Red Sox player power rankings: middle infield reigns supreme
Xander and Petey lead the pack.
COMMENTARY
The American League is blessed with a bunch of great double play combos these days. In fact, when you combine the wins above replacement player (WAR) for a team’s second base and shortstop combo, four of the top five combos reside in the AL. One of them, as you might suspect, is the Red Sox’ Xander Bogaerts and Dustin Pedroia, who have combined for 7.5 WAR this season. That is bested only by Houston’s 9.2 WAR (Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa) and Cleveland’s 8.2 WAR (Jason Kipnis and Francisco Lindor). Right now, both Bogaerts and Pedroia are red hot, and as such, they find themselves atop this edition of the Red Sox Player Power Rankings.
29. Clay Buchholz (29): Now that he’s magically strung two scoreless outings together for the first time in more than a month, everyone is starting to forgive the Prodigal Son all over again. Talk to me when he becomes capable of pitching on back-to-back days. Until then, he’s a waste of a roster spot.
28. Sean O’Sullivan (28): In his first rehab start in Triple-A, he allowed six runs in three innings, which in case you’re wondering is not generally the sort of performance that gets you a ticket back to the Show.
27. Tommy Layne (27): As Tim Britton of the Providence Journal noted on Sunday, Layne knows he needs to be better and feels he is making progress. Unfortunately, that improvement might be too little, too late.
26. Michael Martinez (26): He hasn’t played much. He isn’t going to play much. His impact will be felt in the rare moments when he does. So far, I haven’t felt them.
25. Joe Kelly (NR): Called back up to be a reliever, Kelly has struck out one batter and walked two in his first three relief appearances. I find it hard to believe that the Red Sox can’t find a better reliever via trade than Kelly.
24. Ryan Hanigan (25): As I mentioned on Thursday and at other times this season, Hanigan doesn’t play much and doesn’t have a future with the team. They really should find a better way to use this roster spot.
23. Bryce Brentz (21): In June, he hit .318 in 23 plate appearances. In July, he hit .267 in 32 PA. Which, you know, isn’t as good.
22. Chris Young (22): He is getting closer to a rehab assignment, which is marvelous news. Fingers crossed that the team gets him back for the stretch run.
21. Aaron Hill (19): Either Hill is not taking well to the Red Sox, or the American League, or his new part-time role. Needless to say, something isn’t working right now. You’d say the key to getting him going is more playing time, but with Travis Shaw having rebounded from his poor June (more on that below) it’s not clear how the Sox can get Hill more playing time, as currently constituted.
20. Koji Uehara (12): We may have seen the final pitch Koji Uehara throws in the majors. If he has, there are worse endings than a fastball that caught Giants first baseman Brandon Belt for a strikeout looking, but it’s certainly not the ending Red Sox fans would have liked for the beloved Japanese fireman.
19. Craig Kimbrel (23): He should be back tonight, which is a pretty quick turnaround. Hopefully, he really is ready, and didn’t rush back.
18. Robbie Ross Jr. (24): He’s been the workhorse out of the bullpen the past two weeks, and he hasn’t imploded, which is about as good as can be expected given the sticky situations the team has found itself in during that timeframe.
17. Junichi Tazawa (20): The good news – Tazawa is back. The bad news – his velocity isn’t. After averaging 93.9 mph in his first game back on July 22, he was down to 93.4 mph on July 24 and then just 92.7 mph on Tuesday, which is roughly where he was when he landed on the disabled list. He hasn’t pitched since, and those two pieces of information taken together are certainly less than heartwarming.
16. Eduardo Rodriguez (17): After only striking out one batter in his first start back on the rotation on July 16 against the Yankees, Rodriguez went out and struck out eight Twins and six Tigers in his next two starts. Taken together, he has tallied a 3.06 ERA and 4.66 FIP in those three starts, covering 17.2 innings pitched, which is a much better 1performance than the 8.59 ERA and 6.92 FIP he allowed in six starts and 29.1 innings pitched prior to being demoted.
15. Matt Barnes (15): With 49 innings pitched in 39 outings this season, Barnes has a chance to approach innings pitched totals rarely seen for a latter day Red Sox reliever. In the past decade, the only Red Sox reliever to log 80 or more innings was Alfredo Aceves, who tossed 93 innings in 2011 and 84 in 2012. Of course, if Barnes is used more exclusively in high-leverage situations, his innings per outing may dip back closer to 1.0.
