The Red Sox week in review dives into Masataka Yoshida, Wilyer Abreu, and Garrett Cooper.
The awful nightmare across Red Sox Nation is finally over: my Pod On Lansdowne co-host Liam Fennessy has seen our favorite baseball team win a game in person.
OUR LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE IS OVER
LIAM HAS SEEN THE RED SOX WIN
CUE DIRTY WATER!!!!! pic.twitter.com/DYYiHWgcFg
— Pod On Lansdowne (@PodOnLansdowne) April 27, 2024
A 17-0 beat down on Saturday was one hell of a way to exercise the demons he had. Nothing erases the pain of seeing nine consecutive losses in the flesh like two touchdowns with the extra points and a field goal. Here I am thinking that the Fenway Bowl was in December.
Saturday’s win was all well and good, but this past week in Boston baseball was a bit of a mixed bag after going against a pair of solid Midwest clubs in the Cubs and Guardians. A 3-3 record following the 2016 World Series gauntlet leaves the Sox just north of the .500 mark entering the final few days of April. Not bad, but not great either.
Even if the end result isn’t too flattering, there’s something to be said about the team putting some impressive wins together at this stage considering the amount of injuries they’ve sustained. Every team has to deal with IL stints, but it’s been especially true for the Sox—since March 29 (the day after Opening Day), a who’s who list of contributors with the big club have been placed on the injured list. That group includes starter Brayan Bello and first baseman Triston Casas, a pair of exciting youngsters who sustained setbacks this past week.
So to have a winning record after all of that in mind…hey, that’s not nothing! They haven’t folded given the hand that’s been dealt. The optimistic thinker might be encouraged to see the guys deeper on the organizational depth chart keeping the ship afloat in the interim while some of the banged up players heal up. The most pessimistic-leaning fan could point to some of the warts—bats getting cold some nights, bad defensive and baserunning mistakes, etc.—and say that focusing more on that organizational depth in the winter would’ve made this period a bit more smooth.
Both of those points are fair.
However long the Hospital Sox can tread water is anybody’s guess, but hopefully help is around the corner. Nick Pivetta’s got a rehab start coming up on Thursday, while Casas expressed optimism that his rib injury won’t rule him out for the rest of 2024. Gotta take any wins where we can get ‘em, right?
It’s Monday Morning Brushback time, y’all.
The Curious Case of Masataka Yoshida
Outfielder (technically????) and left-handed hitter Masataka Yoshida’s exclusion from most of the lineup cards this past week was a point of speculation for Red Sox fans. Following a string of absences from the starting nine, MassLive reporter and Drake Maye enjoyer Chris Cotillo unveiled on Wednesday that Yoshida was feeling some “clear frustration.”
Interesting media scrum with Yoshida in the clubhouse. He was very careful in choosing his words through a translator. There’s some clear frustration about this diminished role. Cora talks soon.
— Chris Cotillo (@ChrisCotillo) April 24, 2024
Yoshida’s hasn’t come out of the gates on fire—especially compared to his strong start in his rookie campaign last year. He hasn’t been hitting the ball particularly hard (42nd percentile in hard hit rate entering Sunday’s action, per Savant), though the approach at the plate has been solid (he’s limiting the whiffs and laying off of stuff outside of the zone, en route to keeping his strikeout rate down). A stellar four-hit game on Saturday against the Cubbies has bumped the surface level numbers up, though, giving us a glimpse into some of the upside he can provide with the stick.
On the surface, a lack of the $90 million man in the starting lineup probably should raise some questions, especially considering the aforementioned injury situation. However, I think Masa’s just been a victim of circumstances.
The book on Yoshida is that he’s no defensive wizard—manager Alex Cora would probably agree with that if you gave him some truth serum, considering that he’s played exactly one (1) inning in the outfield thus far. For a team that’s already had its share of gaffes on defense, that’s…telling.
Meanwhile, Tyler O’Neill was always going to push his way back into the lineup following his concussion sustained on Patriots Day; his hot start plus the need for a righty with juice at the plate makes his starts a given at this point. One other player who we’ll talk about soon cannot be taken out of the lineup right now. Duran’s going to stay in the lineup, so the outfield was spoken for. Rafael Devers will be in the heart of the order whenever he’s available, and it seems like the team wasn’t ready to plug him right back into the third base spot earlier in the week after his nagging knee and shoulder problems crept in. Enter Bobby Dalbec and his steady glove (don’t ask about his bat).
All of that sorta left Masa as the odd man out, no? Frustrating for him, I’m sure, but ultimately those decisions from Cora made sense.
Sure enough, when Devers was put back at third on Saturday, the Macho Man was back at DH. Same deal for Sunday night. Raf’s status is the key to the inclusion of Yoshida: if Devers is ready to play the hot corner, you’ll see more of Yoshida as the DH. Simple as that.
