Top Play (WPA): Old friend Daniel Nava (he’ll always be our friend) broke open a scoreless tie with an RBI single off Porcello with two outs in the seventh inning (0.192). If you thought this season’s misery was over, add a crucial hit for Nava against the Red Sox to the list of things that want to make you hurl. Nava’s heroics for the Rays might have hurt more if you couldn’t see them coming from a mile away:

Daniel Nava is going to drive in the winning run, isn’t he?

— Ben Carsley (@BenCarsley) September 24, 2015

Bottom Play (WPA): After Nava’s go-ahead single, the Red Sox put the first two runners on in the bottom of the seventh inning but couldn’t scratch across the tying run. With two outs and runners at second and third, Dustin Pedroia grounded out to shortstop to end the potential rally (-.131). On a night when the Red Sox’s bats struggled, they had few chances, and their inability to cash in here proved costly.

Key Moment: Perhaps an even bigger moment took place earlier in the inning when the Red Sox had runners at first and second with nobody out. Following a leadoff walk by Blake Swihart and a single from Deven Marrero, Jackie Bradley Jr. smashed a ball into the left-center field gap that had double written all over it. Instead, Nava tracked the ball down and made a nice play just in front of the monster to foil Boston again. Nava’s catch was the first out of the inning and, crucially, kept the runners at first and second before the Rays escaped unscathed.

Trends to Watch: Rick Porcello’s final line — seven innings pitched, 11 hits, three runs, eight strikeouts and one walk — doesn’t look all that spectacular, but this outing represented further progress for the right-hander. Porcello induced seven groundballs and struck out more than a batter an inning. His strikeout-to-walk ratio since returning from the DL now sits at 55 to 13. His groundball rate over that time span is a healthy 53.7%, according to the Providence Journal’s Tim Britton. Just one of the 11 hits Porcello allowed went for extra bases, and he was as much a victim of poor fortune as anything else at times. It hasn’t been an easy first season in Boston, but Porcello has something to build on here.

Deven Marrero looked sharp at third base yet again, making some stellar plays to provide further proof of his ability to flash the leather. He’s not going to suddenly earn himself a starting spot for the Red Sox next season, but he could be forcing himself into the picture as a bench option and injury replacement. Marrero’s versatility in the field is an asset Boston can lean on when need be.

Mookie Betts went 3-for-5 with a stolen base and even hit the ball hard when making an out. He’s now reached base safely in 26 straight games and is batting .314/.357/.480 in the second half. He is 22 years old. We are not worthy.

Coming next: The Red Sox close out their four-game series with the Rays on Thursday night at Fenway. Wade Miley will get the start and look to continue a solid second half that’s seen him post a 3.31 FIP, 20.6% strikeout rate and 6.6% walk rate. Tampa Bay will hand the ball to a rejuvenated Erasmo Ramirez, who is coming off back-to-back strong outings against the Orioles and Yankees.

Photo by 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

Part of that re-tooling includes free agents and trades, sure … but also decisions on arbitration-eligible players. Every offseason, teams make tough arb decisions. Tender or non-tender? Go to arb court or settle before things get too testy (a tried and true Red Sox tradition)? Go year-to-year or try for a longer-term extension?

Fortunately for the Sox, this coming offseason isn’t going to posit a host of mission-critical arbitration decisions. As of this writing, the team only has six players for whom they’ll need to consider arbitration. The Sox’s long-terms commitments are a mix of really young pre-arb guys (your Mookie Betts/Xander Bogaerts/Eduardo Rodriguez types), and guys with big ol’ contracts like Dustin Pedroia, Hanley Ramirez and Rick Porcello.

No, the Red Sox’s arbitration cases will determine some roster spots on the fringes, primarily in the team’s bullpen. That’s hardly a major concern. And, of course, there’s a slight chance that one or more of these players could be gone in the next few weeks. Let’s take a look:

We’ll start with the most important player from this group — setup ace Junichi Tazawa. Tazawa’s going into his final year of arbitration, and his performance this year harkens back to his stellar run in 2012. While Tazawa isn’t a lockdown setup guy in the Wade Davis mold, he is quite consistent, and more than capable of striking out a batter per nine.

