Can the Red Sox at least be better than the Orioles in the second half?

BOSTON -- The Red Sox' season has been a bit dizzying. They were as mediocre as mediocre gets for the first two months of the year. They were the best team in baseball in June. In July, they won at a cool .294 clip heading into the All-Star break.

Put it together, and you've got a so-so baseball team that appears to be on the outskirts of the outskirts of real title contention.

So while most observers can see that the Red Sox are extraordinarily unlikely to overcome their many deficiencies to go on an October run, perhaps a more modest demand is in order for the team.

Can they at least be better than the Orioles?

Technically, the Red Sox were better than the Orioles in the first half. Technically. Boston sits at 48-45 on the year. The Orioles are 1.5 games behind them at 46-46. The Orioles' scorching July (11-4) hasn't quite gotten them past the Red Sox in the standings. Not yet at least. And by that measure, the Red Sox are better than the Orioles thus far in 2022.

But head-to-head, that's not the case. The Orioles have won five of their eight games vs. Boston thus far. They won the latter two games of a three-game set in Baltimore early in the year, and they went into Fenway and won three out of five in a series that wrapped around Memorial Day weekend. They've outscored Boston 43-36 in those eight games.

In the ultra-potent AL East, the Rays have fared better than the Red Sox, too. The Orioles are 11-18 vs. the Yankees, Rays and Blue Jays, while the Red Sox are 9-21 against those opponents. Including the Boston-Baltimore head-to-heads, the Orioles have a respectable 16-21 record against the AL East. The Red Sox are 12-26.

The Orioles have won five series against AL East opponents. The Red Sox have won zero.

With a .455 winning percentage against teams better than .500, the Red Sox have been a tick better than Baltimore -- .444 -- in that regard. But the comprehensive comparison on the two teams through 90-plus games of the season would have to lead to inconclusive results as to which team is definitively better than the other.

Can that change in the second half? 

Obviously, at this state of economics in baseball, we know that a high payroll does not always or even often lead to the most success. The Yankees have spent more than anybody in the past two decades and have exactly one World Series to show for it. Meanwhile the budget-conscious Rays are seemingly always in contention, and some teams in the middle of the pack in payroll (the '08 Phillies, '11 Giants, '15 Royals, to name a few)

So to point at the Red Sox' and Orioles' payrolls and state that Boston should obviously be better than Baltimore would be a bit of an oversimplification.

But ... the Red Sox should absolutely, 100 percent, without a doubt be a better baseball team than the Baltimore Orioles.

The Red Sox' payroll is over $200 million, sixth-highest in MLB. The Orioles' payroll is ... under $46 million, the absolutely lowest payroll in all of baseball. Yet despite spending less than a quarter of the money that Boston is spending, there the Orioles are, neck and neck with the Red Sox in the middle of the summer.

From a Baltimore perspective, that's pretty impressive. By going 13-7 in their last 20 games and 20-10 in their last 30, the Orioles are easily one of the best stories in baseball this season.

But from a Boston perspective? It's borderline embarrassing.

Nobody can state right now whether the floundering Red Sox will be buyers or sellers at the trade deadline. Regardless of which route they take, it should not be asking too much for them to simply be better than the Orioles.