If the Red Sox were a ship and not a baseball team, they've be taking on water. Also, if they were a ship, former NBA star Micheal Ray Richardson would declare that "the ship be sinking.''
Or at least dangerously close to doing so.
Every day brings one more bit of bad news. Last Friday, the middle of the diamond was decimated with the news that Kike Hernandez and Christian Arroyo had tested positive for COVID. Then, it was the bullpen's turn Monday into Tuesday afternoon, with a total of five relievers sidelined.
But as the Sox took the field in the bottom of the second inning at Tropicana Field Tuesday came the biggest blow of all: shortstop Xander Bogaerts was pulled from the game and informed that he, too, had tested positive.
Minutes later, as outfielders Kyle Schwarber and Alex Verdugo converged on a flyout, Verdugo, who had seen the mysterious shuffling going on in the infield, could be seen asking Schwarber: "What happened to Bogey?''
A more pertinent question might now be: What will happen to the Red Sox?
Never mind the third loss in a row, which dropped them 10 full games behind Tampa Bay in the American League East. And never mind that the Oakland A's were winning while the Red Sox were losing, pulling to within a game of the Sox for the second wild-card spot in the American League.
The real danger is the bigger picture here. Forget about maintaining a hold on a playoff spot or reaching the postseason. This is more about the potential for the bottom dropping out of the rest of the Red Sox season.
And if what transpired an inning after Bogaerts trotted off the field is any indication, buckle up. Because that was U-G-L-Y. No fewer than three defensive miscues - a lazy off-target throw from Verdugo; a missed cutoff throw by Bobby Dalbec; and a glaring bit of indecision on the part of Hunter Renfroe and Yairo Munox, allowing a ball that should have been caught to fall in for a two-run double -- led quickly to six runs for the Rays, who need no such help.
They've already proven themselves vastly superior to the Sox, as reflected by the 10-game gap that now exists between the teams in the American League East standings.
The pitching staff having been picked over by COVID, the Red Sox do not, simply put, have a major league-caliber bullpen at the moment. Joke all you want about it not being good enough prior to this outbreak. This is different. There are too many 4-A pitchers cluttering the roster, and a team doesn't lose Josh Taylor, Matt Barnes and Hirokazu Sawamura in the span of a day or so and remain competitive.
For now, the pitching staff is in danger of being mistaken for last year's edition, a comparison one wouldn't wish on one's worst enemy. You remember last year: an endless array of bullpen games, openers and a constant shuffling of bodies you had never heard of before. And we know where that got the 2020 Red Sox.
The damage done to the pitching staff was bad enough. But the loss of Bogaerts has the potential to take the team's misery to another level.
Bogaerts, for all his defensive limitations, is the team's stabilizing force, its equilibrium. He's not just in the middle of the infield; he occupies the team's emotional core, serving as its heartbeat: steady, reliable, unyielding.
The absence of Bogaerts, coupled with the challenges of playing the Rays four more times in the next eight days, followed by a demanding road trip to Chicago and Seattle could be enough to sink the Sox completely.
Kyle Schwarber, relatively new to the team, spoke eloquently after the concern for their stricken teammates and counting on one another to get through this stretch.
"We just hope they're not feeling (the virus) super hard and that they recover quickly,' said Schwarber. "That's the biggest thing on everyone's mind, the well-being of all the guys. It sucks, but we have to keep moving forward and putting our best foot forward. We're in the middle of this thing and it's a next-man-up mentality right now. (The outbreak) is floating around everyone's mind, but we've got to put it behind ourselves when we take that field.''
If the Sox can manage to play .500 for the next week or so, they'll get reinforcements back and be ready for a three-week sprint to the finish line with their postseason hopes intact. If not, get ready for a miserable final month of baseball.
"We know where we're at and we're still in a good position,'' proclaimed Cora. "Hopefully, we can figure some things out and see what we can do. I do feel that we still can compete, we still can make it to the playoffs. It's just a matter of what we're going to do in next couple of things to slow this down -- not only off the field, but on the field, how we're going to attack this.''
First, however, the Sox have to stay afloat, and avoid going down with the ship.