There’s no question Tazawa would have a contract tendered were he to make it to this coming offseason in a Sox uniform. The bigger question is just that — will the Sox deal him for another piece at the deadline? My gut says no, because he’s a solid contributor, and even though he’s reaching his final round of arbitration I’m not so sure he’s due for a powerful raise. Arbitrators tend to look at “traditional” stats … and for relievers, saves are still king. While Tazawa’s strikeout rate and WHIP are good, I’d imagine he’s in for a raise that would max him out near $3.5 million or so if the team and Tazawa agree to terms and avoid a hearing.

 With all that in mind, Tazawa’s a pretty useful piece for a more-than-fair contract, even through arbitration. I’d guess that Boston keeps him, wrings him dry before free agency, and then sweats a real decision on whether to try to retain him after 2016.

Daniel Nava looked like a steal coming into 2015 at a measly $1.85 million, but after a stinker of a performance this season, there could actually be an argument to dump him via non-tender and cut bait. I mean, his .192 True Average is really, really awful … even for the Sox. He wouldn’t make the Mets lineup at this point. (Just kidding, he’d be batting cleanup for the Mets or the Phillies.)

And yet … he’s another guy where I think that if he remains with the team — and I don’t think the Sox are trading him — the Red Sox will look to retain him through arbitration. Nava’s not exactly covering himself in glory this season, but it isn’t making him any more expensive either. The arbitrator probably won’t see 20-30 career homers and downright-awful 2015 performance and think “let’s give this guy a huge raise.” Nava might see a slight bump, maybe something around $2 million, and the Sox could probably still use a guy at that low of a cost. At least so long as he can get halfway back to his pre-2015-apocalypse performance.

Make all the jokes you want about Joe Kelly’s dumb-ass Cy Young prediction, but he hasn’t been a complete mess. Yes, he’s given up a boatload of runs, but his FIP (4.11) showed there was room for improvement. His future in the big leagues may be in the bullpen, but any workable starter is worth a couple million dollars per year.

Kelly is jumping up from the minimum salary into his first arbitration-eligible season, and he’s doing it with an ERA that keeps climbing and no more than two dozen wins. If Ivan Nova took home about $3.3 million last year, I think Kelly could be worth about that much coming into 2016. Do the Sox want to spend that kind of money on Joe Kelly? I’m guessing that even if Brian Johnson is the next big thing, the team could really use that kind of depth, and that they wouldn’t want to cut bait on Kelly just yet.

So, after going three-for-three on these gents, the next three arbitration cases are all relatively insignificant bullpen pieces: Alexi Ogando, Robbie Ross, and Varvaro. Ogando is a third-year arbitration-eligible guy, so he’d be the most expensive of the bunch. While I thought he could be a dynamite part of a strong bullpen, his home run issues (eight in 40+ innings) have robbed him of almost any positive value. If he’s going to earn a big raise — and he might since he’s had a nice little run of success early in his career — it may not be worth it for the team to hold him at $2 million and change.

Ross and Varvaro are, well, a nice matching pair. They both are making close to the minimum, and they’re both hovering around replacement level. Ross probably has the better pedigree, with two strong seasons in relief before stumbling in the rotation last year, and he’d be the guy I’d want to hold of the two. But I’d imagine neither are going to earn much more than a million in arbitration, and have take-it-or-leave-it written all over them. They’re more fungible than not.

So, in the end, arbitration may not be the big deal for the Sox that it can be for other teams, but the team may swing four-to-six reasonably priced players out of the process. Sure, they’d be a setup guy, a 25th-man on the bench, a backup starter and some back-of-the bullpen options, but no one is going to command a king’s ransom. The game can be won at the margins, and these marginal guys could turn out to be a terrific value at a low risk.

