Rafael Devers Is Gone, But The Red Sox Have A Bright Present And Future

Great article.

I feel the same way about our 4 rookies. They along with Crochet, Bello, Dobbins and Rafaela are our future. Maybe throw in recently acquire Kyle Harrison with 5 yrs of team control.

You can go ahead and throw in Duran to the mix who is under team control for 4 years.

Also look at our bullpen (although I agree that you can't make long term plans for any of them).

We have hard throwers in Guerrero (6 years),  Alcala (2 yrs). How about Slaten (5yrs)? Bernardino is also under team control for 5 yrs, same with Weissert.

I'm just not heartbroken over Devers leaving. I have always wondered if Pittsburgh would have taken Devers, $15M per year, Duran, Crawford and say Campbell (not trading Mayer and Anthony) and couple of more minor leaguers for 5 years of Skenes. They are paying Mitch Keller $15M+ so Devers contract is affordable, subsidized. 

I like the theme of your article.  Losing Devers is a good thing and now Breslow needs to lose Cora and the transition to a less toxic environment will be complete.  It's hard when your manager is someone who represents cheating.  Devers was selfish and set a bad example, but Cora cheated and sets an even worse example for the young players.

As far as this year being a slow start for the big three prospects, think again.  The transition from minor league baseball to major league baseball is not an overnight action.  There is so much to learn.  Campbell for example started out the best of the three by FAR and looked like he was going to adjust immediately and then the reality of making the jump to the MLB hit.  The scouting for each team is very thorough.  The book on players is created and modified daily.  Once a small chink in the armor exists, the other teams exploit it.  That's how a guy like Campbell goes from hitting .400 after 6 games to hitting .301 after April and 29 games to hitting .227 after May and 51 games to .226 after 66 games on June 17th.  Teams didn't have a book on him then they did, and the coaching staff did NOT do a good job helping him adapt to the changes they identified.  Eventually, he will make his adjustment and catch fire once again, but the length of his slump will be dependent on the amount of help he gets and how quickly he learns what he needs to do to make adjustments.  This is a process that varies by player, so patience is key.  Don't expect greatness year one.  Expect the player to move up the learning curve on how to make adjustments.

Marcelo didn't start fast like Campbell.  He's struggled from day 1.  After 6 games like Campbell, Mayer was hitting .217 not .400.  Mayer has played 20 games now.  He's hitting .214.  He's now in the same boat as Campbell needing to make adjustments but he never experienced the joy of starting out hot like Campbell.  The ironic part is that fans are all over Campbell stating he should be sent down, but he has experienced so much more success than Mayer!!! 

That's the politics of the Red Sox fan base and front office.  That is the direct influence of a manager who plays favorites which is why he needs to be fired.  That should level the playing field for the young prospects. 

Lastly, there is Anthony.  After 6 games, he's the worst of the three with a .059 average.  He's only played 8 games so far and he is at .080.  He's batting 3rd in the line-up!!  Again, this is why Cora needs to go.  He's benched Campbell the most successful prospect and is batting the worst performing prospect 3rd and the 2nd worst 5th. 

Put yourself in that dugout and tell me, as a player not on Cora's good list, would you want to be there when outperforming others means nothing?  That's how Duran felt a couple of years ago.  That's how Rafaela felt last year.  Now Campbell is the red-headed stepchild.  That's why the dugout is toxic.  It was great for years for Devers when players like Mookie, JD, Bogey and Benny were out playing Devers and now it's great for Anthony and Mayer and Hamilton, a AAA at best skilled hitter batting .178 or 48 points lower than then Minor League Player of the Year in 2024 who is sitting.  It's truly pathetic the choices Cora makes and his reasons for doing so.  He was hired as an attempt to fix the diversity issue and instead he simply created a new type of racism.  Instead of white players getting all the opportunities, it's now the Cora favorites that get all the breaks and those favorites have a tendency to be people who are part of Cora's culture.

Baseball should be a performance-based sport, not ethnic based sport   Cora didn't represent diversity like he was supposed to, he simply changed the focus of the racism.  Couple that with his cheating and I will never understand how this former player with questionable morals got the greatest managerial job in baseball.

2 minutes ago, mvp 78 said:

300M for Devers at DH makes no sense. 

Soto for 700M? 

Vlad Jr for 500M? 

Ty. Finally some sense.

