Red Sox: An autopsy of what went wrong for the 2017 season
The Boston Red Sox season was a failure. The team was expected to go deep into the playoffs and venture into the World Series. Now for my own quick autopsy of the 2017 season.
What went wrong for the Boston Red Sox? Despite the loss of David Ortiz, the Red Sox were still considered the American League favorites to cut through the playoffs and advance to the World Series. They were finally victorious in a hotly contested battle for the division crown which they secured in game 161.
The team had added a pitcher who was certainly among the best in either league in Chris Sale. Sale would just be another ace added to a staff that already had two – both Cy Young Award winners in their career and Sale could mean a third. This was for me shaping up like the great Baltimore staff of 1971 that had four 20-game winners.
I expected the Red Sox to do what the Houston Astros, Cleveland Indians and Los Angeles Dodgers did and win 100+ games. On paper, they were just as solid with pitching depth, speed, defensive capabilities, a blend of youth and experience, run-scoring potential and an energized fan base. The expectations were high, and the end results were depressing.
In 2016, it was Cleveland that embarrassed the Red Sox with a quick and humiliating sweep 3-0 that made early October the end of baseball in Boston. This season the process was repeated with just a slight change as the Red Sox managed not to be swept. Big deal. The manager gets fired and Boston fans get the proverbially “wait until next year.”
Just what went wrong? I have my autopsy of the 2017 season. I have now become what the Yankee fans of the previous century were like – if you don’t win the World Series it has been a disappointing season.
The most obvious of all is the loss of Ortiz and management’s failure to replace Ortiz’s bat. Mitch Moreland was no Ortiz and I doubt any sane or semi-sane Red Sox fan expected Moreland to be a replacement. Moreland represented a one-year plug who would give you a nice 20 home run, 80 RBI season and Gold Glove-caliber defensive play.
Moreland did his part and will most certainly convert his fine season into a significant salary boost as he enters free agency. Moreland was part of a dual situation with Hanley Ramirez and that becomes a nice subset to this section since Hanley did little to impress. Was it his shoulder? Whatever it was his bat became a tissue paper wrap with just 23 home runs and 62 RBI – the same RBI total as Dustin Pedroia.
If the game plan was Hanley coming back with a 30/100 season it failed, but what about the player that should have been here? The player Ortiz proselytized for? The player that almost universally Red Sox fans wanted in Fenway Park. The player who has 17 home runs in 202 at-bats at Fenway.
Edwin Encarnacion hit 38 home runs for the Indians and drove in 107. Now Boston is on the hunt for doing what should have been done last offseason and get that power bat. Will it be J.D. Martinez? Will it be a trade for Giancarlo Stanton? Will it be another free agent or another trade?
Management screwed up big time. They know it. The media knows it. The fans know it and the players know it. A Red Sox team that finishes last in the American League on home runs? The world turned upside down.
Projections mean nothing. I love to read the Baseball Prospectus on just what to expect the following season, but I consider it like astrology – fun to read but don’t take it seriously. The main culprits are the younger players since it is baseball nature to expect them to continue to trend upwards like a bullish stock market.
The poster boy for this in 2017 was Xander Bogaerts. Bogaerts was pirouetting from a 2017 Silver Slugger season with 21 home runs into what one would consider the next stage of his development – can you say 30 home runs? Was it a wrist injury or just a step back? Bogaerts was a bitter disappointment with both bat and glove.
Jackie Bradley didn’t win the Gold Glove and his chances of eventually securing that award are far greater than ever puncturing the .300 plateau with his average. Prodigious slumps followed by equally prodigious hot streaks. JBJ finished at .245 and at 27-years-old what you see is what you get.
Mookie Betts is the best player on the Red Sox and only a few are comparable or better in baseball, but 2017 was a disappointment. A .264 average is shoddy from what was expected and knowing the intensity of Betts he is probably disappointed.
The last is Andrew Benintendi who I had as a shoo-in for American League Rookie of the Year. Benintendi hit a respectable .271 with some decent power, but with his swing and speed – does he ever bunt? – I expected close to .300.
With the negative comes the positive and that is the surprising Rafael Devers. Devers finally got the call after a very quick rest stop in Pawtucket and showed surprising hitting ability. Devers will never be Brooks Robinson at third base, but he won’t be Butch Hobson. Trade him for Stanton? I would have to ponder that one.
How important is leadership? The Red Sox fired John Farrell and brought in Alex Cora with “clubhouse” often mention. Was it the idiotic behaviors of David Price that brought “clubhouse” to the forefront? You can’t fire Price, so Farrell makes an obvious scapegoat.
But leadership is more than just the manager as players often have their own internal SWAT units to patrol the clubhouse and keep order – meaning internal squabbles do not end up for the rapacious Boston media. In 2013 the Red Sox had more than a few who would most assuredly have taken the petulant Price aside for a heart to heart discussion.
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The veterans on this current team seem to be just the opposite. Dustin Pedroia had a unique reaction to a kerfuffle with the Orioles. In baseball, there is no right or wrong with your teammates and their actions. You simply stand by them in confrontations with opponents.
Ortiz was a leader by both actions on the field and in the clubhouse sanctuary. Was the replaced? This team seemed passive at times and about as exciting as a library presentation on the mating rituals of the fruit fly. Ah…excitement!
I have heard fans toss about terms such as “boring” or “robotic.” A happy dance after a victory is generally not construed as ultimate in public excitement.
The Red Sox excitement quotient can also be traced to that ingredient Red Sox fans consider like a vampire considers a tasty dose of blood – the home run and a pant load of runs. Get a bonified slugger in the fold and that can get the buzz on at Fenway Park.
Injuries are part of the game and present a ready-made excuse for failure. Every team has them and one can certainly go to the various sources that show the number of games lost to the disabled list, but the Red Sox had the type the hit at the heart of the team and within that is a glimmer of hope for a far more dynamic 2018.
The game revolves – as Earl Weaver will state – around that little bump in the middle of the infield. In the game as played today the rotation is almost becoming a set-up for your bullpen and that is where the first Hammer of Thor hit this squad and where I shall remain.
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Carson Smith was down for almost the entire season and Tyler Thornburg was. With Thornburg it was especially painful to watch the performance of the player traded for Thornburg – Travis Shaw – perform so well for the Brewers.
Despite the loss of both the bullpen still performed about expectations with a third-place finish among their companions in the American League. Even the last month of the season the bullpen still did not embarrass them. Expect even more emphasis during this off-season.
The Red Sox staff lost Steven Wright for almost the entire season and this was significant when Price lost extended time. A Price of 2016 would have been more than welcomed. You can see the loss clearly when you must have Doug Fister in a key playoff game.
Next: Where have all the Red Sox home runs gone?
You never have enough pitching and that has surfaced in many a Red Sox season when a rotation looked overloaded yet became compromised. The 2017 season was no different.