SK: I’m not writing in the baseball book until after the All-Star break. After last night’s 12-inning heart-wrecker, I just can’t. The team has clearly closed up shop until after the break. They need to take a few deep breaths and then just focus on winning game-by-game. The wild card is still possible, but right now losing it looks all too likely. I don’t read the newspaper sports pages when we’re losing—too depressing—but the screams for Francona’s head have surely begun. Yes?

SO: You are correct, sir. Much second-guessing, though I’ve yet to hear anyone ask for the head of hitting coach Ron Jackson, and it’s Papa Jack’s boys who are stringing out the pen and making every defensive out crucial. We’ve scored four or less runs in all of these losses, against decidedly borderline pitching (save for Vazquez, the sole quality arm; last night Jaret “Fat Elvis” Wright was mowing us down like alfalfa). That don’t cut it, even in the NL. Bellhorn is stone-cold, and when we do get runners on, we’re not moving them around. Tell Theo, and tell John Henry too: it’s time to kick some ass.

SK: They’ve got the bats, they’d argue; where are the hits in those bats?

SO: Papa Jack’s slogan last year was “Somebody got-ta pay.” This year, if we don’t start rippin’, it could be him.

Walking on the beach this morning, we pass a couple on a towel. The guy spies our Sox hats and says, “How ’bout those Yankees?”

“How ’bout those Marlins?” I ask.

Later, driving on I-95, I’m cheered by the sheer number of Red Sox stickers and license-plate holders, even an official Mass license plate like Trot hawks on NESN. I pass a car that has one of the free BELIEVE stickers Cambridge Soundworks gives out by Autograph Alley, and I think: yes, it’s that simple. We may be down now, but this is my team, and I’m going to believe in them, whatever happens. Fuck the Yankees, and fuck their no-showing, front-running, fair-weather fans.

We all have our little strategies for dealing with loss, and right now I’m using all of mine. The Red Sox, who seem to be imploding, lost another heart-wrecker last night, this time in twelve innings, in Atlanta. That’s four straight, the last three close ones. Strategies for dealing?

One: Stop reading the sports pages. Right now I won’t even read about Wimbledon, lest my eye should stray to a baseball story, or, worse, the standings, on the facing page.