The hunt for Red Sox October is officially over.

They teetered on the edge for a weeks and staved off elimination with a come-from-behind extra-innings victory on Tuesday. This is the franchise that’s made stunning comebacks and defiance of expectations their bread and butter.

But on Wednesday night, a 6-1 loss to the Blue Jays in Toronto officially slammed the door on the American League Wild Card race. For the third postseason in a row, the Red Sox will be on the outside looking in, matching their longest streak of October absences in the last 30 years.

Richard Fitts came close to making Major League history; he’d begun his career with three consecutive starts of five or more innings without allowing an earned run, and no pitcher had ever done so in their first four.

The rookie right-hander held the Blue Jays scoreless through three before giving up a leadoff double to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and his first career earned run on a subsequent double by Alejandro Kirk. Ernie Clement’s one-out single plated another run, and the Blue Jays scored another two in the bottom of the fifth on Kirk’s two-out single before Wilyer Abreu threw him out at second to end the inning.

Final line: four earned runs on six hits, two walks, and two strikeouts over five innings.

“I’m not happy with it at all,” Fitts told reporters. “This was a crucial game for us, but I just feel like I let the team down. I know I have better and I can be better.”

The Boston bats, meanwhile, wasted a few early scoring opportunities against Kevin Gausman and spent most of the night going quickly and quietly, including four 1-2-3 innings. They were already down 4-0 when Triston Casas’ RBI single drove in the lone run. All in all, seven hits and three walks, but 1-for-6 with runners in scoring position and eight men stranded, including leaving the bases loaded in the sixth. Vaughn Grissom, acquired in exchange for NL Cy Young favorite Chris Sale, struck out looking to cement the elimination.

It’s a fitting ending for the Red Sox, who looked like a playoff team for more than half the season, but ultimately, couldn’t get themselves there. Going into the All-Star break, they held the third Wild Card and were just five games out of first in their division race.

“At one point, it felt like we were (a) playoff-caliber team, and then it just, we missed the opportunity,” manager Alex Cora told reporters. “We had it right there and we blew it.”

The Red Sox are 27-36 since the break. Their bullpen has been the worst in baseball by far. The offense has been missing in action for most of the last two months. They entered Wednesday on their first four-game winning streak since July 5, and promptly broke it.

“In this game, you have to take advantage of opportunities. You got to be consistent. … Since the All-Star break, we were very inconsistent. When we hit, we didn’t pitch, when we pitched, we didn’t hit,” Cora said. “Since LA, we never got it going.”

Their chances were already paper-thin coming into Wednesday. In order to keep their Wild Card hopes alive, the Red Sox not only needed to win all four of their remaining games, but were relying on the Kansas City Royals to lose at least four of their remaining five, the Minnesota Twins to lose at least three of their five, and the Seattle Mariners to lose at least one of their four. According to FanGraphs, there was a 0.6% chance of everything falling Boston’s way.

As Clase extended Toronto’s lead with his first-ever Major League home run, a two-run shot off Josh Winckowski in the bottom of the seventh, the Royals finished a 3-0 victory over the Washington Nationals.

It’s disappointing that the Red Sox came this far, remaining in the race until Game 158, to only come this far. After all, what better way to commemorate the 20th anniversary season of the greatest comeback in baseball history than with another stunning comeback? Shock the world, as Kevin Millar famously said.

But for the same reason, give this team the credit they deserve, for they came this far – further than the projections had them going – despite spending very little during the offseason and having to find ways to win without several key players.

They lost Lucas Giolito, their only proven starting pitching addition, early in spring training. Garrett Whitlock was done for the year after four starts. Grissom missed all of spring training, and when healthy, spent most of the season in Triple-A.

Casas missed months, as did Masataka Yoshida. Trevor Story’s season seemed over after the eighth game, but he made it back. Rafael Devers played through a shoulder issue since the preseason and managed to have another All-Star year and stay on the field until last weekend. Kenley Jansen wasn’t fully healthy early in the preseason and ended up having a strong season until his injured list stint earlier this week.

“Nobody outside the walls here (in our organization), nobody expected us to play all the way ’til now, you know, meaningful games,” Cora said.

Standout performances from their rapidly-growing young core, including Jarren Duran, Tanner Houck, Kutter Crawford, Ceddanne Rafaela, Wilyer Abreu, and Justin Slaten, helped the Red Sox not only stay afloat, but stay in the hunt and win more games than each of the last two years. Fangraphs projected Boston finishing last in the AL East for the third year in a row and winning 79 games, one more than in ‘22 and ‘23. The Red Sox have won 80 games and already mathematically ensured they can’t finish last.

The 2024 Red Sox had so much stacked against them, yet for months they were one of the best teams in baseball, and so fun to watch. They battled and they overcame, and stuck around in this race far longer than expected.

Baseball is a team sport, so the collective result is ultimately what matters. But the foundation of the brighter future the Red Sox brass have been promising for the last half-decade was evident this season. Now, it’s on ownership and the front office to build upon it and get Boston back to its rightful place: in contention.

Three home games with the Tampa Bay Rays stand between Boston and the offseason. The Red Sox need to win at least one of those games to avoid their third consecutive losing season; they’ve only had one streak that long since the 1967 Impossible Dream season.

But this is Boston. These are the Red Sox. If they can eke out a winning record, it’ll be a step in the right direction, but it won’t be enough.