After a handful of players failing to keep the third outfield spot for the Boston Red Sox, top prospect Andrew Benintendi is next in line.
It’s a bird?! It’s a plane!? It’s Andrew Benintendi!
That’s right folks, 7th ranked prospect in all of Major League Baseball, Andrew Benintendi has been called from the Portland Sea Dogs and all of Red Sox Nation hopes he can be the spark to push Boston into October baseball.
Throughout the entire 2016 season, the Sox has had consistency both defensively and offensively from centerfielder Jackie Bradley Jr. and right fielder Mookie Betts. But what they’ve been missing is the third piece of the outfield to balance everyone out.
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First it was Brock Holt, then Chris Young, then they tried converting former Opening Day catcher Blake Swihart into their next starting outfielder. At one time during the season, Young and Swihart were key contributors in the Red Sox offense when Holt was on the DL. But when Young and Swihart eventually followed Holt to the DL, it was time to experiment.
Holt has been continuing to struggle being an everyday player and Bryce Brentz and Ryan LaMarre have not been the answer the Sox were looking for.
After winning the 2015 Golden Spikes Award (college player of the year) and then quickly moving up in the Red Sox farm system, Benintendi has a slash of .295/.357/.515 in 63 games for the Portland Sea Dogs. Not too shabby from a kid who got drafted from the Sox a little over a year ago.
When the decision to call Benintendi up before he has even made his Triple-A debut, some people are saying that it could be too soon for him to play in the big leagues.
But what’s the risk here?
The Red Sox basically had 3 options.
- Continue having a struggling Holt, Brentz or Michael Martinez as your 3rd option in the outfield.
- Trade away multiple players/prospects for a potentially high end outfielder.
- Call up top prospect Andrew Benintendi to hopefully live up to the potential he has right now.
The Sox thankfully picked option number 3.
To that group of people who are worried that Benintendi will not turn out due to the fact that it may be too soon, I hope you weren’t wondering the same thing about Xander Bogaerts in 2013.
When the Sox went on their historic World Series run, 21-year old rookie Xander Bogaerts helped the Red Sox win their 8th championship in franchise history. In the postseason, Bogaerts had a respectable batting average just under .300 with .412 OBP.
If the Red Sox just so happen to make into the postseason, I strongly believe that Benintendi will be on the roster for his strong performance that he will have in the last two months of the season.
With Benintendi being called, this may start one of the best outfield trio’s in all of baseball not only this season, but for multiple years to come.
And once Yoan Moncada gets called up, fasten your seat belts and put on your sunglasses folks because the future is looking bright.