14. Brock Holt (11): While he isn’t quite scuffling, Holt went without an extra-base hit in each of his last 10 starts. If you’re looking for a reason why he was given consecutive days off in Anaheim, that could be why. Fortunately, he doubled in one of his two tries when he came off the bench yesterday. Hopefully that gets him going.
13. Brad Ziegler (16): He hasn’t been fortunate in the wins and losses department thus far in his Red Sox tenure, but in the more important ERA, FIP, K% and BB% departments, he’s been even better in Boston than he was in Arizona, and he was having a good season in Arizona.
12. Sandy Leon (14): The legend of Sandy Leon grows. He’s been worth 1.6 WAR in his short time with the team this season, which is already their best performance since Jarrod Saltalamacchia in 2013.
11. Travis Shaw (13): After hitting .292/.358/.508, good for a 127 wRC+ (ie, he hit 27 percent better than league average) in April and May, Shaw hit a paltry .214/.277/.310 for a 49 wRC+ in June, and it was fair to wonder whether Shaw could hit effectively over the course of an entire season. But he has responded by hitting .246/.310/.508 in July, good for a 105 wRC+. That is slightly above average, and slightly above average is as good a description for his season as a whole.
10. Drew Pomeranz (9): Whenever I plead for patience with a new arrival to the Red Sox, I feel a little like Kevin Bacon at the end of Animal House:
Remain calm. All is well! Yeah, right. No one wants to hear that around here, and after his start Saturday in Anaheim, fans probably smell the blood in the water. Obviously it would be great if Pomeranz would go out and toss a three-hit shutout or something, but he’s certainly not as bad as his current Red Sox statistics suggest he is, and moving forward, I think he’ll be closer to the guy who gave up two runs in six innings against the Tigers on July 25th, striking out seven in the process.
9. Steven Wright (2): Wright allowed 12 base runners in five innings yesterday, but he hung tough, only allowing three runs. Unfortunately for him, most teams don’t have an offense as pathetic as Anaheim’s.
8. Hanley Ramirez (8): Ramirez put himself back on the map in a big way in July, as it was his best month in a Red Sox uniform since his first one back in April of 2015. His 11 extra-base hits in July was not only his most in a Red Sox uniform for a single month but it was also more extra-base hits than he had in the second half last season.
7. David Ortiz (3): Ortiz has come out of the gate a little slow. He’s only slugging .436 in the second half as opposed to .682 in the first half. Still, after he hit that ball into Pesky’s Pole during batting practice two Thursday’s ago, you know he still is capable of crippling any and all baseballs.
6. David Price (9): If you’re looking for an encouraging sign, look no further than the fact that by FanGraphs’ new version of Game Score (http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/instagraphs/game-score-v2-0/), Price has tossed two of his best three starts of the season in July, including his latest offering, when he shut out the Angels for eight innings on Thursday.
5. Jackie Bradley Jr. (5): Recently, over at BP Boston, Matt Collins made the case that Jackie Bradley Jr. is Boston’s MVP this season, and while you or I may disagree, Collins’ article highlighted the fact that we can involve a plethora of players in such a debate, and that is both fantastic and fun.
4. Mookie Betts (1): Betts has done little to slip three spots here, this is more a reflection of how well the three players ahead of him have played recently. As of Sunday, Betts was one of just three players in the majors this year to have at least 20 homers, 20 doubles and 10 stolen bases, with Wil Myers and Ian Desmond being the other two.
3. Rick Porcello (10): Porcello has allowed two or fewer runs in six of his last nine starts, and by FIP- (a park and league adjusted version of FIP that shows how much better or worse than league average a pitcher has been) Porcello is having the best season of his career.
2. Xander Bogaerts (4): Bogaerts has now tallied career highs in home runs and stolen bases, and has tied his career best in WAR. With 14 homers and 13 steals, he’s got a shot at becoming just the third Red Sox shortstop to post a 20-20 season — John Valentin in 1995 and Nomar Garciaparra in 1997 being the other two.
1. Dustin Pedroia (6): The Laser Show was hot before the All-Star break, and he came out of the break even hotter. In the second half, he has found his power stroke – as exemplified by his huge three-run homer yesterday. The Red Sox offense hasn’t been quite as hot in the second half as it was in the first, but it’s not for lack of Pedroia trying. He is producing at borderline MVP level in the second half.
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