If the Red Sox having 5 All-Stars (the most of any MLB team this year) isn’t indicative of the complete disparities between the 2020 and 2021 seasons, I’m not sure what is. Rafael Devers, Xander Bogaerts, J.D. Martinez, Matt Barnes, and Nathan Eovaldi were all named to play against the best in the NL this year, representing the best of the AL.

I keep asking myself, is Alex Cora really that good of a manager? Is Chaim Bloom everything he was cracked up to be? The Red Sox were the first team in baseball to 50 wins, their starting rotation (which left extremely little to be desired) is firing on all cylinders (and they don’t even have Chris Sale back yet), and the offense is giving the pitching staff something to work with.

Here’s my theory: the city of Boston needs at least one team to be absolutely dominating their respective league at a time. Acknowledging that the Revs are also currently sitting atop the Eastern Conference, it certainly isn’t the Patriots anymore, the Celtics left a lot to be desired, and the Bruins at least made a decent name for themselves this season before being booted in the second round of the postseason. I’ll stick with that theory. If Boston doesn’t have at least one team vying for a championship, all hell breaks loose.

We’ll have to see what happens to the rotation if/when Chris Sale returns to full health at long last, but I can only imagine it’ll equate to a serious push for a World Series title. If you told me last year that the Sox were making a case for a championship this year, I would have thought you were crazy, or at least one hell of an optimist.

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