasize the importance of the role they provide with the younger players and how they go about and execute within the game."
This isn't the first time Farrell has had this type of assembly. Boston has formally met as a team multiple times this year, and Farrell said this was the second time he alone has met with a "concentrated group."
A growing worry in the Red Sox clubhouse is the inability to cultivate energy on the field. Boston seemed enthused Thursday after Eduardo Rodriguez made a stellar Major League debut on the mound, but the Red Sox didn't carry that over in losses on Friday and Saturday.
"I don't know [why we can't sustain energy]," second baseman Dustin Pedroia said Saturday. "I don't have any answers. You just gotta go try to find a way to have good at-bats and play good defense and play all aspects of the game right. Consistency, we haven't been there. If you're not consistent, you can't build on anything."
Farrell said Sunday's meeting also gave the players involved a chance to speak their minds as Boston searches for a solution. But as Farrell said Saturday night, the Red Sox have to turn talk into action.
"The best way to describe it was there was an opportunity for them to speak," Farrell said. "I wanted to get their feedback, I wanted to give them some additional expectations that exist, some ideas that I think need to be carried out, and it was a chance to talk through those and [identify], 'What do we do going forward?'"