Red Sox are determined to keep their hot start going

The Boston Red Sox had the second-best start in franchise history, and still they are struggling to shake the New York Yankees in the AL East.

So manager Alex Cora doesn’t have to fear that they will lose their focus when they return from the All-Star break.

“There’s a few good teams out there, that they’re going to make it interesting in the second half,” he said last week. “I still feel we can be better. We’ve still got some challenges in front of us. Just because we had a good first half of the season doesn’t mean we’re going to go all the way.”

After winning 12 of their last 13 games to reach the break with the best record in baseball (68-30), the Red Sox have a season-high 4 1/2-game lead in the division. Their .694 winning percentage is second-best to the 1946 team that Ted Williams led to the All-Star break at .701 (54-23). That team started 68-28-2, the only one in franchise history to fare better in its first 98 games.

“Hopefully when we come back we’ll pick it up right where we left off,” shortstop Xander Bogaerts said. “The team that we have, with this group of guys, I don’t see no reason that this won’t continue.”

Mariners in position

At some point it’s going to end. The feeling of imminent failure among some Seattle fans is going to manifest on the field and this unexpected season is going to start crumbling until it’s just like each of the previous seasons since the Mariners last made the playoffs in 2001. It has to, right?

That feeling is what nearly two decades without postseason baseball has created in the Pacific Northwest. While there is genuine excitement for what Seattle accomplished in the first three and a half months of the season, there’s also a sense of dread among the most fatalistic fans who have seen promising seasons go south before, and it won’t go away until the Mariners officially end the longest current postseason drought in any of the four major pro sports.

Lucky for the doubters, this team is showing the type of resilience needed to do just that.

“I think the thing I’m most proud of, I guess, with this group is the ability for them to be as tight as they are,” Seattle manager Scott Servais said. “I think there’s a special bond within our team and it plays out on the field.”

The Mariners are sitting at 58-39 and hold a three-game lead for the second wild-card spot heading into the second half of the season. And they have overcome enough obstacles thus far to derail most teams.

Five starting position players have spent time on the disabled list, and catcher Mike Zunino is on his second stint on the DL. Their bullpen has had four key arms go down at various times all the way back to spring training,

And that doesn’t take into consideration the 80-game suspension of star second baseman Robinson Cano. Rather than disrupt what Seattle had going, Cano’s suspension seemed to galvanize the team. Seattle is 36-22 since Cano’s suspension started.

“I think just team chemistry carries a team further than a lot of people think, and just when guys are all on the same page and fighting for one another … that’s the big picture, and it keeps everyone focused on that instead of their own individual performances and stuff like that,” outfielder Mitch Haniger said.

Indians bolster their bullpen

The Cleveland Indians need Brad Hand, a lefty, and Adam Cimber, a rookie right-handed sidearmer, to shore up a bullpen that has been without left-hander Andrew Miller since late May and has a 5.28 ERA, second-worst in the majors. The trade for them was announced Thursday, well ahead of the non-waiver trade deadline.

“We tried to have a really honest assessment, what are our strengths and what are the areas we can improve to help better position us to secure a postseason berth and advance once we get there,” Indians president Chris Antonetti said in a conference call. “This not only impacts 2018, but it also reinforces our bullpen options for future years. Both of these guys, Brad and Adam, can do that for us.”

The Indians lead the AL Central by 7 1/2 games over Minnesota. After losing Game 7 of the 2016 World Series to the Chicago Cubs, the Indians returned to the postseason last year but lost in the division series to the New York Yankees.