The Red Sox are getting used to searching for silver linings. It's been a necessity amid a torrent of bad news this season as one player after the next goes down with an injury.
They are straining to find another, with word that Kevin Youkilis will miss the rest of the season following surgery on his thumb.
In the hours after a diagnosis which had been feared for days was finally confirmed, that quest for positives was in full effect.
"We got to battle. It's not over yet," said David Ortiz, who learned of the news about three hours before Thursday's game with Cleveland. "You can't hang it up. Of course we won't have Youk in the lineup helping us out doing his thing the way he normally does, but … you gotta try to compete."
It's a line the Red Sox are used to uttering. Another man down? Nothing to do but press on.
Manager Terry Francona, who is fond of saying he never wants to look too far ahead, found his own reason for optimism in Thursday's starting lineup.
"As tough as it is to lose Youk, we're pretty fortunate," Francona said. "How many teams can take a Youk out and put a [Mike] Lowell in.
"I guess that's how I prefer to look at it. Don't know any other way to do it."
Of course, with Youkilis, it's a bit different. Not only is he one of the best players on the team, if not the best, but his injury has finality to it. While others who have gone down have already returned or will return soon, the complete loss of your cleanup hitter and first baseman extraordinaire is a bit more difficult to swallow.
When Youkilis lingering thumb issue became a full-fledged tear Monday night, ending his season essentially on one swing, Boston lost its leader in runs, on-base percentage and OPS. He ranks among the top three on the team in every other major hitting category. He plays a Gold-Glove caliber first base. And if there is an example for the constant stream of Pawtucket call-ups to live by, Youkilis may be it.
"One of the best players we have," Ortiz added. "It's not what you want to see."
"Obviously the impact is huge," general manager Theo Epstein said. "He was our heart and soul, one of the best hitters in the league, not a guy you can replace."
While the lineup will have a big hole to fill, Lowell showed in his return Tuesday night that there will be nights when the lack of Youkilis' bat is not a huge issue. Other nights, especially when Victor Martinez plays first and Kevin Cash is behind the plate, it will be. But where the Sox might be affected most is on defense, where the combination of Lowell, Martinez, Jed Lowrie and perhaps Ortiz will fall short.
That's no knock on that particular group, but Youkilis has become a special defender and often serves as the quarterback of the infield. He won a Gold Glove at first in 2007 and was the top-ranked first baseman in several defensive metrics last year.
Wednesday's 9-1 loss to Cleveland went from bad to worse when Martinez committed an error with no outs in the seventh. The Indians scored five unearned runs in the inning and seven overall, their most in one game since July 14, 2006. Figures it would happen on a night when Youkilis is out.
The procedure on Youkilis' thumb is not complicated, nor is the recovery. He will be kept in a cast for up to six weeks but is not expected to have any issues once the 2011 season gets going.
Therein lies the final positive in an otherwise crushing blow.
"We know exactly what the problem is," Epstein added. "It's a fairly straightforward procedure to fix it. He'll be 100 percent for spring training and he'll have a normal offseason, and that's the silver lining."
From the top on down, Boston is trying to focus on the bright side. They've had plenty of practice in doing so.
