The Red Sox were a perfectly lovely baseball story for the middle two months of this baseball season. They will be referenced for decades to come, longer, because they fell into a hole 14 games south of .500, they got their manager fired, and they were fixing to hold a Flushing-style fire sale at the deadline. 

Then started to win. Every day. Day after day. Then week after week. 

Their heels were backed up to the abyss, and instead they came back. It was inspiring, even if you are a Yankees fan and thus inclined to loathe every little thing they do. It looked for a while like they might never lose again. Except since the start of August the Red Sox have been exactly a .500 team. They didn’t hit at all in September. They are limping now, literally and figuratively. They are wounded. 

They look ready to go.