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Would Firing Farrell Do Anything For Red Sox?

BOSTON (CBS) -- The Red Sox suffered their worst loss of the season Monday night, losing to the lowly Tampa Bay Rays 13-7 at Tropicana Field.

Eduardo Rodriguez was pummeled by one of the worst lineups in baseball, tagged for nine runs in just 2 2/3 innings. He was sent back to Triple A Pawtucket following the loss.

Boston is now just 9-15 in June, and while the team holds on to the first Wild Card spot in the American League, manager John Farrell is back on the hot seat. A change on the bench is often a move made to put some life back into a slumping team, and Torey Lovullo is an intriguing candidate to take the reins after leading Boston to a 27-20 record late last season as Farrell battled cancer.

But The Boston Globe's Peter Abraham told 98.5 The Sports Hub's Toucher & Rich (with WBZ-TV's Dan Roche in for Rich) that Boston's issues go far deeper than the manager.

"Unless the new manager was going to show up with a new starter and another reliever, it's not going to make a difference. This is not about a managerial decision; they don't have enough pitching. That's not a John Farrell problem, that's a Dave Dombrowski problem," said Abraham. "That was a problem they had when the season started but was overshadowed by hitting the ball like they did when the season started. Now that they're not scoring eight runs a game, we're seeing how bad the pitching is. A lot of people chose to ignore that over the first couple of months because it didn't matter. Now it matters.

"I don't think firing the manager is going to change the pitching situation at all," he said.

Is it time for a change on the Boston bench? Vote now:

Abraham also discussed trade options for the Red Sox, and who could take Eduardo Rodriguez's spot in the rotation: 

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