The real issue is timing. By the time Castillo proves to be a problem, it’ll be too late to do anything about it. The off-season is the time when you can fix holes in the roster (recall: Price, David), but the season is the time when you create those holes. The time between the two is the  potentially bad part. Brutal how that works. The Red Sox outfield situation is a good example, which works well for this article considering that’s kinda what this article is about. The outfield market is bizarrely robust at the moment, featuring above average hitters such as ex-Red Sock Yoenis Cespedes and Justin Upton, and only recently losing Alex Gordon who re-signed with the Royals for almost the exact dollar figure the Red Sox gave to Rusney Castillo, albeit over a shorter term. Despite that potential production sitting on the market, the Red Sox have shown no interest in any of those players even at a potentially reduced price or number of seasons.

Sounds strange, but there are good reasons for it. The first is Castillo’s contract, which will pay him between $11 million and $12 million per season through at least the 2019 season (if he opts out) and likely a few seasons beyond. The second reason is his baseball-playing ability, which presumably exists. So he’s going to start the season in left field. The Red Sox have spent a lot of money on the 2016 roster however, and with this being David Ortiz’s last season, they are, as the kids say, all in. So what happens if Castillo continues being Castillo, i.e. he performs just slightly above replacement level?

Last year Castillo hit .253/.288/.359. This was not good, but 2015 is not the same offensive environment as 2005, so it wasn’t an utter disaster either. Various WAR metrics had Castillo worth just below one win in 2015, and that was in 289 PAs, so less than half a season’s worth of playing time. If Castillo starts in left all season long and hits and plays defense like he did last season, he’ll likely be worth just under two wins. That isn’t great, but it’s acceptable. A step forward from him would push him towards three wins which would be, considering last year and his time in Pawtucket, pretty fantastic.

The slightest slip up in production on either side of the ball from Castillo and we’re looking at a player subtracting from the team rather than adding to it.

Still, with a slash line like that, we’re not dealing with much of a margin for error. The slightest slip up in production on either side of the ball from Castillo and we’re looking at a player subtracting from the team rather than adding to it. So, suppose that’s what happens. Obviously Cespedes and Upton won’t be waiting on the free-agent market to take his spot. The Red Sox will be looking at one of two options; either move someone already in the organization from the bench or the minors to left field or make a trade for an outfielder.

The Red Sox have signed Chris Young to be their fourth outfielder and if Castillo isn’t cutting it after a few months, the job could fall to him, at least temporarily until the team figures out something better. But Young has major platoon issues, so he’s not an ideal season-long fit. Beyond him, there’s always Brock Holt, who is capable of stepping in and playing left if need be. We know this because left field is a baseball position and Holt can play all of the baseball positions. The problem with that is Holt isn’t a long-term solution in left, and more germane to next season, Holt will be counted on to back up most of the infielders. He can’t play left and and man an infield position at the same time. I’m pretty sure he can’t, anyway.

So there don’t appear to be any season-long solutions on the major league roster. This isn’t surprising but it does mean we have to look further down into the minor leagues, and looking in the Red Sox farm system for outfield help is like looking in a 20-something bachelor’s refrigerator for fresh vegetables. You can look but you’re not going to find anything because it’s just not there.

I suppose that’s not entirely fair. There is still Bryce Brentz. The problem with Brentz is he’ll be 28 this season and hasn’t done anything to distinguish himself in Triple-A over the last two seasons if you don’t count shooting himself in the leg with a gun, and I do not count that.

The dark horse here is Andrew Benintendi, who some scouts see as a player who could rise very quickly through the Red Sox system due to his age when drafted, experience as a college player and overall skill set. That’s great, but it’s not something to plan around. You don’t make organizational plans that depend on 22-year-olds with no experience above Single-A showing up and impacting the major league team. It could happen, but even if it did, it wouldn’t be until towards the end of the season (think Michael Conforto of the Mets).

That brings us to the trade market, and the trade market might be harder to predict than the stock of a player like Benintendi. We can look now and see who might be available, but things change once the season starts and teams start to win games. So maybe the best barometer of who might be available is to look at the players who will reach free agency following the 2016 season. There’s a lot of players of course, so I’ll summarize: yuck. Perhaps the easiest name to see as available is Jay Bruce of the Reds. The Reds look to be terrible in 2016 so they’ll likely be happy to move anything not nailed down. Bruce is coming off of a poor couple seasons in Cincinnati, but he’s still youngish (29) and potentially worthwhile… maybe? Beyond him… more dots. Josh Reddick? Alejandro De Aza? You can already see the problem here. That doesn’t mean there won’t be anyone worth dealing for, just that from where we sit now it doesn’t look all that promising.