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We’ll start with what we have. Mike Napoli’s brutal start to the season seemed to conclude in mid-May with an equally brutal stomping of the Rangers, followed by a personal takedown of the Angels. Napoli took the opportunity to resuscitate his season against his previous employers, hitting .429/.500/1.190 in six games against them. That last number is not his OPS, it’s his slugging percentage. It looked like the Napoli of 2013 was back, and the Napoli of 2011 was taking occasional ABs too.

But then the Angels and Rangers left town and the good versions of  Napoli left with them. Since those series, Napoli has hit .193/.299/.303: bad for a glove-first utility infielder, horrendous for a slugging first baseman. But it gets worse. Don’t count those six games against Texas and Anaheim, which you can’t do, but which I’m doing anyway, and Napoli is hitting .177/.284/.292 on the season. That last number is his slugging percentage, not the number of fans willing to pay his way out of town on any given night.

Despite the lack of production, it’s hard to say Napoli’s skills are gone forever, especially while remembering what he did to Anaheim and Texas. But it’s equally difficult to imagine a contending team carrying a first baseman with a .670 OPS who, to date, has been roughly replacement level depending on the WARP-like metric you choose. I don’t know the Red Sox’s plans of course, but as they struggle to get back into the overly forgiving AL East race, one would think the date for Napoli to either snap out of it or lose his job is fast approaching.

As the Red Sox struggle to get back into the overly forgiving AL East race, one would think the date for Napoli to either snap out of it or lose his job is fast approaching.

If he does snap to and OPS .800 the rest of the season, then great. His season numbers will still look bad and it’s tough to imagine the Red Sox re-signing him at this point, but at least they’ll have received something for their money and patience. But if he doesn’t? The Red Sox are rather limited in that eventuality. They could play Brock Holt there, but that seems a waste of the multi-positional talents of \o/. They could move Hanley Ramirez there, but that seems more like an idea than something that could actually happen, like quarks, time travel, or peanut butter with bacon in the same jar. They could move Sandoval to first, but now we’re creating long term problems that don’t really solve short term ones.

The most likely player to replace Napoli as the Red Sox’s starting first baseman this season isn’t on the 40 man roster. That’s Allen Craig. Currently in Triple-A, Craig is getting on base at an over .400 clip, but with just nine extra base hits in 177 plate appearances, the power that marked his time in St. Louis appears to be gone. If Napoli continues to scuffle Craig may get another shot in Boston anyway, but even so, he hasn’t done much to date to push his way back into the Red Sox long-term picture at first base.

The same can be said about Daniel Nava, who began a rehab assignment just last night but faces an uphill climb to reemerge on this roster thanks to Alejandro De Aza.

Photo by Kelly O’Connor, www.sittingstill.smugmug.com

Beyond that, they have Triple-A first baseman Travis Shaw who would likely be stretched as a major league regular given he’s slugging .373 in Pawtucket. And that’s kind of the heart of the problem. There isn’t really anyone else. Shaw is 25 and it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen for him, at least in terms of becoming a major league regular. Sam Travis just moved up to Double-A Portland and he has some promise, but he’s not going to fix the first base problem for the 2015 Red Sox. There’s a chance Travis could end up as a major league first baseman down the line, but that’s not happening this season or, very likely, next either. The system has some hitters further down, but nobody who is ready to make the jump to the majors and help at first base.

As for trade market, it’s difficult to imagine the Red Sox front office going in deep on this team right now, though things could change in the next couple weeks should they go on an honest-to-goodness winning streak. Conceivably the Brewers could make Adam Lind available. Lind is having another nice season at the plate and has another option year left under his contract. Beyond him the most intriguing free-agent-to-be is probably Chris Davis of the Orioles, and as long as Baltimore is close to first place, that would seem unlikely. Davis will be a free agent after this season, but he’ll likely cost more than Boston will want to spend in dollars and years. Even looking two years into the future, the market only offers Edwin Encarnacion, Pedro Alvarez, Justin Morneau, and *gasp* Mark Teixeira. How crazy would that be?

