So far, the Red Sox have played 20 games, or, about one-eighth of the schedule.
That’s hardly long enough to make any official determinations about what way the season is headed, but that hasn’t stopped a lot of people from jumping to some (absurdly early) conclusions.
It doesn’t matter than more than five full months remain to be played, or that we haven’t even reached Memorial Day weekend, the time by which most believe some real judgments can be made.
In an era of X and other social media platforms, it’s apparently never too soon to make arbitrary conclusions.
But just for fun, let’s play along with some of the narratives associated with the team and take some closer looks.
1) It’s time to panic over Triston Casas.
There’s no getting away from the fact that Casas is off to a poor start. He’s slashing just .172/.243/.266, and of those three numbers, it’s hard to say which is the most disconcerting. I’m going with the .266 slugging, which reflects how little damage he’s done at the plate (one homer, three doubles).
And while we’re at it, though it’s become a somewhat discredited stat, the three RBI are troubling, too, especially for someone hitting cleanup for much of the young season.
If we look under the hood, there are other numbers which spotlight his struggles. His walk rate (7.3 percent) is a little more than half of his career rate (13.6 percent).
Still, all is not lost when it comes to Casas. Of late, he’s been hitting the ball hard, but with poor results. In the just-completed series with Tampa Bay, Casas had exit velocities above 97 mph — anything over 95 mph is considered “hard-hit’’ — in six of his last 10 plate appearances.
That’s little more than bad luck and a sign that Casas may be on the verge of busting out of this three-week-long dip. Hit that ball hard enough for long enough and hits — many of them for extra-bases — will come.
That’s further illustrated by his solid contact rate (10.9 percent, a career best) and his bat speed, which ranks him in the 88th percentile among all hitters.
There’s also some atypical aggressiveness that have clouded his outcomes. He’s swinging at 40.6 percent of all first pitches, a far higher rate (a 12 percent increase) than even a year ago.
In other words, it’s pretty obvious what’s ailing Casas. He’s hasn’t been nearly as selective as in the past, and when he swings, he’s not making the quality of contact he has previously though recent games have shown a better approach with the desired outcomes.
The Red Sox have little choice to be patient with Casas, for a few reasons.
First, on the current active roster, Romy Gonzalez and Rob Refsnyder are the only ones with any first base experience and Refsnyder hasn’t played the position since 2020. Neither represents a long-term solution.
Nor are there any options in the minor league system. The Red Sox don’t have any future first baseman anywhere near the big leagues, in part because Casas, healthy again after missing a good chunk of last season do to a rib injury, is their first baseman of the present and future.
And please, no more talk of Roman Anthony being move to first. Shoehorning Anthony into a position he’s never before played just to speed up his promotion to the majors makes zero sense. No matter how talented and promising, Anthony is likely to struggle at least a little bit when he does arrive, because that’s a fact of life. (See: Holliday, Jackson, who a year ago was what Anthony is now — the top-rated position player prospect in the game). The last thing he needs is an entirely new position to which he has to adjust. Lastly, Anthony profiles as an above-average outfielder; sticking him at first would represent a terrible waste of his athleticism.
2) The bullpen is a question mark.
Without the established Kenley Jansen in the role of closer, the back end of the bullpen was uncertain — made doubly so by the early-season unavailability of Liam Hendriks, who began the year on the IL due to elbow inflammation.
But even without Hendriks, the bullpen has been pretty good. Among all 30 teams, the Red Sox rank eighth in bullpen ERA (3.96) and only three teams have allowed fewer homers than the Sox (four).
To date, Aroldis Chapman has been fine as the closer; even the walks-to-9IP ratio (4.9) is better than he’s shown in recent years. As is also customary, he’s been almost impossible to square up, with a .192 slugging percentage against.
The other high-leverage options — Garrett Whitlock and Justin Slaten — have also been largely effective. Whitlock has adapted to the multi-inning role well (five of his seven outings have been for two innings), and he’s unscored upon in three of those.
Meanwhile, Slaten’s numbers are skewed by one really bad performance in the first full week of the season (four earned runs allowed with no outs recorded) in Baltimore. Other than that, he’s been almost perfect with seven scoreless innings and just one hit allowed.
In theory, the bullpen should soon be further enhanced by the return of Hendriks, though it remains uncertain what the Sox can reasonably expect from someone who last competed in the big leagues in the regular season in June of 2023.
