Article: The Red Sox Infield Defense Is About To Get Much Better

[Davy Andrews]

In 2024, the Red Sox had one of the worst infields in all of baseball. That's going to change in a hurry.

I should mention up front that I’m writing this on Thursday morning. I have no idea how this afternoon’s game will have gone by the time you’re reading this on Friday. This article could look embarrassing if the infield makes nine errors today. That said, we’ve known for some time now what the Opening Day Red Sox lineup would look like. And even if we weren’t sure, manager Alex Cora spelled it out earlier this week during an interview on WEEI. “Alex is going to play third,” he said. “Raffy’s going to DH. We are in the winning business. He understands that.” What business does that put Masataka Yoshida in? The answer is very unclear, as Alex Mayes will explain later this morning. However, aside from that question, we now have have a bunch of information about what the team will look like this season. I'll break down the offense on Monday, but today I’m going to break down what the now settled lineup means on defense. Here's your headline:

The Infield Defense Will Be Much Better
I think we should expect Kristian Campbell to have some growing pains at the major league level, especially on defense. He hasn’t played that many minor league games, and bounced around the diamond during spring training. It will take a while for him to get his feet under him, and in the meantime, we should be prepared for some ugly defensive plays. That seemed to be the case during Thursday's season opener, when he made a couple routine plays, but also got eaten up by a dying line drive. That said, it’s hard to imagine that his glove will be worse than what the Red Sox ran out at second base last season. According to Statcast’s Fielding Run Value, David Hamilton was the only Red Sox defender actually saved the team runs in 2024. Enmanuel Valdez spent the most time at second, and Vaughn Grissom spent the third-most, and both put up terrible numbers miserable. In all, the Red Sox graded out at -7 runs, second-worst among all teams. Even if Campbell is just a bit below average at second, that will constitute a big improvement.

Obviously the really big improvement will come at third base, where the team has swapped in Alex Bregman’s Gold Glove for Rafael Devers’ cement one. Last year, Bregman put up 5 FRV, while Devers put up -5. In other words, the Red Sox just saved themselves 10 runs at third base, which equates to roughly one win. Even if Bregman’s defense comes back down to earth a bit, we’re talking about a huge gain. If you look at Defensive Runs Saved, another leading metric, the gap is even bigger.

Lastly, the team should have Trevor Story around all season (barring yet another injury). Story’s defense has graded out as excellent over the last two seasons, but he racked up all that value over a short sample size. I don’t think we can bank on his continued excellence at the position, but I do think we can feel confident that he’ll be solid, maybe even solidly above average out there. The Red Sox ranked 28th with -6 FRV at shortstop last season. Even if he’s just a league-average shortstop, Story just saved the team a bit more than half a win.

If we put all that together, I think we can conservatively estimate that the Red Sox will be saving roughly five runs at all three infield spots, which translates to a win and a half. There’s even more upside too. If Campbell acclimates quickly, if Story stays healthy and productive, if Devers shows that last season wasn’t a fluke, and if Triston Casas stabilizes a first base situation that ranked 20th last year, we could be talking about an even bigger improvement, and every run will count in a division as competitive as the AL East.  

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[moonslav59]

This is one area I have been harping on for years, and it seems like we finally did something about it.

While Casas remains a weak defender, maybe someday Devers can show he can play 1B better.

The OF defense is solid and then some.

Our catcher D needs work, but Narvaez is supposed to be pretty good on D.

[Larry Cook]

His article does not account for injuries. 

if story gets hurt. Does Mayer become the full time SS??? 

if Casas gets hurt, who plays first???

[moonslav59]

1 minute ago, Larry Cook said:

His article does not account for injuries. 

if story gets hurt. Does Mayer become the full time SS??? 

if Casas gets hurt, who plays first???

Mayer would start SS, if Story is out longer term.

We might go with Romy, Wong or Ref at 1B, shorter term, but maybe we'd need to trade for someone, if Casas goes out longer term.

Too bad Devers can't play 1B, and then Ref, Yoshida and others could DH.

 

[mvp 78]

4 minutes ago, Larry Cook said:

His article does not account for injuries. 

if story gets hurt. Does Mayer become the full time SS??? 

if Casas gets hurt, who plays first???

I think if Story gets hurt in the very near future, Hamilton takes over at SS for a few months. If Story gets hurt in a few months, it's time for Mayer to come up.

If Bregman gets injured, Mayer can come up and step in.

If Campbell doesn't work out, Hamilton looked good at 2b. Mayer could also play there if he's not fielding elsewhere.

1b is a problem in this org. Catcher is a problem too. They don't really have much depth at those two positions. They are apparently trying out Grissom at 1b, but I think Toro would come up and be the guy to play 1b. 

[moonslav59]

34 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

I think if Story gets hurt in the very near future, Hamilton takes over at SS for a few months. If Story gets hurt in a few months, it's time for Mayer to come up.

If Bregman gets injured, Mayer can come up and step in.

If Campbell doesn't work out, Hamilton looked good at 2b. Mayer could also play there if he's not fielding elsewhere.

1b is a problem in this org. Catcher is a problem too. They don't really have much depth at those two positions. They are apparently trying out Grissom at 1b, but I think Toro would come up and be the guy to play 1b. 

Didn't Cora say Mayer gets the first call, if someone gets hurt (assuming more than for a few days)?

I agree on the catcher issue. IMO, when the roster squeeze gets tighter, we'll trade from a bottleneck position for a catcher.

[mvp 78]

7 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Didn't Cora say Mayer gets the first call, if someone gets hurt?

I agree on the catcher issue. IMO, when the roster squeeze gets tighter, we'll trade from a bottleneck position for a catcher.

I don't think he specifically said that. Why would he pigeon hole himself like that? 

[5GoldGlovesOF,75]

58 minutes ago, moonslav59 said:

Didn't Cora say Mayer gets the first call, if someone gets hurt (assuming more than for a few days)?

I agree on the catcher issue. IMO, when the roster squeeze gets tighter, we'll trade from a bottleneck position for a catcher.

Merloni said it in Mexico on NESN, but didn't quote Cora.

[notin]

4 hours ago, Larry Cook said:

His article does not account for injuries. 

if story gets hurt. Does Mayer become the full time SS??? 

if Casas gets hurt, who plays first???

Hopefully Mayer does.  Neither Romy nor Hamilton is anything but a short term stopgap at SS.

If Casas gets hurt, we leave first base unmanned and play another outfielder.  Or call up Abraham Toro.  Or both…

[mvp 78]

17 minutes ago, notin said:

Hopefully Mayer does.  Neither Romy nor Hamilton is anything but a short term stopgap at SS.

If Casas gets hurt, we leave first base unmanned and play another outfielder.  Or call up Abraham Toro.  Or both…

Hamilton filling in a 2b makes sense. At SS it only makes sense as a very short term solution. 

2B 8 DRS, 3 OAA

SS -4 DRS, -3 OAA

[moonslav59]

7 hours ago, 5GoldGlovesOF,75 said:

Merloni said it in Mexico on NESN, but didn't quote Cora.

OK. My bad, however it does make sense that if we lose Bregman or Story for more than 10 days, Mayer should and would get the call. 2B is maybe a little more iffy, as DHam and Romy could platoon, there and save the roster spot.