I usually enjoy Michael Silverman’s coverage of the Red Sox for the Boston Herald, but his column today — claiming the Red Sox will be failures if they don’t sweep the Orioles — is nonsensical gibberish. Let’s take a look and Read Between the Lines.

The Red Sox  have to sweep now.

Anything less against the woeful Baltimore Orioles will be not just a wasted opportunity but a waste of the time and energy for anyone involved with the next two games.

So if Pedroia hits for the cycle tonight and Jon Lester throws a perfect game, all will be lost if the Red Sox lose tomorrow’s closing set, even though they’re 3 games ahead in the wild card entering tonight’s action.

If the Sox can’t sweep, be doubtful about this team’s killer instinct.

Because the Orioles are defenseless rabbits.

Just before this series started, the Red Sox could not quite pull off a sweep after they jumped to a 2-0 lead against two of the better teams in the league, the Yankees, in the Bronx, and then the White Sox, at Fenway.

So if the Red Sox can only win two of three again, for the third series in a row, they’ll be unmasked as a team satisfied with winning 66 percent of their games.

There was some consolation in the fact the Sox lost Game 3 and still won a three-game series against two good teams. But anyone in the Red Sox clubhouse who can find consolation in simply a series win against the Orioles is not someone who should feel comfortable in that clubhouse.