Take a deep breath, BoSox nation; you're still in it

You are a Boston Red Sox fan. Your team remains solidly in the hunt for a wild-card spot and even a division title. Yet you constantly fret because that is what Sox fans do. They fret.

The way the success of Mardi Gras was once measured by the tonnage of garbage accumulated, the more worry you feel, the happier you are, because you are a Sox fan. Your angst can be measured by the angstrom.

To some Red Sox fans, it's always rainy in Boston. (Getty Images)

You are only one game behind the Yankees in the American League East race. Not a terrible position to reside at all. I believe they call that being in the thick of it. Yet all I hear from my Sox friends, from you Sox types, is how the world is coming to an end. We're dead, we're toast. We're dog meat. We're not going to win it.

"We're going to get crushed," one Sox friend tells me.

Shut up. Relax. You're fine.

"You don't understand," he says. "You're not a Sox fan."

No one understands the Sox fan except the Sox fan.

When I lived in Boston, all I ever heard from Sox fans was how the Sox will always let you down. Sox fans cannot live or breathe without their Sox but complaining about them is a part of being a Sox follower. You just shake your head and chuckle because they are Sox fans and you don't get them.

A World Series reached, a curse flogged, and still the Sox fan persistently wades in a pool of nervousness. It is their way. It is the Sox way.

You are a Sox fan and Sox fans are frequently, secretly filled with trepidation about their Sox and noisily, boisterously braggart about them. Yes, these are contradictory emotions, but that is what it means to be a Sox fan.

As the division races become hot and bothered, your team, Sox fans, is among the most intriguing. You shouldn't be worried. Instead you should be on the edge of your seat. That is because the Sox have a serious run left in them.

Their timing could not be better. Look around baseball and there are only a handful of dominant clubs. The New York Mets could be the most formidable but after the Mets very few teams grab you by the throat. Detroit, Oakland, Los Angeles, the Yankees and even the Chicago White Sox possess great strengths but also significant weaknesses.

What club do you point to and say, "That is the team to beat?" Who is dominant? Who is great? The answer is no one. Not yet. It's just another one of those mad scrambles and your Sox, you worrier you, are in the middle of the madness.

Why not the Sox? Why not?

If the Sox, your Sox, do get into the postseason, they might be the most dangerous team behind the powerful Mets. The Sox possess a stubborn spunkiness that is impossible not to appreciate.

This team could ride the bat of dangerous and wacky Manny Ramirez, Dr. StrangeGlove himself, who just saw his 27-game hitting streak end on Sunday. Ramirez is as loopy as he is dangerous. Somehow I don't think old Manny will be dwelling on the conclusion of his streak since he has the attention span of a 7-year-old hooked on Madden.

What happened Saturday was typical Red Sox ball. They won on the last at-bat. That has only happened in Boston 8,001 times this season. Those kinds of victories are inspirational if not almost spiritual.

Even a gloom and doom Boston fan like you must feel that momentum swing and it's coming just in time for the series against Detroit on Monday and the Yankees this weekend.

So, Sox fans. Calm yourselves.

I know you don't believe it, but you might just be fine.