Perhaps the Red Sox could make a blockbuster move and acquire someone we don’t currently think is available, like a Joey Votto or Paul Goldschmidt. Votto is having a fine season but there’s no way the Red Sox want to be paying him through 2023, and asking about Goldschmidt is just asking to have your ear rung after whomever answers the phone in Arizona slams it down upon first hearing the word “gold.”

As for this season, I like the idea of acquiring Lind, but you have to think so will other teams so the price may be steep. Still, if Napoli hasn’t turned it around and Boston is in it at the deadline, acquiring a first baseman who slugs .500, gets on base, and with one more season under contract at $8 million could go a long way towards fixing first base both this season and next.

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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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Top Play (WPA): Perhaps surprisingly, the Red Sox recorded the top two plays by WPA — a fourth inning double by Dustin Pedroia (+.120), which set Boston up with runners on the corners and no outs, and a ninth inning leadoff double by David Ortiz (+.105).

Mitch Moreland provided much of the offense for the Rangers, homering over the Monster in the fourth inning (+.090) and — less menacingly — grounding out to second with the bases loaded in the first (+.076), a play which, thanks to Xander Bogaerts’ error (on a double-play-transfer attempt) and Delino DeShields’ combination of foot speed and smart base running, led to two runs.

Bottom Play (WPA): Less surprisingly, the Red Sox claimed the five biggest negative WPA plays (and nine of the bottom 10) last night, led by Hanley Ramirez’s fourth inning dribbler back to the pitcher that ended with Pedroia, who was on third, out at the plate (-.085). That’s the closest the Red Sox would come to adding a second run.

Key Moment: In the fifth inning, the Red Sox looked like they were putting together a rally against Koufax Rodriguez. With one out, Bogaerts drew a walk and then, with Daniel Nava at the plate, the Red Sox executed a perfect hit-and-run, as Nava grounded one through the vacated hole at second, setting Boston up with runners on first and third. Of course, when things are going bad, sometimes they go really bad. Turned out the ball clanked off an unsuspecting Bogaerts on his way to second, leaving the Red Sox in a less favorable situation: a runner on first and Sandy Leon at the dish. They didn’t score.

Trends to Watch: Good Buchholz, Bad Buchholz — meet In-Between Buchholz. The Red Sox’ righty wasn’t great, but he certainly wasn’t bad, pitching into the eighth inning while surrendering three runs (two earned), striking out four, and walking two. Don’t look now, but that’s three straight quality starts for Buchholz, a feat he’s only accomplished one other time since the start of the 2014 season. It’s encouraging to see the up-and-down could-be ace, who still has plenty of potential, fight through a start that could have got away from him early, even if allowing a two-spot in the first looks like a mountain this offense isn’t currently equipped to climb.

Then there’s this:

10th straight time Sox have scored two or fewer earned runs against a lefthanded starter, a run that stretches to 4/20/15.

— Alex Speier (@alexspeier) May 22, 2015

That stretch features some good lefties, like Drew Smyly and C.C. Sabathia, but also a number of less inspiring hurlers. Here’s the list, which includes each pitcher’s PECOTA-projected ERA:

What’s somewhat befuddling about the struggles against lefties is that the Red Sox don’t have an extreme lefty-swinging offense. Sure, there’s Ortiz (and he’s struggled mightily vs. lefties) and Sandoval is far superior against righties, but most of the lineup — Mookie Betts, Pedroia, Ramirez, Mike Napoli, Bogaerts, etc. — bats from the right side. Those righties, however, haven’t taken advantage of the platoon advantage, hitting just .206/.310/.361 against lefties this season. And the lefties (mostly Ortiz), well, they’ve really struggled versus same-handed pitching, posting a cringe-worthy .446 OPS. The good news: those are both small samples, and there’s no reason why the Sox shouldn’t improve against left handers as the season progresses.

