While injuries take toll, Sox know they've 'got to keep going'

BOSTON -- The injuries started in Spring Training and have come in waves throughout the season.

The latest wave -- Vaughn Grissom going down with a right hamstring strain on Saturday and Wilyer Abreu spraining his right ankle after falling down the dugout steps as he walked back in from a defensive inning on Sunday -- has left the Red Sox with six regular position players on the injured list at once.

Considering the circumstances, the 8-3 loss to the Braves and the electric Max Fried (13 strikeouts in seven innings) on Tuesday night wasn’t all that surprising.

Attrition is attrition. And there are times throughout a 162-game season a team just pays for it.

Despite this, manager Alex Cora tried to set the tone before the game with his unrelenting attitude.

“[I got up] and ran four miles,” said Cora. “That’s the way it is. Injuries are part of it. This morning, [I took care of the] kids, ran four miles and then it’s time to go. Can’t stop now. We’re 3 1/2 games from the [third American League] Wild Card spot. That’s the way I see it.”

All in all, the Red Sox (30-31) have done well to hang close with Lucas Giolito (right UCL), Trevor Story (left shoulder) and Garrett Whitlock (right UCL) all out for the season and Triston Casas (left rib cage) and Masataka Yoshida (left thumb) gone for more than a month.

“We've been good. We've been bad. We’ve been OK,” said Cora. “Can’t stop. I’m not going to stop. That’s the message to everybody.”

Abreu has turned into a cornerstone for the Red Sox in all aspects of the game, and the fluky nature of his injury had to be annoying. But Cora continues to take each bump in stride.

“Yeah, Wily, he’s actually seeing the [foot] specialist, we’ll know more [after that],” said Cora. “But it’s an IL [move] now. How long? We don’t know yet. We’ve just got to keep going.”

After one more game with the Braves on Wednesday, the Red Sox get what should be a soft spot in the schedule when they face the 15-46 White Sox for a four-game series in Chicago that starts Thursday.

Winning that series is important, considering two elite teams (the Phillies and the Yankees) will spend next week at Fenway Park.

The news wasn’t all bad on Tuesday. Cora announced that Tyler O’Neill is expected to be activated on Wednesday after missing the last 10 days with right knee inflammation. And Yoshida could start a Minor League rehab assignment by Friday, which could position him to return at some point during the next homestand.

One thing that is really important for the Red Sox while they are undermanned is to play clean defense. It didn’t happen on Tuesday, as a pair of errors by the usually sure-handed Dominic Smith at first base led to two unearned runs against Kutter Crawford in the second inning.

“I think it cost us the game,” Smith said of his miscues. “Playing a good team over there, we’ve got to play clean baseball. I won’t say you have to play perfect baseball, but pretty much perfect.”

Smith helped his team fight back with a solo shot into the Monster in the third, and Bobby Dalbec briefly put Boston in front with a two-run single in the fourth.

After that, Fried was untouchable. And Crawford’s recent slide after his brilliant start to the season continued in the sixth inning when he walked Austin Riley to start the frame and allowed a single to Marcell Ozuna before giving up a three-run rocket to Ozzie Albies that snapped a 3-3 tie. Crawford’s velocity has been down in his last four starts, as evidenced by the home-run fastball to Albies that came in at 90.8 mph. Crawford’s season average on his four-seamer is 92.6.

“I’m kind of going through a rut right now,” said Crawford. “We're just going to keep fighting, keep trying to get better every single day and every single outing. And hopefully, eventually I'm going to come out on top of this whole rut.”

For the Red Sox, the main hope is that they can get semi-healthy again at some point.

“Unfortunately, Wilyer goes down,” said outfielder Rob Refsnyder, a reserve who has been thrust into a more prominent role of late. “He's been a big part of the season so far. But there's no excuses. I mean, everybody gets hurt on different teams, and it’s just part of it.”