The good news for the Red Sox, if there is any good news here for the Red Sox, is that Castillo mediocrity won’t be debilitating.

The good news for the Red Sox, if there is any good news here for the Red Sox, is that Castillo mediocrity won’t be debilitating. That’s not to say you wouldn’t rather have Justin Upton, because you would really really rather have Justin Upton, but clearly that isn’t happening. FanGraphs’ Steamer projections have Castillo hitting .270/.313/.403 this season, and if you accept that as a baseline of offensive production and move his defense from below to above average, that puts him into plus territory overall. In 2015 the league average left fielder hit .256/.319/.411, so Castillo doesn’t project to be actually good, but at least he shouldn’t be bad enough to sink the team. Taking this a step further, the fact that the Red Sox have devoted so much time and money to the 2016 team and yet aren’t attempting to replace Castillo has to count for something as well. Right? Probably? Let’s go with that.

Ultimately, Castillo hasn’t played much major league baseball, but he’s played enough to warrant skepticism that he’ll ever show much beyond production beyond a glorified fourth outfielder. Fortunately, the Red Sox should have a deep enough roster that they can give him the chance to develop further, and if he fails to capitalize on that chance there are other options. Not necessarily good ones, but for now at least, that’s a problem to tackle later.

Photo by Rick Osentoski/USA Today Sports Images

Going into this season the Red Sox were due to spend $22 million on new left fielder Hanley Ramirez, $13 million for Shane Victorino, $10.5 million for Rusney Castillo, $5.5 million for Allen Craig and $1.85 million for Daniel Nava. During the season they also brought in Alejandro De Aza and the remainder of his $5.5 million contract. Those five guys will cost Boston $52.85 million this season alone. Of the possible 309 games started, those players have started not nearly enough. Victorino was traded to Anaheim with the vast majority of his remaining contract Boston’s responsibility. Nava is now DFA’d and it looks like a similar story may take place there as well. Castillo and Craig spent the majority of the season as the most expensive duo in International League history or, if not (because I’m not researching that), then darn close. The upshot is that, despite the money, next year’s Red Sox outfield will likely be much different than this year’s version. There may even be room for Jackie Bradley!

Two paragraphs in now and I haven’t mentioned Bradley until the last sentence, but as you are now seeing, that trend is over! Bradley, the former first-round pick and forgotten member of the 2013 team is up and contributing, or at least playing. He even had a hit yesterday in the Red Sox’s bizarre route of Chris Sale and the White Sox. Bradley, a left-handed hitter, even even had a hit off of Chris Sale on an 0-2 count. In his career Sale has allowed a line of .151/.177/.201 after falling behind 0-2, while lefties have a .510 OPS against him. Bradley is hitting .121/.211/.212 this season, so he fits right in. The hit itself wasn’t a wonder or anything. Sale threw him a crappy slider that spun weakly across the center of the plate. He’s lucky he wasn’t facing David Ortiz when he threw that pitch or it would have ended up over the Monster and four runs would have scored instead of landing relatively harmlessly in front of the center fielder for an RBI single. That’s not to take anything away from Bradley. He’s not Ortiz and he shouldn’t try to be. He got a bad pitch and even on an 0-2 count when he was likely looking to be defensive he was able to deal with the change of speeds and line it back up the middle. That’s good!

It also illustrates the great thing about Bradley. To be effective, he doesn’t have to crush the ball like Ortiz, or Ramirez, or anyone else who crushes the ball. In fact, if he crushes the ball like Ryan Hanigan, he’ll be a perfectly good starting center fielder. His otherworldly defense at a premium position sees to that. Forget .500: Bradley doesn’t have to slug .400 or get on base at a .370 clip to be a worthwhile player. It wouldn’t hurt, but his bar is set lower. That’s partially why his inability to hit even remotely well in the majors has been so disappointing. It’s not like he had to hit well, he just had to not hit putridly.

Bradley just turned 25 years old. He’s still young. He’s still improving and he still has skills both in the field and at the plate.

Which brings us to today, right now. The Red Sox now have almost 60 games to spend on knowledge. They have almost 60 games wherein the outcome does not matter at all beyond individual performance in so far as it sets up the team for success next season. If Rick Porcello can find his sinker and Rusney Castillo can find some power and Hanley Ramirez can find the ball (he knows he had it here somewhere!) the 2016 Red Sox will be better off for it. While the team’s outfield depth was a pronounced failure this season, that doesn’t mean they won’t try to assemble similar outfield depth for 2016. A part of that depth will likely be Bradley, and this is why a simple line drive off the bat of the ninth place hitter brings me to my feet in a late July game weeks after the season was lost. The Red Sox’s best defensive alignment certainly does not include Hanley Ramirez, no matter what strides he makes over the next two plus months. Next season he may find himself at first, at DH, or still in left field, but don’t think for a second the Red Sox aren’t aware that their lineup problems are significantly lessened if Ramirez is not a part of the outfield.

