Bogaerts: Slumping Red Sox need to 'try harder'

Xander Bogaerts isn't happy after his Boston Red Sox lost for the eighth time in 10 games following a 12-4 blowout at the hands of the Toronto Blue Jays on Friday to start a crucial four-game series.

"It's not about a lack of effort, a lack of focus, a lack of work. It's none of that," the All-Star shortstop said postgame, according to Christopher Smith of Masslive.com. "Maybe we should try harder because apparently what we're doing right now is not enough."

Bogaerts, who's only collected 10 hits over his past 15 games, acknowledged everybody on the team has to look at themselves in the mirror, including himself.

"Coming from me, it really sucks not being able to produce and help the team," Bogaerts said. "This game is about whoever's putting up more runs. And it's a really, really bad time to be playing bad right now. As I said, coming in tomorrow we've got two games. We've got to try harder and win."

Boston dropped out of the AL East lead during its slide, and the club is now grasping to a wild-card spot. The Red Sox are 2 1/2 games behind the Tampa Bay Rays for the top spot in the division, three games ahead of the New York Yankees, and four games in front of the Blue Jays.