Coming Next: Speaking of lefties, Boston will face a pair this weekend (C.J. Wilson and Hector Santiago), with the Angels set to visit Fenway for a three-game set. On Friday night, however, it’s an all right-handed affair, as Rick Porcello faces off against Garrett Richards. Hopefully the Red Sox are able to find their offensive stride against the Angels before they head out for a seven-game road trip to Minnesota and Texas.

Photo by Winslow Townson/USA Today Sports Images

By now we should all know Nava’s amazing background story, but hearing about it never gets old so I’ll go through the Cliff Notes. He started out as an equipment manager for the Santa Clara team, left to become a junior college All-American, then went back to play for Santa Clara. After going undrafted, he signed to play Independent League ball and was eventually noticed by the Red Sox. This is when the team famously bought him from his Independent League team for a single dollar.

Nava was a borderline All-Star in 2013, hitting .303/.385/.445 with a .309 TAv over 536 plate appearances.

That was back in 2007, and the now-32-year-old has amazingly stuck with the organization for this long. In fact, he’s turned into one of the more quietly productive hitters in all of baseball. He really put himself on the map in 2013 when he formed a platoon with Jonny Gomes that wound up being one of the most productive left fields in all of baseball. Nava was a borderline All-Star that year and finished the season hitting .303/.385/.445 with a .309 TAv over 536 plate appearances. He fell off a bit from that pace in 2014, but he still managed a highly respectable .271 TAv in 408 trips to the plate.

An underrated fact about Daniel Nava is that he’s adorable.

What’s been clear as Nava has matured as a hitter has been his obvious superiority against right-handed pitching. Though he’s been a switch-hitter for most of his career, he’s excelled against righties while putting up middling performances against southpaws. To wit, he’s posted a .305 TAv versus the former while struggling to a .206 mark versus lefties. Although he’s been able to keep his excellent walk-rate steady with left-handed arms on the mound, he strikes out much more in those situations and also loses his respectable, if unspectacular power. While he ISOs .136 versus righties, that number falls all the way down to .088 against lefties.

These clear platoon splits bring us back to the discussion from the beginning of this post. Nava’s ability to hit right-handed pitching is something that will turn out to be very valuable on this team, and is why his name wasn’t thrown around in trade speculation nearly as much as Victorino’s or Craig’s. With the new additions in Pablo Sandoval and Ramirez, the Red Sox suddenly became a very right-handed-heavy lineup. It’s not the end of the world considering right-handed hitters typically have less severe platoon splits than their left-handed counterparts. With that being said, it’s still something that opposing teams can take advantage of.

Nava’s ability to hit right-handed pitching is something that will turn out to be very valuable on this team, and is why his name wasn’t thrown around in trade speculation nearly as much as Victorino’s or Craig’s.

Nava carries tremendous value in this respect. Until Castillo is ready to come up and help the major-league club, it’s clear that Victorino will be getting the majority of the playing time in right field. While he still has the ability to be a valuable all-around player, he’s also been something of a Bizarro World Daniel Nava. Spending most of his career as a switch-hitter, he’s been demonstrably worse against right-handed pitching. For his career, he’s put up a .264 TAv against righties compared to a .311 TAv. Though Victorino’s defense and base-running advantage probably makes a straight platoon unlikely, Nava could and perhaps should get  a significant number of starts against right-handed pitchers, especially in games away from Fenway. Even when Castillo does come to Boston, it would make a lot of sense for the Red Sox to ease him into the majors. Part of that means sitting him against the tough right-handed pitching against whom Nava excels.

Nava started the year on the periphery of the roster, expected to be mostly a pinch hitter with some token starts when the starters need some rest. Based on early season trends, it looks like he’ll be playing a lot more than that. It’s something that makes a lot of sense with the construction of the roster, too. He’ll never be the flashiest of players on the field, but he’s proven he can be a productive member of a great offense, especially against right-handed pitching. He’s not going to be the most heralded member of this team, but Nava could quietly be one of the keys to this offense being able to compete regardless of who is on the mound.

Photo by Kelly O’Connor, sittingstill.smugmug.com