An outfield without Hanley Ramirez opens up a spot though, right? Victorino and Nava are gone. Craig is off the 40 man roster and his power stroke is as off the roster as Victorino and Nava. That leaves Mookie Betts, who will have a spot somewhere. It leaves Castillo, who we will presumably learn more about over the next two months, but who looks like a candidate to play somewhere in the outfield come 2016. And it leaves … Jackie Bradley Jr.

The Red Sox minor league system may be highly rated, but one thing it does not offer is major league-ready outfielders. Bryce Brentz might carve out a major league career for himself, but it won’t likely be as a full-time starter. Manuel Margo is 20 years old, Andrew Benintendi is in Lowell, and that rounds out the outfielders among the Sox Prospects top 20. Some believe Garin Cecchini may yet hit, but even if so he’s hardly a strong prospect to start in the outfield. After that there is no Dana, only Zuul.

Bradley brings world-class defense to the table, something no other Red Sox prospect can offer, and he brings (still) a strong minor league track record. As recently as a few days ago, Bradley was hitting .305/.382/.472 in Triple-A. Pawtucket isn’t Boston but it’s also not meaningless. Bradley just turned 25 years old. He’s still young. He’s still improving and he still has skills both in the field and at the plate. Ramirez can’t field, Castillo might not be able to hit, and the rest of the cast has left the stage never to return. There might be a place on the Red Sox for Jackie Bradley after all.

That might not be such a bad thing, either. Bradley has certainly given new meaning to the term “struggling” in his time with Boston, but the fact that he’s succeeded in Pawtucket (he has an .816 OPS over parts of three season there) and everywhere else he’s played in the minors means he very likely has the skills to hit enough in Boston. Remember how he struggled in Triple-A after his long and failed stint as the starting center fielder last season? He turned that around this season and crushed Triple-A pitching.

Bradley doesn’t have to OPS .900 to succeed in Boston. His defense is good enough that an OPS in the low 700s will do the trick. The fact that he’s getting another opportunity to play in Boston this season may turn out to be a silver lining in the dark cloud that has been 2015. The Red Sox might have an opening in their major league outfield next season and they’ll be much better off both financially and defensively if that opening can be filled by Jackie Bradley. Shockingly, there’s a chance it might, which is more of a chance than just about anyone though possible in March. So I guess toss that on the top of the pile of weirdness that is the 2015 Red Sox season.

Photo by Brett Davis/USA Today Sports Images

Brock Holt

Let’s start with the obvious one. Holt is fresh off his improbable trip to the All-Star Game, and clearly isn’t going to be sitting on the bench. With that being said, it’s going to be a lot harder to find a consistent spot for him, though that may not be a bad thing. As we know, Holt’s value comes from being able to play all over the diamond while still playing on something close to an everyday basis. That’s easier said than done, though, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see him spend the majority of his time at a single position. First base is the favorite for that, but it’s dependent on Napoli’s start to the second half. More on that in a second. The other strong possibility is right field. Boston has gotten surprisingly solid contributions from the Alejandro De Aza/Shane Victorino platoon, but it wouldn’t shock anyone if that duo slows down and the team prefers Holt’s consistency.

Final Result: Mostly first base, with some right field and super utility work mixed in.

Mike Napoli

As mentioned above, the start to the second half is huge for Napoli’s spot on this team. The fact that they’ve gone this long with him is sort of amazing in it’s own way, but one has to imagine his leash is running short. They’ve already experimented with pulling David Ortiz out of his DH role to play some first, and now they have a natural replacement in Holt being freed up. The hope by most has been that Napoli would eventually start hitting well enough to build up some trade value, but eventually they need to give up on that hope. He’s already a one-year sunk cost, and it wouldn’t surprise me to see him designated for assignment if he doesn’t pick it up by the end of the month.

Final Result: Eventually DFA’d, clearing space for Brock Holt

Alejandro De Aza

There hasn’t been a bigger surprise during this recent flirtation with contention than De Aza, who was brought in merely as depth but instead is coming off one of the best Junes of any player in baseball. Now, none of us expect that production to keep up, but he still deserves to be playing until he proves he shouldn’t any more, especially against right-handed pitching. Once Napoli’s time in Boston ends, Holt will shift over to first base and stop cutting into De Aza’s playing time. The latter, in the mean time, can serve as a pinch runner/hitter and defensive replacement, especially in left field. He can also man left field on nights John Farrell opts to put Hanley Ramirez in as his designated hitter. Then, there’s the possibility of a trade, though the Red Sox would have to fall completely out of it, because De Aza isn’t the kind of chip that must be cashed in. Teams know who he is, and won’t give up a ton just because he had a good month.