I don’t expect Masa to be consistently warming the bench this often for the rest of the season. This week presented an awkward situation, but it’ shouldn’t be a trend going forward.
SUNDAY NIGHT UPDATE: The plot thickens…
Masataka Yoshida left the game because his hand got jammed during his second at-bat. There’s some concern. Not sure yet whether he’ll get X-rays yet
— Christopher Smith (@SmittyOnMLB) April 29, 2024
Big Wilyer Style
Remember a few paragraphs ago—when we were all younger, wide-eyed, and bushy-tailed—when I said there was one other player who can’t be taken out of the lineup? Yeah, it’s Wilyer Abreu.
After notching just five hits in his first 27 at-bats to open the season, Abreu hit well north of .400 between April 18 and 27, with his seven extra-base hits (including a pair of homers) good enough for an OPS over 1.200 (!!!!) in that time. That’s brought the season-long OPS back up to the upper-half of the .800’s, similar to what we saw at the end of 2023.
Wilyer Abreu puts the Sox on top pic.twitter.com/IMJRanq1dN
— The Pesky Report (@PeskyReport) April 23, 2024
And even during an oh-fer night at the plate on Sunday, Abreu was able to flash some leather with an impressive play in right field.
WILYER ABREU HAS NO TIME FOR YOUR HORSESHIT THE MAN IS HERE TO CATCH BASEBALLS pic.twitter.com/71LjKLfdbc
— Red (@SurvivingGrady) April 29, 2024
What’s impressive about Abreu’s profile at the dish is both his ability to pepper the opposite field as well as his adjustments to different offerings from pitchers.
Sure, he’s pulling the ball about half the time—as he should, if he’s getting stuff to hit to the pull side—but he’s not beholden to the pull approach. His career opposite field percentage has been right around 30% thus far, about 5% higher than the league average.
Nothing gets the juices pumping quite like a guy sitting back on a pitch and slappin’ that shit the other way. That opens up the entire arsenal (3-2 spurs) for Abreu at the dish, making him more of a dangerous threat thanks to his skill of spraying the ball wherever he needs to.
As for the pitches he’s been seeing, he’s slugged close to .550 on changeups and exactly .700 on sliders—the two pitches he’s seen the most outside of your standard issue four-seamers—entering Sunday. Oh, and he’s slugged over .600 on those heaters too, in case you’re wondering.
So we’re talking about a 24-year-old hitter who has demonstrated a knack for hitting the ball to all fields as well as the capacity to adjust to different speeds and break. We’ve seen Abreu in roughly 50 games at the highest level, and he can already add those features to his resume. This isn’t to say that the kid is a lock to become the next Juan Soto. However, I’m pretty confident in saying that even after around 150 MLB at-bats, Abreu’s a guy worth getting excited about.
Hopefully the best is yet to come.
Coop Kid’s Afraid to Leave His Coop
Welcome to Boston, Garrett Cooper! The 33-year-old was dealt to the Red Sox on Saturday after being designated for assignment by the Cubs earlier in the week. Cash considerations went to the North Side club; there won’t be a dry eye at Fenway when the tribute video for that cash is played on the big screen.
With Casas on the shelf for an uncertain amount of time, Cooper’s acquisition seems like an intuitive move to me. It didn’t take much to get him, and now he can man the fort at first base…since the current guy there isn’t cutting it on offense. Bobby Dalbec’s glove is a nice enough of an asset—as I mentioned earlier—but that doesn’t change the fact that his OPS+ entering Sunday was literally zero (0). As a reminder, the league average for that stat is always 100. You do the math.
With Cooper in the mix going forward, the Red Sox can have a steady-enough of a defender on the corner (and in the outfield if they have an emergency, I guess!) without having to sacrifice a spot in the batting order. Cooper’s dismissal from Chicago wasn’t for a lack of skill, as he’s slashing a respectable .270/.341/.432 so far in 2024 and boasts a career 109 OPS+. He’s no uber-power threat (the most round trippers he’s ever logged in a year was 17 across 123 total games in Miami and Whale’ Va San Diego last season) but he could be good enough to keep the line movin’ while Casas recovers and provide depth when one of the faces of the franchise returns to action.
As for Dalbec’s fate, maybe he’s kept around the big roster as a defensive replacement late in games? Maybe he’s sent back down to Worcester, since he still has one option left? That remains to be seen, but it looks to me like his role as a starter this season might be in jeopardy.
Song of the Week: “She Moves In Her Own Way” by The Kooks
Giving the nod to a band that doesn’t get enough respect compared to some other artists that were making headway in the 2000’s. Solid group, and a very nice lil’ song.
Until next week, friends! Same time and same place. Go Sox.