Position player who gets to Strut
Few hitters in the American League have been hotter than Dustin Pedroia this month. The veteran second baseman is hitting .363 with a .989 OPS in July. He has six home runs this season, four of which have come in his last 13 games.
Pedroia’s 23 RBI are the most in the league this month. This is a guy who has never topped 91 RBI in a season suddenly becoming a run producing force over the past few weeks.
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Last week was no different. Pedoria hit .360 with a pair of doubles and two of those aforementioned home runs. He also led the team with 9 RBI and 17 total bases.
If there was any downside to Pedroia’s week it’s that he made his first error of the season. The botched ground ball snapped a franchise record streak of 114 games without an error by a second baseman. Rather than focus on the negativity of the mistake, let’s take a moment to reflect on how incredible it is that Pedroia has played 81 games and only made one error! The play doesn’t stand out for the effect it had on the team – the Red Sox still won the game. We remember it simply because of how rare of an occurrence it is that Pedroia makes an error.
Pedroia has since started a new streak of games without an error, while mixing in a nine-game hitting streak this month. The 33-year old is the elder statesman on the roster, yet shows no signs of slowing down as the puts the team on his back to kick off the season’s second half.