Final Result: Backup outfield, eventually taking over right field when Napoli leaves

Shane Victorino

This is where we get to the outskirts of changes. As sat as it may be, Victorino is merely a part-time player now, and his role may not change too much with Pedroia’s return. He may see slightly less playing time against right-handed pitching, since the Red Sox can now turn to both Holt and De Aza in that situation, but that’s not a huge change.

Final Result: Not much changes, still the short-end of a right field platoon

Hanley Ramirez and David Ortiz

These last two names are more about speculation than what I anticipate being actual change. Many people will be calling for at least one of these guys to take over first base if/when Napoli is gone, with the other slotting in as the DH. To their credit, there is some strong rationale behind the idea. The move would open up an extra outfield spot to play both Holt and De Aza, and could open up a spot for Rusney Castillo and/or Jackie Bradley later in the year. However, it’s not a practical change. Ortiz can’t handle playing in the field on an everyday basis at his age, no matter how much you may want him to. Ramirez, meanwhile, likely wouldn’t be able to transition to first base as easily as some make it seem. It’s a legitimate consideration for next year, but it’s not a smart move to make the change in the middle of the current season.

Final Result: Keep the status quo

Pedroia’s return to the lineup is clearly a net positive for this team, but they’ll have some decision to makes as the second half begins. Players who had been playing every day will see their playing time drop, their position change, and some may even lose their job entirely. There are a lot of different roads John Farrell can go down, and there’s a chance the decision he makes could be the difference between contention and another lost year. In turn, that could be the difference between him staying on as manager next year and him looking for another job.

Photo by Bob DeChiara/USA Today Sports Images

Ben Cherington spent nearly $90 million to bring Hanley Ramirez’s bat to town, and after an astounding rise in 2014 and terrific spring, Mookie Betts had the look of a potential All-Star in center field. That didn’t even factor in Rusney Castillo and Shane Victorino, both of whom looked likely to be given opportunities in right. Add in Brock Holt, Daniel Nava, Jackie Bradley Jr. and Allen Craig, and many were wondering whether the Red Sox had too many outfielders for their own good.

That’s roughly the opposite of how everything turned out, of course. Despite plenty of depth on paper, Boston’s outfield production was woeful through the season’s first 10 weeks as the club sunk to the AL East basement. Hanley ranked as the game’s worst fielder, Mookie went through his first real slump, Victorino got hurt yet again and Castillo proved unready for every-day playing time. For a while, the squad’s outfield looked like an issue with few obvious solutions.

Then Alejandro De Aza happened.

On June 4, Cherington struck a trade with the Orioles for De Aza in a move that sparked more jabs at Boston’s expense than anything else. That Cherington surrendered a legitimate minor leaguer in Joe Gunkel and cash for De Aza, who Baltimore had designated for assignment, caused many observers to raise an eyebrow.

All De Aza has done since is hit. Through 91 plate appearances for the Red Sox, the eight-year veteran is batting .306/.352/.588 with three home runs and 13 extra-base hits. Over that period, De Aza has 12 multi-hit games, and his bat has certainly helped a scuffling Boston offense improve its performance since the beginning of June.

That De Aza, of all players, provided the Red Sox with a valuable spark just when the club’s fortunes looked hopeless is bizarre in the way only baseball can be. The 31-year-old entered 2015 with few career accolades, although he did post a .311 true average in 20 games for the Orioles down the stretch a year ago.

Still, the preseason projections weren’t exactly optimistic about his chances this season, with PECOTA forecasting De Aza to hit .263/.320/.384 in 2015. When he batted just .214/.277/.359 over 30 games for Baltimore to begin the campaign, De Aza looked unlikely to make a significant contribution for any team this season.

All of which makes his play for the Red Sox even more of a pleasant surprise. De Aza ranks fifth among Boston hitters with 1.1 WARP despite playing just 27 games for the team this season. Although that is partially a reflection of how poorly the rest of the roster has been, De Aza’s positive contributions can’t be denied.

Yet how much longer can we expect De Aza to sustain this level of performance? He certainly wouldn’t be the first player to exceed expectations over a 30-game sample, and PECOTA isn’t optimistic about how he’ll perform the rest of the season, projecting De Aza to hit .265/.324/.362. A simple look at his current .365 BABIP indicates De Aza has probably been the beneficiary of some good fortune on balls in play, though his career mark of .329 is better than you’d think.

