Should Sox try for season-saving trade? YEA: Time is on Sox’ side

To everything there is a season, the Book of Ecclesiastes (and Roger McGuinn) tell us, and a time for every purpose unto heaven. For the Boston Red Sox, it is most definitely time to save their season by making a trade.As currently constituted, the Sox won’t win the American League East ? and chances are, they won’t win the wild card as well, not with the way the New York Yankees and Tampa Bay Rays are playing. Yet the first half of the 2010 season shows that the roster offers promise, and that the Sox are just a trade away from dislodging the Yanks and Rays for a playoff spot.At the outset of the season it was “A Time to Panic” on Yawkey Way. Questions abounded over GM Theo Epstein’s “run prevention” approach to running the Sox, while one of the team’s biggest RBI men, David Ortiz, faced doubts from the Nation over his hitting ability. As the team struggled to start the season, these misgivings seemed validated.Yet the Sox shook off their slump, sometimes in unexpected ways. Outfielder Darnell McDonald, for instance, has stepped up superbly with a .271 average and a .992 fielding percentage in the almost 70 games he’s played so far. Other times, it was the team’s stars who came through, such as Ortiz, who capped a strong first half with a win in Monday’s Home Run Derby.Pitching-wise, Josh Beckett may be on the mend ? but the team does have a “Big Three” of starters in Jon Lester, John Lackey and Clay Buchholz. That trio seems as formidable as Paul Pierce, Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett. The Sox’ star pitching trifecta is a combined 30-12, and only one of these pitchers has an ERA over 3, although it is a doozy: Lackey’s 4.78. Meanwhile, closer Jonathan Papelbon has shaken off the New York Yankees’ walkoff victory earlier in the season and has converted 20 of 23 save opportunities.With such personnel, the Sox are only five games behind the division-leading Yankees and three back of the wild-card-leading Rays. That is ground that Epstein can make up in a trade.The biggest problem that a trade could solve is in the starting-pitching department. The Sox don’t have much depth beyond their top three and Daisuke Matsuzaka (6-3, 4.56). Beckett had an ERA over 7, and while Tim Wakefield is a Sox legend for his longevity and loyalty, he’s kind of reminding people of a pitching version of Carl Yastrzemski in Yaz’ seasons in decline.Trades are a dicey business – Sox fans will forever lament their team sending away Jeff Bagwell for Larry Andersen in 1990. Yet trades also represent a kind of optimism, a moment when a GM can say “Eureka!” and, perhaps, discover the missing piece to the championship puzzle. The paradox for GMs is that the new guys they bring in will only work if the old guys who remain represent enough of a foundation for success.From old reliables like Pap and Big Papi to new, redoubtable players like McDonald, it looks like the Sox have a good foundation already. Theo, it’s time to complete the team with a trade or two.Rich Tenorio is The Item’s sports copy editor.