Red Sox Haunted By 'Bad Omen' Since Spring Training, Analyst Says

Are the Boston Red Sox in the middle of a failed season that was cursed from the start?

During a Monday night airing of the MLB on FS1 Postgame program, host Kevin Burkhardt discussed the Red Sox’s struggles with analysts Eric Karros and Dontrelle Willis.

“What's going on?” Burkhardt asked.

“What exactly are the Red Sox right now in your eyes?”

“I think there are a bunch of different pieces of the puzzle that they haven't been able to fit together so far,” Karros replied.

“You look at their starting pitching, and that hasn't been what they had hoped. Outside of (Garrett) Crochet ... they just haven't been able to get the consistency. And then offensively, outside of really (Rafael) Devers and (Jarren) Duran just a little bit … there has not been the constant offense, and I think (manager Alex) Cora will get this team going eventually. But again, the pieces just haven't fit.”

Willis, a former World Series-winning starting pitcher for the Florida Marlins, then chimed in.

“You know what?” Willis said.

“(There’s) been kind of a bad omen since spring training coming into this season (for Boston).”

“You look at Sam Kennedy, the president, and (chief baseball officer) Craig Breslow, they did not really discuss or get on the same page as … Rafael Devers (concerning the switch to designated hitter).”

“You can tell he was not happy … he voiced his opinion publicly.”

“And so ... coming into this season, there's already enough pressure on the Red Sox to be successful.”

"They're trying to build a team to go out and (challenge the) Yankees, and all of a sudden, you have your best player, arguably one of the best players in all of baseball, not happy with you. So right (out of) the gate, it was, you know, negativity around them.”

Karros also reminded viewers about Alex Bregman’s recent quad injury not helping matters.

“And let's not forget … Bregman’s out,” Karros said.

“He was playing as well as anybody, but he's not going to be around … so they're gonna have to figure it out.”

Karros is right — Boston has a lot of figuring things out to do. And if the Red Sox want to exorcise the bad omen that Willis mentioned, they’ll have to improve their performance in close games.

Per MassLive’s Christopher Smith, Boston is just 6-16 in one-run games this season.

That’s simply not going to get it done.