Julio Lugo’s batting average is .213 — and dropping. He hit only .111 (3-for-27) during Boston’s just-ended West Coast road trip. And he’s not walking much either.

The Providence Journal / Bob Breidenbach

It’s always easy to find flaws in a team and ignore the positive.

And that’s no different with the Boston Red Sox.

The major plus for the Red Sox as they enter their final 100 games of the season, beginning with tonight’s interleague game with the Colorado Rockies at Fenway Park, is their position in the American League East.

Boston is in first place, a comfortable 9½ games ahead of the surging second-place New York Yankees after 62 games. Aside from the solid tangible elements to this team, notably strong starting pitching and consistently airtight late-inning relief, the Red Sox have shown resiliency that comes with having a roster dominated by veterans who have been successful in the past.

Those positives helped Boston rebound on the recently completed road trip. The Red Sox lost the first three games, stretching their season-long losing streak to four games and to six losses in seven games overall.

But with Curt Schilling showing the way, coming within one out of a no-hitter in an important game for Boston in Oakland, the Red Sox won three straight before a Sunday loss in Arizona dropped them to 3-4 for the journey.

It would have been a great comeback had the Sox won Sunday, but given they were 0-3 at the start of the trip, 3-4 is not bad.

That doesn’t mean, however, as the Sox get ready to host the Rockies, that there aren’t a few trouble spots that are going to need smoothing over if they want to be able to remain comfortably ahead in the division and return to the playoffs.

The main offensive problem right now happens to be the leadoff spot in Boston’s batting order, namely Julio Lugo.

On the trip, finding offense was difficult. In four of the seven games, the Red Sox scored two or fewer runs. They managed only seven runs in four games against the Athletics, though they were able to win one of them, thanks to Schilling, by 1-0.

Boston exploded for 10 runs in the first game against Arizona, thanks to J.D. Drew suddenly finding his stroke, hammering two homers and a double and driving in a career-high seven runs. But that was the only game of the seven in which the Red Sox managed to score more than four runs.

And while Lugo hardly was the only culprit, his continued offensive woes have to be a major concern for the Sox. He went 3-for-27 (.111), scoring only two runs in the seven games, both of which came in Boston’s 10-3 win over the Diamondbacks on Friday night. Lugo led off that game with a homer.

His batting average is down to .213. Just as importantly, his on-base percentage was just .275 entering Sunday’s game, and he went 1-for-5, an infield single, in the road-trip finale. He doesn’t walk very often — only 21 times in 262 plate appearances.

Lugo has swiped 17 bases without being caught, but, as some baseball philosopher once said, you can’t steal first.

Since hitting .333 over his first 11 games after signing a four-year, $36-million contract as a free agent in the offseason, Lugo has steadily gone downhill. Over his last 46 games, the equivalent of more than one-quarter of the season, Lugo is batting a paltry .188 (37-for-97).

Even his ability to drive in runs despite a low batting average has dried up. He has just eight RBI over his last 19 games, batting a mere .127 (10-for-79) over that stretch. And of his limited number of hits, Lugo has only two extra-base hits (one double and a homer) in those 79 at-bats.

And his defense, which has never been a strong point of his game, has started to show leaks on routine plays, such as a bobble that cost Schilling a chance for a perfect game in Oakland last Thursday. Possibly losing his concentration because he’s pressing too much on offense, Lugo has been charged with four errors in his last 16 games.

Clearly, it is time to move down Lugo in Boston’s batting order, to possibly create more RBI chances for Kevin Youkilis, David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez as well as to take some of the pressure off him.

The Sox don’t have many options to replace him, but for now, the best option would be to move Dustin Pedroia to the No. 1 slot. The rookie second baseman doesn’t whiff often, has walked 18 times (to Lugo’s 21 in almost 100 more plate appearances) and is batting .316 after a very slow start.

Pedroia is very confident in his abilities and, now that he has gotten his feet on the ground, he wouldn’t be psyched out by the move from near the bottom of the order to the top, even if he does lack the speed that teams like to see in leadoff men. Or maybe lead off Youkilis and bat Pedroia second.

Coco Crisp’s speed would make him a perfect replacement for Lugo, but he has been just as weak at the plate as Lugo. He went 3-for-25 on the trip, dropping his average to .224.

Maybe it’s not ideal to have Lugo and Crisp hitting back-to-back at the bottom of the order if Pedroia leads off, but in essence that’s what they have had when fielding their normal starting lineup, anyway, with Crisp ninth, followed by Lugo.

There are, as mentioned, many reasons to be encouraged by the Sox this season. But danger signs can’t be ignored, and there’s a major one in the leadoff hole.

How long can the Sox wait for Lugo, a career .277 hitter in the majors, to find his stroke while the Red Sox struggle to get their leadoff man on base for the productive hitters behind him?

skrasner@projo.com