But “better than you’d think” is a decent way to describe De Aza in general. With a career 101 OPS+, he’s long been an average hitter. And the Dominican Republic native has also been a solid fielder in the outfield for multiple seasons.

De Aza ranks fifth among Boston hitters with 1.1 WARP despite playing just 27 games for the team this season.

Indeed, De Aza’s arrival has coincided with vastly improved fielding in Boston’s outfield, with Hanley beginning to see more time at DH. That’s certainly been a big benefit to the club’s pitching staff and a key factor in the team’s recent run of success.

De Aza also hits right-handed pitching well, owning a .272/.335/.416 line versus righties throughout his career. His performance for the Orioles last season (and against for Boston in 2015) demonstrates he’s capable of getting hot for multiple weeks at a time.

No, we shouldn’t expect De Aza to continue playing at an All-Star level for the rest of the summer. However, that doesn’t mean he will stop providing value for the Red Sox. De Aza’s been a solid all-around player for a few years now, and he’s someone who can contribute to a ball club in multiple ways.

At a time when the Red Sox were suffering from multiple sub-replacement-level performers, De Aza has given the team the type of boost it sorely needed. For his part, Cherington deserves credit for acquiring a player who was probably a little undervalued after his poor start to the season. De Aza won’t continue to carry the Red Sox, but he gives them added roster flexibility and a solid option against right-handers.

In a season when nothing has gone as expected, maybe we shouldn’t be quite so surprised by how De Aza has played.

Photo by Greg M. Cooper/USA Today Sports Images

Top Play (WPA): This game’s three top plays are represented by Boston’s three homeruns: Pablo Sandoval’s solo shot in the second (.121), David Ortiz’s two-run blast in the fourth (.119) and Alejandro De Aza’s solo bomb in the second (.111). Hitting three homers against one of the game’s best pitchers is no small feat, and it was impressive to see Boston’s hitters capitalize on the few mistakes Archer made at several points.

Worst Play (WPA): There was no singular truly terrible moment for either team in this game. Steven Souza’s strikeout in the bottom of the eight (-.064) gets “top” honors here, but there were five additional plays all within .020 WARP. What’s interesting to note is that the bottom 17 — yes, 17 — plays all belonged to Tampa. That’s a bad day at the office.

Key Moment: The homers were great, and you can argue that Ortiz’s bomb deserves the nod here. But for my money, the key moment in this game came in the bottom of the eighth, when Deven Marrero made a very Dustin Pedroia-esque play to rob Brendan Guyer of a base hit that probably would’ve scored a run. Marrero’s bat clearly isn’t ready for the majors, per his MiLB numbers, but he’s lauded for his glove and here we got to see why. This is all the more impressive when you consider that Marrero has very little experience at the keystone.

Trend to Watch: Justin Masterson was … good? This certainly isn’t a “trend” yet, and the Rays don’t have a great offense, but Masterson struck out six in five innings, scattering five hits without giving up any free passes. Should we be optimistic this will continue? No. But for one night, at least, the much-maligned decision to replace Joe Kelly with Masterson and not Steven Wright or Brian Johnson looks quite justified.

Jerry Remy learning he pronounces things weird is also a key trend.

Last trend: I’m an idiot.

Available Sox SP, ranked: 1) Buch 2) #Ed 3) Porcello 4) Miley 5) Johnson 6) Wright 7) Brock Holt 8) Owens 9) You 10) Kelly Last) Masterson

— Ben Carsley (@BenCarsley) June 25, 2015

Coming Next: Boston heads up North to take on the Blue Jays in a four-game series that could go a long way toward determining if they buy or sell at the deadline. The Jays have a terrific offense and are, for my money, the scariest team in the division. If Boston takes three out of four, it’s entirely possible they’d “only” be seven or so games out of first. If they tie, lose the series or get swept, well, take a long last look at Mike Napoli, Shane Victorino and potentially Koji Uehara and Clay Buchholz.

The good news is Boston’s four best pitchers are toeing the rubber, and yes this is sarcastic.

Photo by Kim Klement/USA Today Sports Images

Top Play (WPA): The top two plays in the game were homers from each team in the fourth inning. Baltimore scored six times in the inning to end Eduardo Rodriguez’s day early, led by Matt Wieters’ two-run home run, which proved to be the top play by WPA (.219). Boston’s offense, which has been trending upwards recently, answered in the bottom of the inning with three runs of their own when Alejandro De Aza homered against his former team to drive in Pablo Sandoval and Mike Napoli (.149). However, the bullpen could not hold down Baltimore’s offense as the Red Sox attempted to come from behind. Mookie Betts and Xander Bogaerts plated two more runs in the seventh on a single and a double, respectively.