To replace Devers bat, it will cost way more than the 280M we shedded.  Maybe that bat, which will cost 40% more may be able to play a lousy 1B, so maybe that makes it a better value (saracasm)

Most likely they will get another Giolito with the money saved, who will promptly get hurt, and your Boston mediocre Sox continue to be just that.

In a world where Walker Buehler costs 21m, freeing up 31m by removing the guy who carries your entire lineup - and spinning it as a good thing is a take that is way to pervasive

51 minutes ago, Maxbialystock said:

You exaggerate Devers value to the Sox.  For most of his tenure, the Sox have been unable to make it to the postseason.  In the fantastic, incredible 2018 run Devers WAR was 0.0.  The big guns were Betts, JDM Bogey, and Beni.  The Sox made the 2021 postseason, and Devers was one of 6 pretty good bats.  The others were JDM, Bogey, Dugo, Renfroe, and Kike.  Devers was on the 2019, 2020, 2022, 2023, and 2024 teams which did not make the postseason.  

And this.  The Sox almost always have pretty good hitting.  Their problems have  been with the pitching. 

Despite the recent spate of weak hitting/scoring, the Sox are still ranked 6th in MLB in runs scored--which is where they have been for almost all of this season.   And the Sox team ERA is currently ranked 20th.

 

2018 was a different team. More recently, I dont think that the fact that the TEAM success in recent years has been bad means we can just subtract our best hitter during that span and not miss a beat.

And it is my opinion that you are taking our "pretty good hitting" (which we almost always have had, per you) for granted.  Keep subtracting your best bats and see how long that keeps up. Also, I dont think "pretty good hitting" is good enough.  Dodgers had a rash of pitching injuries and were carried by their offense.

6th isnt good enough, and if it werent for Devers I wonder what they would have been.

Count on your pitchers to get hurt, build your team through the bats.

1 hour ago, drewski6 said:

In a world where Walker Buehler costs 21m, freeing up 31m by removing the guy who carries your entire lineup - and spinning it as a good thing is a take that is way to pervasive

I'd hedge a bit. $20M on a one year deal is easier to deal with than $313M over 10 yrs, now 8 1/2 years left.

I will never bad mouth Devers for his performance. He's a very good baseball player. Maybe even a Hall of Fame worthy.

But I'm not going to relitigate what happened here. It didn't do me any good to torment over Betts departure. My being negative toward Devers and Betts probably has more to do with concealing my hurt feelings.

When my favorite team loses in NCAA tournament, for me the basketball season is over. That's how I deal with disappointments. Devers is over for me.

Tarik Skubal will be a free agent AFTER 2026 season. He's making $10,150M this year. Lucky for us that his agent is Boras. That means Skubal will go FA route.

Sox needs to gear up for him. Got to have him.

Crochet, Skubal, Bello, and two cheap starters will go long ways in getting us to the World Series.

(maybe Dobbins and Kyle Harrison?)

1 hour ago, Nick said:

I'd hedge a bit. $20M on a one year deal is easier to deal with than $313M over 10 yrs, now 8 1/2 years left.

Sure - but is it really better. Is that what you want? Every year 3 new 1 yr contracts for pitchers and if they do great they are gone, while we struggle to score runs.

Our aversion to long term deals is part of the reason why we keep getting the Giolittos and Buehlers and paying them high AAVs. The James Paxtons and the Sandovals.

When you offer 1 yr deals, you get players who are willing to accept them.

1 hour ago, Maxbialystock said:

Well, we just disagree.  I would love to see the hitting improve above 6th in runs scored and agree it will be harder without Devers.  But the Sox are going nowhere without pitching--and in the that 6 game winning streak the Sox lineup was without Bregman and Abreu plus the key hits were by players not named Devers.  

If the pitching turns around and resembles something like what we just saw, the Sox are in the postseason with or without great hitting.  

Bregman was our best hitter, but the real point is that both of them in lineup helped a lot.  Thus were the Sox 26-26 when Bregman went down.  Thus too they are back over .500 because of great pitching and without Bregman and Abreu and, for one game, Devers.  

A lot of truth in those pitcher injuries.  No wonder every MLB has 13 even though just one is on the mound at any given time.  

Right, pitching is about depth and injury luck in 2025.  Dodgers were supposed to be 7 deep this year and last and have had patchwork rotations. Like the Yankees, like the Braves.  Big investments in pitching results in big investments on the IL (unfortunately).

But I will concede that I did go too far when I said Raffy completely carried our lineup.  Good points there.  But I just think that in 2025, every pitcher is likely to get hurt, so invest in hitting