As recently as Wednesday afternoon, they were serving as a traveling Super-spreader Event, making pit stops throughout the American League circuit, and losing teammates faster than they could count.
It began last Friday when two players were quarantined and removed from the roster, and it continued for five treacherous days. Bad news on the doorstep, every day, from Cleveland and continuing once they arrived at Tropicana Field, including twice in the middle of games.
It's not hyperbole to suggest that when the team was forced to yank stalwart shortstop Xander Bogaerts off the field Tuesday night, they had reached a season low point, They would go on that same night to lose their third straight and it seemed legitimate to wonder, the way things were going, whether they could field a full team the following night.
And yet, when the series wrapped Thursday night, the Sox had shutout the Tampa Bay Rays, 4-0, for their second straight win, gaining a split with the American League's hottest and best team at a time when their own roster was...well, what's one notch down from decimated?
Not only that, but the win also, improbably, sent the Red Sox home with a winning record on their road trip. Though it all, despite it all, the Red Sox managed to win more games (four) than they lost (three) since this hellish experience began last Friday.
The duck boats will not be readied just yet. Playoff tickets will not be put on sale because of this. But however modest a 4-3 road trip might look on paper, it was a not insignificant accomplishment.
"There was a good vibe,'' said Alex Cora as the team readied to return home. "Chris (Sale) was talking to the guys today and he's been saying all along, 'Nothing's going to stop us.' He's been pretty loud in the clubhouse, just letting them know: 'It doesn't matter what's going on, we're going to keep pushing. We're going to be OK, we're going to be OK.' When you have guys like that who can speak up in the clubhouse but then they go out there and perform, it's a lot easier.
"There was a lot of energy today. The guys were into it from the get-go and to be able to do that is a testament to them. As a group, they understand that teams go through stuff like this. It's not the first team that has had a COVID issue. But there have been teams that went through this and then they took off. Hopefully, we start taking off and we can play solid baseball all the way through September and get to October.''
''Getting to October'' might have sounded like an outlandish goal only a few days ago, when simply finishing the week with at least 28 available bodies seemed a more fitting -- if hardly guaranteed -- objective.
But the last two games at The Trop, the Red Sox found salvation in two standbys: pitching and defense.
In each of the last two wins, they got a dominant starting pitching performance. On Wednesday, it was Sale himself, huffing and puffing through six innings with just two runs allowed. On Wednesday, it was an even more dominant Eduardo Rodriguez, who was in sync with his delivery and able to attack with multiple pitches. At a time when everything around them seemed to be falling apart, Rodriguez, the player hit most directly by COVID last year, was a picture of stability, Through six innings, he had faced two batters over the minimum.
Also for the second consecutive night, the Red Sox elected not to conduct themselves on defense as though the theme music from Benny Hill was playing in the background. They converted balls in play into outs, and though they turned just one double play -- they had three the night before -- it was welcomed.
Offensively they did enough. Even the bottom third -- made up entirely of escapees from the Worcester roster -- contributed in small ways. Danny Santana didn't have a hit, but he walked twice, including a leadoff walk in the second which resulted in him scoring the game's second run. Jack Lopez is still searching for his first major league hit, but he managed to bunt Santana into scoring position. And Jonathan Arauz, the third member of the Triple-A Triumvirate, had two walks of his own, including one that kick-started a two-run fifth.
Sometime between leaving Fenway late last Thursday and this series, the Red Sox saw their season flip to some sort of reality series, where the baseball took a back seat to a daily drama revolving around their own well-being. They chartered home having left some teammates in Cleveland and others in St. Petersburg, but along the way, they proved a little something to themselves.
They're still standing, still in possession of a playoff spot. For now, that seems like achievement enough.