Bottom Play (WPA): The man who had Boston’s top play in the game also produced the bottom play against his former team. In the sixth inning with no outs and Napoli on first, De Aza grounded into a double play (-.089) to kill Boston’s hope for a big inning.

Key Moment: Wieters’ two-run home run in the top of the fourth and the ensuing offensive outburst by Baltimore knocked Rodriguez out of the game. The bullpen allowed just two more runs over the final 5 1/3 innings, but those runs proved to be the difference in the game.

Trends to Watch: Eduardo Rodriguez has now made six major league starts. In the first three, he looked invincible, allowing just one earned run over 20 2/3 innings while striking out 21. His fourth start was where he showed he’s still a young player learning how to pitch at the major league level, allowing nine runs to the Toronto Blue Jays. He followed that up with a solid 6 1/3 innings of one-run ball, before going just 3 2/3 on Thursday. This is to be expected with young players, especially considering his quick ascent and age of 22. He’s shown flashes of his potential so far, and although he doesn’t project to be an ace, he has the highest ceiling of any pitching prospect in the system and a bright future ahead of him.

Napoli broke up a streak of six strikeouts in a row in his first at-bat of the game with a bloop ground-rule double. He added another single in the fourth inning and scored two runs to raise his average just above the Mendoza line to .203. Napoli is known as a streaky hitter. Could this be the start of one of his hot streaks? Maybe, but that question has been asked many times already this season.

Jonathan Aro was called up from Pawtucket prior to the game, and was thrust into action right away due to Rodriguez’s early departure. He allowed four hits and one run while striking out two over his 1 1/3 innings of work. At this time last year, Aro was pitching in Low-A Greenville, but he has continued to excel and rocketed through the system. This season in 44 2/3 innings pitched split evenly between Portland and Pawtucket, he owns a 2.22 ERA with 49 strikeouts and just 11 walks. Even more impressively, he put up a ratio of 30 strikeouts to three walks after his promotion to the PawSox. While he doesn’t profile as a future closer-type, the 24-year-old looks like a nice bullpen piece with some late-inning upside.

Coming Next: The Red Sox head down to Florida for the start of a three-game weekend series against the division-leading Tampa Bay Rays tomorrow night.  The Rays are coming off a series loss to the Blue Jays, but still lead the New York Yankees by a game. If the Red Sox plan to mount any sort of a comeback this season, they need to win this series.

Photo by Greg M. Cooper/USA Today Sports Images 

As you probably know by now, the team started the season with an injured Castillo and, choosing an outfield rotation of Mookie Betts, Shane Victorino, Hanley Ramirez, Daniel Nava and Allen Craig, packed up Bradley and mailed him off to Rhode Island. In many ways this made sense: Bradley had options and he’d disappointed offensively in 2014. The team’s second-most talented young center fielder was named in far too many offseason trade rumors, but ultimately, the team stood pat on their depth.

Moving into June, things have happened, as things are wont to do. Allen Craig has been worse than anyone could have anticipated, and my father told me that he has been sent away to a farm upstate where he can run around and play. In the least surprising development since the sun rose this morning, Victorino got injured. Down two outfielders now, you’d think that the next logical move would be to call up Bradley along with Rusney. Alas, JBJ has only received six games and 13 plate appearances with the big club.

Somehow, Carlos Peguero showed up on the Red Sox roster instead of Bradley. Peguero, formerly of the Rangers, Royals and Mariners, can hit a little, but isn’t the backup center fielder that anyone wants. But after Peguero wasn’t cutting the mustard, the Red Sox went out and gave up a real, live prospect (Joe Gunkel) to get Alejandro De Aza.

De Aza’s a good outfielder, a solid major-league regular for the last few years. BP puts his career True Average at .266, which puts him close to league-average, and his defense is decidedly average. The question isn’t why a team would acquire De Aza — the question is why this Red Sox team would acquire De Aza when they already have a player like Jackie Bradley Jr.

Bradley hasn’t been a very good hitter in his time in the major leagues, but in Pawtucket this year, he’s positively raking. He’s got a .388 on-base percentage and a .486 slugging percentage, and while that’s due to regress a bit, one doesn’t have to squint to imagine a world where he’s an okay hitter in the majors. Bradley’s defense is world-class, so even if he doesn’t hit the way the team might like, he could still be as good overall as a player like Alejandro De Aza.

