When the Red Sox woke up in Washington on July 4, they were stuck in the mucky middle of the American League, losers more often than they were winners, insistent in a belief that, through the halfway point of the season, had not aligned with reality.
It was the day everything changed.
Now, they are where they always thought they would be: in the postseason for the first time in four years, beginning Tuesday when they visit the Yankees in New York. First pitch is at 6:08 p.m.
A survey of players and staff who have been around for the whole wild ride opened with one question: When did the Red Sox turn around their season?
While it’s hard to point to a single moment over the six-month season, the majority thought out loud and arrived, separately, at the same conclusion: The Streak.
Beginning on Independence Day in the nation’s capital, the Red Sox ripped off 10 consecutive wins across an improbable, dramatic, season-swinging week and a half.
“Since spring training, we were all well aware of how talented our team is and what we were capable of,” starting pitcher Lucas Giolito said. “But for the longest time, to start the year, it was a lot of up and down. We’re doing one thing really well, but we’re not doing another thing really well. We’re losing these one-run games.
“It was like, arrgh, where is it?”
They found it — found themselves — in that early-to-mid-July run, the importance of which is difficult to overstate.
Consider: Had the Sox gone, say, a still-very-good 7-3 during that stretch, September would have looked different, with a much more stressful final week — perhaps missing the playoffs altogether.
Aside from the standings, The Streak provided proof they really could do this.
“It pretty much let the league know we mean business,” infielder Romy Gonzalez said. “And we’re a really good ball club.”
Shortstop Trevor Story said: “You realize you create a lot of confidence in the boys around you and you feel like, if we can do this, we can beat anybody.”
Even when a team is hot and playing against weaker clubs (Nationals, Rockies, Rays), 10 in a row is improbable.
To understand the significance of The Streak, understand where the Sox had been: at .500 on 15 occasions. They lost first baseman Triston Casas, a middle-of-the-order bat, to a knee injury in early May. The pitching staff was at times a mess. Their biggest offensive addition of the offseason, third baseman Alex Bregman, hurt his right quadriceps in late May.
On June 9, they called up outfielder Roman Anthony, the top prospect in baseball, a landmark occasion. And then, six days later, they traded unhappy star Rafael Devers, their best bat and the face of the franchise, to the Giants in a stunner.
The team struggled to score in the immediate aftermath, but there were glimpses of excellence. The Streak resulted from the convergence of these threads of positivity, the tributaries of success coalescing into a rushing river.
In early June, Giolito regained his All-Star form and righthander Brayan Bello took a huge step forward, providing stability for the pitching rotation behind ace Garrett Crochet.
Story, following a miserable May, figured it out going into June and has barely slowed since. After the briefest of adjustment periods, Anthony played at a high level. Ceddanne Rafaela hit so well that, combined with his elite defense in center field, he was one of the best players in baseball for weeks.
At the start of July, the Sox started using reliever Garrett Whitlock in one-inning stints, helping him transform — after major elbow surgery cost him 2024 — into an elite setup man for dominant closer Aroldis Chapman. And Bregman neared a return from the injured list.
The vibes were starting to shift. They just needed to win.
“We always felt like it was a matter of time before we rip off a heater,” Crochet said.
Opening that summer series against the Nationals, manager Alex Cora made sure to send a message to his players about the 11 a.m. start, as is July 4 tradition in Washington: No excuses. No nonsense.
“We’re young, we’re athletic, we should outplay out-play these guys today — with energy,” he said. “And they did. From the get-go.”
The other quote of note from that day: Cora sat in the visitors’ dugout for his pregame media session and stretched for a not-so-obvious parallel.
In 2018, when they most recently won the World Series, the Red Sox played in that same morning game. It was during the first series of a season-best 10-game win streak that year.
“That’s when we took off, actually,” Cora said on July 4. “Hopefully we can do the same thing.”
There were obvious differences between those Red Sox and these Red Sox. The 2018 team established itself as a powerhouse at the outset and went on to be maybe the best team in franchise history. The 2025 club had a losing record.
“In this case, we were OK. Mid. Playing .500 ball,” Cora said recently. “If we wanted to get to this, we needed to take off. It just happened that it started in Washington.”
Giolito was great for seven innings. The Sox scored seven runs in the fifth. Story drove in four on the day. Anthony reached base four times.
The Red Sox didn’t know it yet, but they were on their way.
“Not only because of what happened in the series, but inside the clubhouse, outside the clubhouse, we had a couple dinners, everybody was [in] a really good group,” catcher Carlos Narváez said. “Everybody was locked in.”
The next day it was another blowout behind Rafaela’s two hits and three RBIs. They completed the sweep July 6, hanging on after a four-run first inning.
When the Rockies came to Fenway Park for a three-game set, the Sox made it look easy. Bello struck out 10 in the first nine-inning complete game of his life on July 8. Giolito tossed six scoreless innings a day later.
That was six in a row. The recipe was one that tends to work well in October.
“That’s what led the charge, the pitching, but when we pair that with good at-bats and timely hitting, it felt like someone was getting a big hit every night,” Story said. “It just felt like we created that momentum and the confidence in our team that anyone can do it on any given night.”
A four-game sweep of the Rays ran it to 10 straight going into the All-Star break.
Crochet threw a three-hit, nine-strikeout shutout on July 12, his best performance in a remarkable debut year with the Red Sox. But the pièce de résistance had come the night before, Bregman’s first game back, a Friday at a full Fenway. The Red Sox trailed by one in the ninth inning.
Tampa Bay closer Pete Fairbanks was on the mound. Anthony drew a one-out walk, putting the tying run on base. Rafaela stepped to the plate. A ground ball to an infielder could have ended the game — and The Streak. Fairbanks threw a slider that nipped the lower edge of the strike zone.
Rafaela blasted it over everything for a walkoff two-run home run, deep into the night and onto Lansdowne Street.
“When Rafaela did that,” Crochet said, “we felt like we couldn’t lose.”
Several Red Sox described it as the most electric moment of the season — until, at least, Rafaela’s walkoff triple Friday night against the Tigers to clinch a postseason berth.
“The fact that he hit that when [Fairbanks was] throwing 100 [miles per hour] with all that crazy funk … ” reliever Greg Weissert said.
Story said: “A no-doubter, against one of the best closers in the league, against a division rival — we were riding super high. It was a special moment.”
Added DH/outfielder Rob Refsnyder: “It doesn’t feel like there are a lot of games we can’t come back in. So that’s a good feeling.”
Throughout, the sort of awkward part: All this happened in the wake of the Devers trade. They got better shortly after moving on, as chief baseball officer Craig Breslow said they would.
The Streak ended July 18 at the Cubs, the first game back from the break. But the Red Sox hope now the bigger-picture “something special,” as Narváez describes it, extends another month.
“It definitely had us knowing that if we just keep playing like that, we’re going to be in a good position,” Giolito said. “And here we are.”
Tim Healey can be reached at timothy.healey@globe.com. Follow him @timbhealey.