3) The starting rotation is plenty deep.
Well, it looked that way early in spring training.
The Red Sox had added Garrett Crochet and Walker Buehler to a group that included Tanner Houck, Brayan Bello, Kutter Crawford and Lucas Giolito.
Would they try a six-man rotation? What would they do with all of that pitching?
Turns out, this wasn’t an issue. Bello got slowed by shoulder soreness at the start of spring and won’t make his debut until sometime next week. Crawford battled a chronic knee issue and is still weeks — minimum — from contributing. Finally, Giolito’s rehab from a lost year following elbow surgery and a subsequent hamstring strain has been ugly at Worcester.
In addition, the Sox dealt off a depth starter in Quinn Priester for some future reward.
The result? The team has already plugged in rookie Hunter Dobbins for one start, with another likely coming Friday night as the homestand gets underway. And there was at least talk of having the final game of the series in Tampa be a bullpen game; instead, Sean Newcomb gave them 4.2 scoreless innings.
The return of Bello should upgrade the rotation, but at the same time, the Red Sox have to figure out what’s wrong with Houck, who’s downturn in performance now dates back al the way to last July.
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It’s too early to begin to speculate about the trade deadline, and how the Red Sox might approach it. A lot can happen between now and the end of July, and what looks like an area of strength could soon turn to a weakness — or vice versa.
But there’s little doubt that the Red Sox are, at some point, going to experience a glut of outfielders.
There’s Masataka Yoshida, who is still weeks away from being ready to play in Boston. And eventually, there’s the matter of Anthony. There will come a time that Anthony has nothing left to prove at Triple A, forcing the Red Sox to find a spot for him on the major league roster. And not a fringe one, either — it’s clear the Red Sox aren’t going to promote Anthony until they’re convinced he can be an everyday contributor.
But where?
Right field seems spoken for by Wilyer Abreu, who’s already won a Gold Glove in his first full year and this season, despite being limited in spring training thanks to a intestinal virus, has been the team’s best hitter.
If there’s one thing that Abreu hasn’t yet proven, it’s his ability to hit lefties. Alex Cora wants to give him that chance, but in something of a fluke, the Red Sox have only faced a few lefty starters this season and Abreu has just six at-bats against them to date.
In the other corner outfield spot is Jarren Duran, who last season put everything together and was the team’s best player (and the MVP of the All-Star Game). This year, he’s off to a slow start both offensively and defensively.
It’s hard to believe that last year was some kind of outlier for Duran – you don’t often see a player with 83 extra-base hits, 34 steals and named as a Gold Glove finalist fail to come close to matching those levels a mere year later.
There was nothing fluky about Duran’s 2024 and even though there’s been zero progress made toward extending him, it’s difficult to imagine the Red Sox trading him with three full years of control remaining after this one.
That leaves, by process of elimination, Ceddanne Rafaela. Rafaela looked to be making progress in spring training toward a more disciplined approach at the plate, but since the regular season began, he’s fallen back into some bad habits.
(Almost comically, however, his four walks in just 17 games are nearly one-quarter as many as he had all of last year.)
Rafaela remains a plus-plus defender in center — he’s already been credited with three defensive runs saved — with an arm as good as any outfielder in the league. He also has way above-average speed.
But what can be expected of him offensively? Is he merely a speed-and-defense guy? Or is there still room for growth, as he hinted with his 15 homers last year?
Either way, Rafaela remains the most likely trade chip from among the outfielders. The Sox could then either move Duran back to center, or have Anthony play there with Duran remaining in left.
One variable to be considered: will Rafaela’s contract extension (eight years, $50 million) be an impediment to moving him? On one hand, the control for another seven seasons gives an acquiring team plenty cost control and certainty.
But Rafaela’s value currently isn’t great, and the contract could serve as a disincentive, to the point where the Red Sox might have to take back some of the deal in order to successfully move him.
And for what would the Red Sox be in the market?
For now, it would seem there are three areas of need: catching, a younger closer and, of course, more starting pitching.
One National League source said recently that the Red Sox stockpile of prospects and willingness to (again) add salary could well make them logical players for Sandy Alcantara.
Indeed, if the Red Sox are contenders at the halfway point, the prospect of heading into the postseason with a 1-2 punch of Crochet and Alcantara is highly intriguing.
That’s a long way off for now, however, by which time, surely some other theories and narratives will also have been proven false.
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