The hallmark of any great team is its bench. As long as you have guys who can show up and rake on a moment’s notice, then you have a chance to compete. The gamesmanship of those hard-working benchers is what makes the difference between a great team and a merely good one.

In that respect, the Red Sox’s most recent series against the Arizona Diamondbacks may go down as one of their most important of the season. That’s because Eric Hinske earned crucial playing time, seeing action in all three games. It was a break from his usual routing of waiting patiently on the bench, night after night, eagerly anticipating his chance to contribute. He’s always been known as a reserved, introspective player, but when it comes to his role on this Red Sox team, Hinske is uncharacteristically outspoken. “I wish I had more playing time” says the 2002 Rookie of the Year winner-turned disgraced role player, “but the team is looking so strong right now. We’re playing well and hope we can continue to play well.”

It’s obvious that Hinske feels grossly underused, and his frustration has finally bubbled over into such a vicious slam on Red Sox management. Obviously the Eric Hinske who currently rides the finely polished, 140 Million dollar pine for the Red Sox is a different man from the Hinske who briefly starred for Toronto before being railroaded out of town by GM J.P. Ricciardi and his band of merry brown-nosing “Moneyball”ers. This new Eric Hinske is a man of more finely tuned resolve, one who is more inclined to speak his mind.

Red Sox fans had high hopes that this would finally be the year for them to unseat the Yankees in the AL East and regain the division crown after 17 years in the losers’ wilderness. “We’re looking good in the standings right now,” Hinske intones, “but there’s a lot of baseball left to be played. It’s a long season and we have to play hard the whole way through, all 162 games.” Despite his confident demeanour concerning his team’s fairly solid play to date, cracks in Boston’s armour have been propagating for weeks, practically from the first day of the season.

The Red Sox have staked their season (and a large chunk of their payroll) on Japanese hurler Daisuke Matsuzaka. He has received a huge amount of hype, but the jury is still out on whether he can withstand the long rigours of the grueling American baseball season. Japanese seasons are far shorter, and they don’t have to pitch in the bitterly cold playoff weather that the Red Sox will have to contend with if they are still playing baseball when October rolls around. For all of Red Sox Nation’s ballyhooing, they’d be best to remember that Far East pitchers have compiled an MLB legacy that, to date, is less than sterling. The list of Hall of Fame-worthy Japanese pitchers contains approximately the same number of names as the waiting list of Paris Hilton’s potential cellmates. If you haven’t figured it out by now, that number is zero.

Other question marks include Josh Beckett, the oft-injured hurler who the Red Sox counted on to fill future Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez’s shoes. They refused to resign Pedro and predictably enough, his replacement Beckett has already made yet another trip to the DL in 2007. Meanwhile, Curt Schilling’s lack of focus continues to haunt the team. Instead of concentrating on his pitching, he’s too busy posting to his blog, engaging in message board feuds, and launching ad hominem attacks on people like noted steroid thug Barry Bonds.

And that’s just the starting rotation. The Red Sox lineup contains an equal number of question marks, from the wasted time and money spent on free agent bust JD Drew, to the sagging leadership of broken down catcher Jason Veritek, to the weak start of perennial headcase Manny Ramirez. Boston’s balloon can pop on just about any given day.

Still, there’s an element of truth to what Hinske says. It’s a long season, and the Red Sox will discover what that means soon enough. Take this week, for instance. Boston has lost six of ten in struggling to build on its sizable lead in the AL East and as of this writing, their lead has withered to 9.5 games over the defending division champion Yankees. Interleague play continues tonight as they take on the surging Rockies, and later in the week, the always dangerous Giants.

“I enjoy interleague play,” continues Hinske, “the Rockies and Giants play hard and hopefully we can come away with some wins.” Despite Hinske’s smug bravado, the Red Sox are fortunate to have a player like him on their roster. It’s clear that the Red Sox with Hinske are a better team than the Red Sox without Hinske. If the Blue Jays had held on to him then they might be faced with better bench options than the unproven Howie Clark and his one measly extra base hit this season. But in Boston, unlike in Toronto, there is room for improvement with the talent they already have, and Eric Hinske’s talents bring the Red Sox one step closer to being a complete team. For a team who haven’t won their division since 1990, they’d be best to not rest on their laurels.

Richard Griffin begrudgingly covers the Toronto Blue Jays and all the other baseball news that’s fit to print, each week in the Toronto Star. Each Wednesday, he will even answer any baseball-related questions you might dare to have.