To me, the question is why. Why did the team go out and acquire another outfielder when they had a perfectly good one waiting in the wings? I’d like to review a couple of possibilities:

The Red Sox Do Not Believe in Jackie Bradley Junior

This is the worst, most reactionary reason why the Red Sox haven’t brought Bradley to bear. If the Red Sox didn’t believe in Bradley, the team would’ve shipped him off to another team long ago. They would have never called him up in the first place, or traded him for pennies on the dollar to one of the dozens of teams who could use a premium defensive outfielder. This is a talk-radio reason, and not worthy of a big league front office that makes rational decisions.

The Red Sox are Showcasing Bradley for a Trade

Photo by Kim Klement/USA Today Sports Images

While possible, I think we’ve come to the point where front offices aren’t going to be confused or convinced by a very short-term, small-sample performance when trading for players. While it is possible that Jackie Bradley’s long-term value to the Red Sox will come as part of a trade package, it seems unlikely that the team would hold him down in Pawtucket, where he’s succeeding, so that he doesn’t embarrass himself at Fenway and diminish his value.

General managers just don’t think that way anymore. I think. Front offices are way smarter than we give them credit for, and we give them plenty of credit.

The Red Sox Prefer Offense to Defense in the Outfield

Anyone who’s seen Hanley Ramirez play left field can attest that this might be the case. Perhaps the Red Sox want to improve the team’s offense more than the team’s defense, and perhaps they figure the best way to do that is to add the “safer” bat of De Aza. And make no mistake, De Aza’s bat is a safer bet.

Last year, JBJ was a terror at the plate of Freddy Kruger-ian proportions. He hit for no power, struck out constantly, but also failed to reach base a lot. In the minors, Bradley has been a good bet for on-base percentage, but the risk present in his bat is real. But without a doubt, the thing that makes Bradley a valuable big-league contributor is his glove. It’s not just good, it’s great. All the major defensive metrics peg him as a win or two in pure defensive value, even in just two-thirds of a season last year.

On the other side, De Aza’s other skills vacillate, but his bat has been steady. His defensive and baserunning numbers shift from year to year … but those numbers are often seen as less reliable than offense. Whereas Bradley is a question mark on offense — a question mark that may lean towards below-average — the Sox can rely on De Aza to provide unsexy but effective numbers in the lineup. Maybe that’s just their preference at this point?

Jackie Bradley Jr. is Better Served By Having Regular Plate Appearances

Player development is a very real thing, though it’s often overlooked in sabermetric circles. While I personally couldn’t identify what it is that Bradley Jr. still needs to improve upon, the Red Sox player development staff may have something in mind. And one thing I do know, from my background as an instructional designer, is that it will be a heck of a lot easier to improve at a given skill with regular, applicable practice, versus intermittent practice.

If Bradley did come up to the big league team, it would be hard for him to get regular playing time when the struggling Betts and Castillo need the same. Add in Hanley to the outfield calculus, and Bradley might not be receiving regular starts even before accounting for the other “regulars” on the bench. It’s perfectly reasonable to think that Bradley will continue to improve at Pawtucket with regular playing time, versus languishing on the big league bench. It’s a judgment call, but a fair one in my view.

The Red Sox Believe that Alejandro De Aza is a Better Baseball Player Today

This may actually be the reason that speaks loudest. De Aza is a pretty steady commodity, as far as available outfielders go. His year-to-year numbers have been roughly consistent: a healthy mix of batted ball ability and double-digit homer power makes him just dangerous enough as a corner outfielder. He’s an average baserunner and defender … he’s basically the picture of a second-division starter in a corner outfield spot.

Jackie Bradley, for all his defensive wizardry, may rely just a bit too much of defense to make the case for a comparable WARP to De Aza overall. If you’re not too confident in Bradley’s defensive numbers, and you’re worried that he won’t hit well enough to carry the day, it makes sense to think that De Aza is simply the better outfielder over the course of the season.

Maybe when we get down to it, choosing De Aza over Bradley is less about Bradley, and more about De Aza. Unlike Peguero (sorry, buddy), De Aza is a real, serviceable starting outfielder this year. Perhaps we need to think of it this way: Bradley isn’t necessarily being held down, it’s De Aza who’s rightfully being held up. Bradley may still be part of the plan, but there’s no shame in going with someone who’s closer to a sure thing.

Top photo by Gregory Fisher/USA Today Sports Images

So let’s do this quickly: Gunkel is a pitching prospect. The Red Sox picked him in the 13th round of the 2013 draft and he doesn’t throw hard so now you know what you need to know about Joe Gunkel. The thing of it is, I love prospects like Gunkel. He gets outs. He commands the strike zone. Those are skills I believe are under-rated amongst the scouting set. Compare Gunkel to Trey Ball and Ty Buttrey, two high-bonus high-round pitchers the Red Sox drafted in recent years now struggling in the low minors while Gunkel is having success in Double-A.

