Thirteen Down, Seventeen to Go, and Contreras Is Still Not Playing

Willson Contreras is day-to-day with the hand injury, which at this point in the season means he is either back in the lineup this week or he isn't, and Boston doesn't have much runway left to find out. The All-Star first baseman has been in and out of the lineup long enough that I wrote about his absence two days ago and the situation hasn't materially changed. He's not on the IL. He's not playing. That's where things stand.

The depth chart behind him at first is Nick Sogard and Mickey Gasper, which is functional but not comfortable. Gasper has been the team's most efficient bat all September, so his presence there isn't nothing — but moving him from a pinch-hit role into everyday first base duty changes how the bench operates, and this bench is already thin enough that every role matters. The offense is scoring three runs a game over the last ten contests. There isn't much slack in the system to absorb another moving part.

Boston is 73-72, holding the sixth AL wild-card seed with 17 games left. The pitching has been good enough to stay in this. The defense has tightened. But the offense needs bodies, and right now one of its three All-Stars is day-to-day, another — Rafaela — is on the 10-day IL, and Chapman is only just working back himself. That's the whole All-Star contingent, more or less in various states of unavailability. The next 10 days will tell most of the story.