But if he does end up with a moderately valuable major league career it won’t be with the Red Sox. Gunkel was traded to Baltimore Wednesday for Alejandro De Aza, an outfielder with some power and… well, that’s really about it. De Aza is a depth piece, someone acquired in season when the back end of your roster isn’t good enough, isn’t major league quality. And that’s what makes it so odd. This deal is an indictment of the depth on the Red Sox roster.

It’s strange because at the beginning of the season Boston’s depth was one of the great things about the club’s roster. Recall during the off-season people saying, “What are they going to do with all those outfielders? They have too many! They’ll have to trade some of them for sure!” And now not only have they not traded any, they’ve traded for another one!

At the beginning of the season the Red Sox outfield consisted of Hanley Ramirez, Mookie Betts, Shane Victorino, Daniel Nava, Allen Craig, and Rusney Castillo, six guys with a case for starting (not to mention Jackie Bradley Jr.). But two months into the season, they’ve all fallen apart. Ramirez has hit but his defense has been so bad he’s tossed all that value right back where it came from. Betts has struggled in his first full season in the majors, though his defense has been good for the most part. Victorino has been in and out of the lineup and played decently while healthy. Nava has been bad and is now hurt. Allen Craig has been worse and is now in Triple-A. Castillo has been an adventure in the outfield, alternatively making great plays and head-scratching ones. Oh, and he hasn’t hit, either. Out of six possible good hitters the team has one. Out of six possible good defenders the team has one or two. Victorino, Craig, and Nava have been complete zeroes. How can you construct a productive outfield out of that? Answer: you can’t!

At the beginning of the season Boston’s depth was one of the great things about the club’s roster.

In the infield, Mike Napoli spent the better part of two months not hitting at all, but there was nobody to step in for him because Ortiz can’t play first base and Nava can’t hit. The recent struggles of Pablo Sandoval have highlighted the one depth player who has played well: Brock Holt. Holt has played every position except pitcher and catcher this season and done it all with acceptable defense. He’s not hit exceptionally, well but then if he could hit exceptionally well he wouldn’t be a depth player. There is no room to complain about Brock Holt’s performance except for this one thing: he can only play one position at a time.

Then we get to catcher. It’s difficult to kill the team for this because how do you predict a 23-year-old catcher to miss the season due to Tommy John surgery? Losing Ryan Hanigan was a bit more predictable considering his history and age, even if the injury itself was fluky. Both of those injuries lead to the acquisition of Sandy Leon, who is clearly stretched as a co-starting catcher but because Boston’s other catcher is now 23-year-old Blake Swihart, that’s the role he’s having to fill. The Red Sox aren’t last in offensive production from catchers but they are 26th.

The Red Sox have failed spectacularly so far this season and a large portion of that is because of previous reliable players like Sandoval, Napoli, Ortiz, and the like. But some portion of that has been because the team didn’t have anyone save Holt to step in and play adequately while the stars were hurt or finding themselves. The team’s plans for Nava and Craig, two infield/outfield types slated for the bench, fell flat because neither hit a lick. Nava is the owner of a .440 OPS this season while Craig’s is .430. Perhaps it’s not surprising the Red Sox are dead last in offensive production from right fielders. Even the Phillies’ right fielders have been better and their right fielder is Jeff Francoeur, who was trying to make it as a pitcher in Triple-A last season.

So who is at fault here? There must be someone. We knew Allen Craig couldn’t hit, right? Except the guy was an All Star a few seasons ago. Well how about Nava? He was a late bloomer so we should have expected him to fall off the cliff. But he put up a 101 OPS+ last season while playing both outfield corners and first base. The difficult part is that the logic is not difficult to follow. If the Red Sox had signed Edinson Volquez to a two year, $20 million and he’d blown up we could easily say “I told ya so!” and be right, but here that’s not the case. That isn’t to say the team’s move can’t be questioned. Clearly they should be, if for no other reason than the results have been putrid. Just that many of the individual moves that haven’t worked out made sense at the time.

Ultimately the team’s depth has failed it as much as their starters, but we’re not at the stage in the evolution of baseball where building the best bench is a cogent strategy for winning. The best benches don’t win. The best starters do. And now we get De Aza. Maybe he’s lightning in a bottle the way that Craig and Nava weren’t, but likely he’s not. Likely he’s just Alejandro De Aza, slightly supped up Carlos Peguero, and if I had to guess, he’ll end up on the scrap heap before the season is out. It’s such a waste of Joe Gunkel, and all because of the failure of depth.

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